How can I move my local Dropbox folder to my external drive?

Hey bferney ​- thanks for using Dropbox and welcome to the Community!

Can you try these steps to do this and let me know how it goes?

Thanks!

Thanks, Walter - 

So, here is where the wheels immediately get wobbly on the cart . . . 

The instructions say to open the dropbox icon in my task bar and to click on the "initials or avatar".  When I open the dropbox icon on my task bar, it opens Explorer.  There are no initials or avatar.  When I open dropbox through the internet, I see my initials; but, when i click on the initials, there is no option for preferences or sync. 

I moved all of the files on my desktop to my external drive last night; but, that moved them out of Dropbox on the web as well - files that others have access to and need to do their work. 

bferney wrote:

The instructions say to open the dropbox icon in my task bar and to click on the "initials or avatar". When I open the dropbox icon on my task bar, it opens Explorer.

Either you're clicking the wrong icon, or you're double-clicking the correct icon. The icon they're referring to is the one in your system tray. A single-click opens the app, while a double click opens Explorer.

If you have a Dropbox icon anywhere else (Start Menu, Desktop, pinned to your task bar) that's the wrong icon. Refer to the this help article on how to access Preferences.

bferney  wrote:

When I open dropbox through the internet, I see my initials; but, when i click on the initials, there is no option for preferences or sync.

You can't make this change on the Dropbox website. It needs to be done through Preferences in the Dropbox application on your computer.

bferney wrote:

I moved all of the files on my desktop to my external drive last night; but, that moved them out of Dropbox on the web as well

You can't move the Dropbox folder manually. If you do, Dropbox will not be able to sync, and as you experienced, could see it as a mass deletion.

And, speaking of mass deletion ...

You need to be VERY CAREFUL while running Dropbox on an external drive as data loss can occur under the right conditions. If the external drive were to become disconnected while the Dropbox application is running, Dropbox could see the sudden loss of the files as a mass deletion and then sync that to your account and any other devices that you sync with.

Thanks for this clarification - there is a difference between the task bar and the systems tray, which is what was confusing me.   

So, I understand about the mass deletion.  Is there a way to transfer the files back to their original locations?  I assume that I can then change the backup location to my external drive and it will not mass move the files as it did before? I need to get them off of my C drive and onto the external drive. 

Appreciate the help!!

Hey bferney ​! Hope it’s alright if I jump in, too.

How did you move your files over to your external drive exactly? Did you just copy paste the files from your Dropbox folder to your external drive directly or did you manually move the whole Dropbox folder there?

Nancy, I did a drop and drag through Explorer.  It removed some of the synced files, but not all of them.  When I try to drop and drag the files back, it tells me that I do not have sufficient space to accomplish the task and need another 456 GB of space. 

Allow me to clarify - it moved the files to the external drive; but not all of them and those that were moved to the external drive were removed from Dropbox. 

Thanks for clarifying! As the next step, can you tell me what’s the current syncing status of your Dropbox app?

I’d like to make sure it’s up to date first, before taking any other actions.

Nancy, the message is "everything is up to date"

Perfect. What I was thinking, in this case, is to try and move your Dropbox folder again to your external hard drive (with these steps). 

Once the folder has been successfully moved and your Dropbox app shows as up to date, you can move back your files within the Dropbox folder and wait till they’re synced to your web account once more.

Let me know if that works for you, or if you have any further questions.