Need to see if your shared folder is taking up space on your dropbox 👨💻? Find out how to check here.
Forum Discussion
Solved
Duplicating my whole computer just to back it up?
I'm sorry if this is a stupid question. I want to back up my computer, so I installed Dropbox but am I understanding it right that I need to put everything I want backed up in that folder? Because I'...
Altt wrote:
Or am I misunderstanding?
Dropbox itself isnt a backup tool. Its a sync tool. It isnt designed to backup the system. So if you copy everything in to Dropbox's folder yes you use 2x space but you also end up with double versions AND unless you constantly copy/paste updated files back and forwards between folders you will always have one out of date. Dropbox has NO link to the original location of the files. So copy the 'Documents' folder over and that's all you did - a copy at that point in time. It wont update again.
Dropbox BACKUP is a different system, but, doesn't allow the syncing across machines or accessibility online etc.: www.dropbox.com/backups
Mark
Super User II
Super User II
Altt wrote:
Or am I misunderstanding?
Dropbox itself isnt a backup tool. Its a sync tool. It isnt designed to backup the system. So if you copy everything in to Dropbox's folder yes you use 2x space but you also end up with double versions AND unless you constantly copy/paste updated files back and forwards between folders you will always have one out of date. Dropbox has NO link to the original location of the files. So copy the 'Documents' folder over and that's all you did - a copy at that point in time. It wont update again.
Dropbox BACKUP is a different system, but, doesn't allow the syncing across machines or accessibility online etc.: www.dropbox.com/backups
I guess I had the wrong idea about its purpose to begin with. So the only way to keep my files up to date on Dropbox is with the Sync feature? Thank you for taking the time to respond!
