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Problem transferring files from desktop dropbox folder to an external drive
I've used Dropbox for 2 years without issue. My files are located in the dropbox folder on my computer. It has worked flawlessly. Suddenly, when I try to transfer a file (located within dropbox on my computer) to an external drive, I get an error message:
"Property Loss
Are you sure you want to copy this file without its properties? The file "Doc" (for example) has properties that can't be copied to the new location."
If I transfer a file not located in the dropbox folder to an external drive, it transfers without this message.
Help?
Hi Lee,
This happens because your external drive uses a different file system than your internal drive. Your internal drive (where your Dropbox folder is located) uses NTFS, while your external drive most likely uses FAT32. The NTFS file system can store additional properties with a file, while FAT32 cannot do that. Dropbox uses this feature of the NTFS file system to store additional properties for the files in the Dropbox folder.
When you try to copy a file from the Dropbox folder to the external drive you receive that warning because the file system on the external drive cannot store additional properties. Therefore, those additional properties cannot be copied to the external drive.
You will not see that warning message when you transfer a file which has no additional properties (like most of the files outside of your Dropbox folder).
However, you can safely ignore this message because those additional properties are relevant only in the context of the Dropbox folder and only for the Dropbox application.
Hope this helps.
Razvan
13 Replies
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I got the same message (Are you sure you want to copy this file without its properties?) while trying to move JPG files from DROPBOX to my external drive. I selected YES while also checking the box to do this for all files selected. That seemed to work for me. I think that's what DropBox support is telling us to do.
The message only started appearing since I switched to Windows 10 and Office 2016 this year.
- Rich
Super User II
The message about copying without some properties is because you're copying a file from a partition that supports meta data for files (extended attributes) and you're copying it to a partition that does not support meta data. It's not a problem, as long as you know that any meta data associated with a file will not be copied.
I'm new to Drop Box and have found my way here because I'm experiencing the same message. The answers to questions here are quite conflicting. Some say the unspecified properties that will be lost are just tags that Drop Box uses to manage files and don't matter, others say that their files won't function / are not recognized once copied in this manner, and one says that it's "only" metadata that is lost, so it's not a problem as long as you know it will be lost(?)
Some of my files have metadata & tags carefully added for the benefit of my team, so saying it doesn't matter as long as I know about it is not helpful. "If you come ashore here we will cut off some of your toes. It's just something we do. It's not a problem as long as you know about it."
Can someone confirm exactly what these properties are that will be lost, and what the consequences are? Using Drop Box is not going to be a solution for us if it creates more problems than it solves.
