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Deleted files due to external drive getting disconnected
1. It looks like the external drive where I keep the local copies of my Dropbox files got disconnected.
2. This caused a number of files to get deleted from the Dropbox server and from all local copies on other machines.
3. I read up on this issue online and I can confirm that this the cause was the unmounting of the external drive.
4. Now I am restoring the files to the server using the Dropbox "undelete" option.
5. This has been looking good. The files are almost all back on the server (perhaps 10% left to go).
6. However, when I re-plug the external drive and Dropbox starts syncing again, it restarts deleting files from the server.
I don't understand step 6. How can I prevent this from happening? Note that the file path to the external drive hasn't changed from before the crash.
Can someone help me out?
Thanks.
Drago
Hi dragomirradev, unfortunately when working with your Dropbox folder on an external drive that's always a possibility.
We can’t guarantee perfect functionality of the Dropbox app if you’re running it on an external drive. For the Dropbox application to work properly, I’d recommend that you install it on the hard drive of your Operating System.
This is because Dropbox can’t always work correctly if the Dropbox folder becomes inaccessible, and this can happen if it's located on an external drive.
I'll forward your feedback to the appropriate areas so we can continue to improve.
41 Replies
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- Yes - I just don’t get why this is not possible to fix - or at least put more safety in place. The impact of this issue is beyond major on a business team.
The one protection I have implemented for a business I work with is to use Synologu Cloud sync with the “do not delete files duing sync” set on a local nas in the office - better than nothing but not ideal…… This is not a solution. This is a limit.
^^ Exactly this. This is far from solved.
- I agree - I still need Dropbox fixed properly - it is a not ideal workaround for a fundamental Dropbox flaw. I just added it in as an illustration of a temporary workaround. We happened to have the elements to be able to put this in place. It is not a real fix.
- I agree and I’d like to repeat that is for our data security that it’s important to have an offline physical copy.
This means that the full support for external drives is directly connected to data security and Dropbox should be aware of this and put a fix to something that from the user side seems to be very easy to fix. Same problem as everyone else. I'm cancelling drop box. I cant afford to loss precious files or to waste more time. Customer service is poor. Download service all has lots of bugs.
Adding my response for the record since I experienced this as well. Dropbox wiped its entire folder during sync when a drive became disconnected. I've been using Dropbox for years but will also be cancelling my subscription due to this. I was shocked to read the current response to the problem is "don't use external hard drives". This seems completely untenable for a company trying to maintain pro users. How could anyone working with modern 4k+ video not utilize external drives? Why wouldn't Dropbox recognize when the its own root folder went missing and stop any sync operations? If anyone on this forum has recommendations for other cloud solutions that don't take the liberty of deleting files on external drives I'd love to hear them.
I was talking to Jared in Support about a recent problem and he suggested this info be directed to you instead of him:
The problem is that when there is a power outage in my area the drive with my dropbox folder will power down before the computer will. Then the dropbox app to will start wholesale deleting files because the drive is no longer available. This is a ridiculous conclusion for the software to arrive at.
Would it not make way more sense for the app to throw up a dialog box saying ‘dropbox cannot find your dropbox folder, please relink your folder” rather than just wholesale deleting files because of a technical glitch?
I have been through this three times now because the power grid where my home is located is unstable. If I turn that computer off I have to wait for hours for things to be updated before I can work at home. If I leave it on at home then this happens.
The first time this happened the dropbox support person told me that there was no way that the dropbox app could delete my files. The last two times I have had this problem I have bought new hard drives thinking my catalog file had become corrupt and dropbox was not able to read files off the drive and so it started deleting them in the cloud.
I have used dropbox for my work flow since 2011. This change in behavior is something that hasn’t happened before last year. I strongly suggest that your programming team review the reasons for having the app behave the way it currently does and consider that you are doing more harm than good to your users.
I cannot image a circumstance where a user would want their entire dropbox account wiped out because their external drive became disconnected from the computer.
I lost an entire days worth of work because over 160,000 files in my dropbox folder were removed before I figured out what was going on. Even files I had currently open were deleted so that when I went to save them the computer errored out saying that the folder and the file itself no longer existed on my computer.
I am a one man shop and I rely on dropbox solely as my cloud solution so that I can work regardless of my location. Please consider the applications current behavior very detrimental to my companies workflow.
- Mark
Super User II
There are already such measures in Dropbox Joe2-0 , however, they arent really very reliable. Dropbox obviously try and make it more and more reliable over time BUT this is why they dont really suggest you move the folder to external drives. It just isnt the point of Dropbox and the risks are huge.
I guess I stumbled upon this issue with Dropbox's functionality. My old PC's main system HDD is too small to store all of my family photos, videos, documents, etc. so I moved the dropbox folder to a second internal HDD. It failed yesterday apparently and I noticed that files were being deleted. Isn't there a setting to keep cloud files without deleting, regardless of what I do with the files on my computer? What's the point of using Dropbox to backup my priceless family history if it is deleted due to a hard drive failure? That's the whole reason I'm using a cloud backup! Any help?
