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Forum Discussion
Solved
App always updating thousands of files
Since a few weeks, my Dropbox app is always updating thousands of files, whenever my computer is started, taken out of sleep or hibernation. I think it started after I used Dropbox to briefly store a lot of small files on a secondary laptop. Searching on the internet, I have found more people with similar problems and I have tried some of the suggested solutions, but so far to no avail. This is on Windows 11, Dropbox plus subscription with selective sync enabled (my whole dropbox doesn't fit on the laptop).
What I have done: remove and reinstall Dropbox; remove, delete dropbox cache folder, reboot laptop, reinstall Dropbox. At first the reinstall seemed to work but it didn't solve it permanently. Any other suggestions?
Hi gjwolfswinkel, thanks for the screenshots!
It seems you're using the beta version of our app. To eliminate the possibility of this causing the syncing issue, can you try going into your account settings on the Dropbox website, and turning Early releases off?
After that, install one of the stable builds of the Dropbox application.
27 Replies
- Walter
Dropbox Community Moderator
Hi there gjwolfswinkel - sorry to hear about this and thanks for letting us know the troubleshooting steps you've attempted so far.
Could you send us a screenshot of the app's exact status as shown in your taskbar so that we can have a visual too?
Thanks!
Sure, here you go Walter. Hope this helps!
- Megan
Hi gjwolfswinkel, thanks for the screenshots!
It seems you're using the beta version of our app. To eliminate the possibility of this causing the syncing issue, can you try going into your account settings on the Dropbox website, and turning Early releases off?
After that, install one of the stable builds of the Dropbox application.
Hi Megan,
As an IT guy I'm always trying new stuff, I wasn't even aware anymore I had this set in my account. I have now disabled that setting and reinstalled. First result looks promising, no indexing and updating thousands of files after the first reboot. I'll keep an eye on it for a few days and will post results in this thread in a few days. Thanks so far!Hi Megan,
The problem hasn't returned for a few days now. Consider it solved 🙂 Thanks!
I'm having the same issue, and my early release is set off already. This ties up a LOT of my computer memory as it updates, and it takes DAYS to complete, making my computer run slow. I end up turning updates off, but then, of course, it doesn't update new files. The above solution won't work for me, so what else do you have in Pandora's Box of solutions?
- Nancy
Thanks for that! It looks like the app is trying to update a very large number of files indeed, which explains why it takes so long to complete the updates.
Did you take any actions on the Dropbox app, right before this behavior started? For example, did you add a large number of files in your local Dropbox folder or did the app start updating these files out of the blue?
Hi, Nancy,
I tried to answer via email, but just got a denied notification, sorry I didn't know earlier to respond earlier. No, it's started updating all the files every day about a month ago out of the blue. Don't know why. I do add and change files, but not even close to it needing to update that many files. And I don't know that I actually have 3,000,000 + files on drop box to update, so that's weird to me, too.
