Help! How Do I Email a Large File To My Friend?

How to share a large file with your friend.

Oy! Have you ever tried to email a large picture or file to a friend, only to have it come back rejected with an error message, or worse, have it crash your computer?

Is there a large file that you want to share with someone, but don't have a way to transfer to them?

Well fret no more. If you have a computer and an internet connection, you can share any (legal) files with your friends. You don't need to download anything, sign up for anything, or pay for anything (unless you want to make a donatation), and it's really easy to use.

The trouble with sending big files through email is that most Internet Service Providers (e.g. AOL, MSN, Comcast, Adelphia, Earthlink, etc.) restrict the size of files that you can send with email. Typically, you can send a file up to 5MB. Anything over that will choke your email.

A great simple way to get around this size limitation is to use a free website called MyTempDir.com. All you do is upload your file to the website, and it will give you a link to your file. Then you just email the link to your friend and they can download the file from the MyTempDir website. Free and easy as 123.

The only things to keep in mind is that there is a 25MB limit to the size of the files and there is no guarantee that your file is safe from others. Since it's possible for other people to access your file, NEVER upload a confidential or file with sensitive information.

Files are kept for 14 days then automatically deleted. You can delete it faster if you enter your email address when uploading your file, as MyTempDir will send you a link to delete the file. The nice thing is that there is no limit to the number of files that you can upload.

Other Options

If you have a large video or other file that you want to share, you can also try a website called www.streamload.com. They have a basic free account that lets you share up to 100MB of files per month. Other plans start at $4.95 per month and allow you unlimited storage space and allow up to 1GB of downloads/transfers per month.

Jusspress.com lets you share up to ten 2 minute long videos with your friends with their free account, and unlimited amounts for $5 per month.

So, the next time you think about emailing someone a huge file - don't. Upload it to MyTempDir.com or one of the other free file transfer websites.

Happy file/picture sharing :)