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fort's avatar
fort
New member | Level 2
8 years ago
Solved

High CPU usage even when not syncing or indexing

For the past couple of days, Dropbox has been consistently using around 30% of my CPU, when not syncing or indexing anything (i.e., the menu bar drop down says `Up to date`). Any idea why this might ...
desktop
Mac
sync
V P.1's avatar
V P.1
Helpful | Level 6
6 years ago

This fixed it for me (after years of trawling, trying fixes and finding out that the "symlinks" are presumably, in english, shortcuts and that bug was fixed in 2019).

Windows

  1. Quit Dropbox by clicking the Dropbox icon in the system tray, clicking your profile picture or initials in the notifications panel, and selecting Exit Dropbox from the menu.
  2. open the command prompt.
  3. Copy and paste the following lines into the command prompt, one at a time, and press Enter after each one.
    • Be sure to copy-and-paste these commands, rather than typing by hand, as entering the command incorrectly could cause some harm to your computer
    • Paste by right-clicking and then selecting Paste

icacls "%HOMEPATH%\Dropbox" /grant "%USERNAME%":(F) /T

icacls "%APPDATA%\Dropbox" /grant "%USERNAME%":(F) /T

https://help.dropbox.com/installs-integrations/desktop/move-dropbox-folder - permissions

 

(I tried this first, got "file not found", not sure if it had any effect)

Windows

  1. Press the Windows + R keys (at the same time) on your keyboard.
  2. Type cmd and press Enter on your keyboard to open the command prompt.
  3. Copy and paste the command line below and press Enter on your keyboard.

dir "%HOMEPATH%\Dropbox" /a:l /s

https://help.dropbox.com/installs-integrations/desktop/high-cpu-usage

 

Don't thank me, Dropbox, for doing what your (Edited per Dropbox Community Guidelines) "community moderator" failed to do,  (WHO MARKED THIS PAGE SOLVED???) but do feel free to pay me. 🙂

 

A M.13's avatar
A M.13
Helpful | Level 6
6 years ago

Thank you so much V P.1  - dropbox had crippled my machine until this fix. 

 

One point though, these commands assume that dropbox is in your personal folder.  If you have moved dropbox, you have to run them on the location dropbox has been moved to. so if your dropbox folder is in e:\drobox, replace %HOMEPATH% with e: .  Someone please correct me if I am wrong

 

BTW does this have to be done every time dropbox or the computer is restarted?  It's just the effect seemed to disappear after some time and I had no choice but the force stop dropbox from Windows task manager.  Is it better to set dropbox not to startup on logon?  Or is it time to ditch dropbox?  The app is so bad that even right clicking the icon in the tasbar displays the horrible logo doing a dance.  What a waste of a once great app.

  • A M.13's avatar
    A M.13
    Helpful | Level 6
    6 years ago

    I have just noticed a dropboxupdate task that runs every hour on my machine.  Is it really necessary for Dropbox to check for updates every hour wastin precious resources?  It would also explain why after exiting dropbox, dropbox was still hogging my CPU. 

     

    I have disabled the task and will see how I get on.  Would appreciate guidance from the collective.

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