Need to see if your shared folder is taking up space on your dropbox 👨‍💻? Find out how to check here.

Forum Discussion

codydee12's avatar
codydee12
New member | Level 2
7 years ago
Solved

When I download files to my computer, the sound becomes corrupted?

Hey, I am on a MacBook Pro running macOS Mojave. I have audio files shared with me that sound uncorrupted when listedned to via the dropbox.com When I download the files to my mac via driect download...
Download
Share
Third Party Integrations
  • Rich's avatar
    Rich
    7 years ago

    I doubt they becoming corrupted. LIkely a problem with the audio player you're using, especially if you're getting the same result in multiple browsers.

    Try a different audiop player.

Walter's avatar
Walter
Icon for Dropbox Community Moderator rankDropbox Community Moderator
6 years ago

Hi rs70; thanks for joining the discussion here.

 

Based on your description, it sounds like the 3rd party app you're using (Pro tools) is somehow corrupting the files in question, since when you re-visit them on our website they show as corrupted too. 

 

Just to make sure if that's the case or something else that's happening, could you take a look at the file's version history to see if there are multiple versions of the file and/or if an older one works as expected? 

 

Also, were you indeed able to preview those files on our website before accessing them from Pro Tools? 

 

Let us know what you find!

Skywatcher's avatar
Skywatcher
Helpful | Level 5
5 years ago

Hi Walter,

 

So I disagree and here is the reason. Yesterday I was working on a Pro Tools session. I had all my files on Dropbox. Mid session a bunch files became corrupted. Pro Tools does not write to the audio files, everything is non destructive. The only thing Pro Tools writes is timecode information to it's own session files not the WAVS. Once the files are in Pro Tools it never touches the originals.

 

Not only that but the same files, in a different folder also became corrupted. Pro Tools wasn't even using these files. The only thing that is continuously looking at / checking these files is Dropbox. There is no other explanation.

 

I am not the only person to have experienced this. The fact that Dropbox has system level access to the files (for example it can remove a lock that I have put on immediately) indicates to me that Dropbox is the culprit.

 

From now on I am ironically, syncing all my files from Dropbox to my local drive and working from there. When I am done I will sync back to Dropbox.

 

I think Dropbox should take this seriously, as I have also seen other people complaining about document and excel files. I don't think this is limited to audio.

About View, download, and export

Node avatar for View, download, and export
Need support with viewing, downloading, and exporting files and folders from your Dropbox account? Find help from the Dropbox Community.

The Dropbox Community team is active from Monday to Friday. We try to respond to you as soon as we can, usually within 2 hours.

If you need more help you can view your support options (expected response time for an email or ticket is 24 hours), or contact us on X, Facebook or Instagram.

For more info on available support options for your Dropbox plan, see this article.

If you found the answer to your question in this Community thread, please 'like' the post to say thanks and to let us know it was useful!