Dropbox Pro, sending large (50GB) files from external hard drive to Dropbox

[khkannisto]

I'm on Dropbox Pro. I have about 1TB worth of video files on an external hard drive which I need to send to a client. My plan was to ZIP them into 50GB chunks and upload directly via the web interface. No such luck -- the transfers always got stuck about 3/4 through with 15 minutes left to transfer. So I downloaded the desktop app, hoping this would make it more stable, which it does, as I've managed to upload one file with the Sync now. However, this requires me to copy the files from the external hard drive to the sync folder which is on my internal hard drive, which cannot accommodate an additional 1TB worth of files.

Also, although I've set the preferences to "online only", the copied files remain on my internal hard drive, which doesn't sound right. Since I have slightly over 100GB of free space on the internal hard drive, I can fit two such 50GB files on the internal drive at time. So, three questions:

1A) Once the file has been synced to Dropbox online (green check mark), can I set it to "online only" to remove it from my local drive?

1B) Why doesn't that happen automatically although my preferences are set to "online only" for new files?

2) What is the best approach to this task of reliably uploading a bunch of 50GB files from an external hard drive directly to Dropbox, preferably without having to copy them to the internal hard drive first?

[Hannah]

Hey @khkannisto, thanks for joining the Dropbox Community!

The best way to go about this is to add your files in batches, as you were planning, and once each batch has finished syncing, switch it to online-only, to free up the space.

When you add files to the Dropbox folder, they'll initially need to take up space, in order to sync, that's why they don't become online-only immediately.

But once they've synced, you can make them online-only, to accomplish what you want.

If you have any other questions, let me know.

[Rich · Accepted solution]

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@khkannisto wrote:

1A) Once the file has been synced to Dropbox online (green check mark), can I set it to "online only" to remove it from my local drive?

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Yes.

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1B) Why doesn't that happen automatically although my preferences are set to "online only" for new files?

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That setting applies to new files syncing DOWN to your computer from other devices. Not files you've added to your local Dropbox folder yourself.

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2) What is the best approach to this task of reliably uploading a bunch of 50GB files from an external hard drive directly to Dropbox, preferably without having to copy them to the internal hard drive first?

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Copy them to the internal drive first and let the Dropbox application sync them. It will be the fastest and most reliable method. The only other way is to upload them through the Dropbox website, and uploading a 50GB file through a web browser (with any service) is, as you've noticed, problematic at best. Any connection error at all and you'll be starting the process all over again.

[khkannisto]

Thanks. I was hoping there was a way to do it directly from the external hard drive. I know it is a technically feasible feature, as a similar function exists in sync.com for instance, so I will make a feature suggestion for "send to Dropbox" context menu item.