Forum Discussion

dukeeastwood's avatar
dukeeastwood
Helpful | Level 7
3 years ago

I need to copy (not move) a Dropbox folder to an external hard drive.

Very simple.. Can you COPY dropbox folder to an external hard drive? And when I mean COPY, I mean make a COPY... as in making a backup of the entire dropbox onto a large external har ddrive.  If so...
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Jay's avatar
Jay
Icon for Dropbox Community Moderator rankDropbox Community Moderator
3 years ago

Hi dukeeastwood, the Dropbox folder itself is where the files are being downloaded to when you make files available offline. There isn't another 'offline file' location which is what you're expecting from your description.

 

If you're not sure of the location of your Dropbox folder, you can locate it using this method.

 

Once you've found the Dropbox folder, and that the files have a green syncing icon on them, you can copy the files to an external drive.

dukeeastwood's avatar
dukeeastwood
Helpful | Level 7
3 years ago

Why can't any of you see the problem with that?????????

 

That means those files exist IN a dropbox app folder... I can log out and move them... then if I log back in the app will sync with the app again... and I have seen ON THESE FORUMS that that results in files doing missing.  If I leave them in the folder... they are always in a dopey drop box folder.... this is infuriating!

  • Calvin2DBX's avatar
    Calvin2DBX
    Icon for Dropbox Community Moderator rankDropbox Community Moderator
    3 years ago

    Hi dukeeastwood,

     

    The Dropbox folder is designed to be a two way portal for anything you want in your Dropbox account and on a computer.

     

    If you copy from the Dropbox folder, you can set the original in the Dropbox folder to "Online", after, which would all but instantaneously stop it taking up any space.

     

    Is the the end goal to have the entire Dropbox account copied onto an external hard drive, and be able to make changes on the external drive without deleting or changing anything in Dropbox? 

     

    Signing out of the app will leave a Dropbox folder that can be moved, renamed, copied — all without any changes reflecting back to the account.

     

    If you prefer to keep the app connected and keep using it to sync, you can set items to be ignored on the computer so changes made won't reflect to the web.

     

    For more on how to do that, please check this out: https://help.dropbox.com/sync/ignored-files

     

    Let me know if that might help!

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