(OS X) Dropbox consuming a lot of CPU whenever any file or folder is changed anywhere

John H.

thanks for reminding me about Google Drive. I played with my corporate Office365 account bit today and still found OneDrive to be unusable. I'll look into Google Drive again. I did buy more space recently for photos on iCould. I just wish Dropbox would work without brining my Macbook to its knees.

Dave H.,

great tip on using Google Drive with OS X. I'll need to pay attention to my Wifi and Dropbox's use of resources. Basically, I just want "set it and forget it" access to my files online - in addition to my backups in CrashPlan and Time Machine. 

Thanks,

Mark

I5 2.8 Mhrz
12Gb Ram
Win 7 & Mac Os

Changing my computers power profile plans doesn't help.
Drop box is using up at least 50% of my cpu load and setting my CPU clock to max even when I set it to powersaver!!

Going to have to stop using drop box if this continues.

I love how long this thread's been going on with no official response since Demetrios back in december of last year.

I've noticed that if I quit Dropbox as soon as I login to my machine (OS X 10.10.3, 16gb Ram, Core i7), I'm able to start using my system almost immediately, whereas when I let Dropbox sync the whole thing is laggy for a good 10 minutes.

This is a more-than-capable work machine, so I'm not sure how inefficient DB's code is for this sort of thing to prevent me from getting my work done in the morning.

The truth is Dropbox does not give a damn about problems faced by power-users with large file base to start with. They thrive on people uploading pictures 1 - 10 at a time and keep milking them for premium membership. Their deafening silence in this issue is a sign of lack of willingness to put our need in their roadmap since we are already paid members- Newsflash Dropbox you have started SUCKING !!!!

Seems like a lot of people on OSX here, but I'm having the same issue on Windows. 

I have approx. 66k files (I am using it to synchronize my Atom config folder, so lots of very small config and code files).

Every now and then a few files get changed (say 10 in total, perhaps 7kb each), and Dropbox starts ramping up my i7 CPU for hours, the fan nearly achieving lift-off from the table, finishing its sync eventually after 2 hours in my most recent experience.

I don't understand how syncing a handful of files, a few kb in size, can cause such mayham on a system.

I'm inclined to go back to Google Drive over this. It was very efficient in its usage of resources and synced files more readily and intuitively. I have no clue what the Dropbox client is trying to do most of the time. Clearly not just syncing my files.

Anybody know of any movement on this front from other sources maybe?

Exactly the same problem for me, file copies elsewhere in file structure and up goes Dropbox to 100% cpu. A problem with long transfers, and presumably in the background all the time. Maybe it's a good sign that this weak behaviour seems so antiquated now.

So I re-installed Google Drive instead, which had a couple of GB on it. And it synced completely within 20mins.

Dropbox, meanwhile, hasn't finished syncing a few MB since yesterday afternoon, all the while trying via the fan to get my laptop airbourne.

Same here, over 180% if CPU usage, most energy impacting app. it takes hours to update my file list. This is ridiculous!

Same problem here, it's always been like this... When Dropbox starts going 100% CPU while doing some work I just quit it and open it again when I'm AFK.

Macbook Air, OSX 10.10.5 (Yosemite)

I've had this same problem with Dropbox since 2014--and after being ignored by Dropbox tech help, I finally got a reply only when I flashed by daytime job description and business title. I'm running OS X 10.7.5 (scared to upgrade for fear so many more programs will "break"--but that's another issue).

Solution in early 2015 was to downgrade to Dropbox 3.10.11...but for some other reason the "Max-out CPU" issue has returned. All the behavior you all have described fits my machine, a Macbook Air, 256GB with Core i7. So the machine has plenty of horsepower.

I was so frustrated at Dropbox last year..and my paid, Premium account...that I swore I'd find another cloud service. Looks like it's time to make good on my vow.

Astounding that so many Mac users could complain about the same problem with no response from Dropbox. 

UPDATE 12/2/15:

I received a response from the Dropbox team (and I suppose so did others on this thread) which was very apologetic and suggest a number of mitigation strategies. I hope they'll post their response publicly.

However--I spent several hours recently meticulously deleting symbolic links. This was something this forum (or another one...I checked so many!) had requested. I used Terminal with the find -l command (when pointed at the proper volume/directory)

find . -type l

I found hundreds of links, mostly in Pictures folders. Used Pathfinder to delete 'em and also Finder to look at the source. I even used Spotlight to verify that a version of the original (same file name) existed elsewhere.

Anyway...bottom line is I eliminated maybe >85% of the symbolic links in the Dropbox folder and the "100% CPU" problem seems to have died down. Will watch and advise here.