[Sia](https://sia.tech) is a new approach to cloud storage platforms. Instead of all datacenters being owned and operated by a single company, Sia opens the floodgates and allows anyone to make money by renting out their hard drive. Data integrity is protected using redundancy and cryptography.

In this post, I'll go through the steps to using the Sia wallet to upload a file.

## 1. Download the Sia UI from http://sia.tech/apps/#ui

Synchronizing the UI will probably take a day or two. 

![Sia1.png](https://steemitimages.com/DQmb9ukxfFvDd1fpm8f5xi8L6KbsWLryNz5D4yuCLXjswyR/Sia1.png)

## 2. Setup your wallet

This step is really important. The wallet generates a **Seed** and a **Password**. Keep it safe somewhere. 

Setting up a wallet will also allow to recieve Siacoins.

![Sia2.png](https://steemitimages.com/DQmZFoH11Wc26QJSWKb9ss99DFX9UVYn5oWApr8ohDaQAUq/Sia2.png)

## 3. Accquire Siacoin

The easiest way would be to buy BTC and exchange them for Siacoins on exchanges like Poloniex. Here I'm transferring some from my Poloniex.

![Sia3.png](https://steemitimages.com/DQmPeMS5afydaPTjFU79FsVr8aYMtPUv5sHoutNnPtQgJtt/Sia3.png)

![Sia4.png](https://steemitimages.com/DQmakY6miCiCvcve2NnsoAubDoFkv7tcLjVR7RwN41qw5TP/Sia4.png)

## 4. Let's upload a file - Prepatory stage

Before we can upload anything, we'll need to create an allowance.

With **500** SC, I could allocate **2 Terabytes** (TB) for storage.

![Sia5.png](https://steemitimages.com/DQmZaYN7rcs2bkZhMqQRbeuM7uC4kB66zGTGRv9PDdbkB65/Sia5.png)

The first attempt to create an allowance failed due to issues in the software. The UI crashed and as a result I lost about 15 Siacoins.

![Sia6.png](https://steemitimages.com/DQmejyFavtCh5LRPiuh7uoCEADx3VbQgtbatQUByK9jx7us/Sia6.png)

The second attempt was successful, but took around **45** minutes.

![Sia7.png](https://steemitimages.com/DQmQNbDTPWKMHSsnQzU8x9DJUBZm8T7BePwDvPdgRTYTXLD/Sia7.png)

## 5. Let's upload a file - this time fo real

I uploaded an image file that I had on my hard drive.

![Sia8.png](https://steemitimages.com/DQmbeRMA9eNRsL1TMGtJVusEr8XWieLiGm2uiio5fKoNvu7/Sia8.png)

The upload didn't get through because the network couldn't find nodes to upload to.

# Conclusion

Sia's goal of being a competitor to Dropbox and Google Drive is highly ambitious. The UI is buggy and requires cumbersome steps before one can start uploading files. It's definitely not ready for primetime action. 

That being said, It's impressive they've got a working product. I'm quite certain that the future releases will make things much smoother. Getting there!!

Thanks for reading !! 

Follow [@lexsapktoa](https://steemit.com/@lexsapkota) for more crypto related stuff.