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Problem backing up downloads folder

Problem backing up downloads folder

Squick55
Explorer | Level 3

I upgraded my hard drive to an SSD drive earlier this year and apparently I never set up the backup for the downloads, documents and desktop. I just went to do so and when I click setup I get an error message on the downloads folder saying that Dropbox and the downloads folder are on different drives. I went to my drive manager and noticed that I have a C drive with 450 GB and a D drive with about 1.8 TB and the Dropbox folder that is being synced is on the D drive but I also discovered that there's a Dropbox folder on my C drive under users/"username". I think what happened was when I first reinstalled Dropbox It tried to set up the folder on the C drive where it was supposed to but ran out of room and I don't know how the D drive got created but that's where Dropbox folder is now located and being synced. I need to figure out how to fix this.

 

 

I've adjusted my sync settings so that I have only just under 300 gigs being synced to the Dropbox folder on the D drive and I have about 387 gigs available space on the C drive so I could move the Dropbox folder back to where it belongs but then I still have the problem of available storage space. It's a 2 TB hard drive and I don't know how it got set up with 450 allocated to the C drive and the rest to the D drive. If I move Dropbox back to C there won't be enough space to sync the rest of my stuff that I had on there before.

 

 

So one question I have is if I move the Dropbox folder back to the C drive, would I be able to somehow add more storage to the C drive without having to reformat things or how do I go about setting this up so I can back up my downloads folder. That's really the main issue here is being able to back up the downloads folder just in case something happens.

 

 

I also have an issue where apparently my desktop and documents are connected to OneDrive so Dropbox says it can't back up both but let's figure out one problem at a time. Hopefully all of that makes sense. 

 

Screenshot of disk management page

https://www.dropbox.com/s/ruz87js6pbsvqxv/Disk%20Management%20Screenshot.png?dl=0

 

6 Replies 6

Jay
Dropbox Staff

Hi @Squick55, thanks for bringing this to our attention.

 

The Dropbox desktop application would automatically pick the C drive for the Dropbox folder. If it's located on another drive, then it would need to have been done manually, or the app detected a previous installation which was located there.

 

As for adding more storage to your C drive, this would need to be done in the Windows system (if it's possible using partitions), and isn't something we could assist with.

 

If you have any further queries, feel free to message back.


Jay
Community Moderator @ Dropbox
dropbox.com/support


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Squick55
Explorer | Level 3

The program files itself for DB are located in C: but the Dropbox folder containing the files somehow ended up on D:. The problem is there's not enough space on C: to hold everything I usually sync. Not sure if there's a way to realocate more storage to the C: drive without having to reformat everything. And the dropbox install was a brand new install after swapping out the hard drive and installing an SSD. I didn't use a backup, did a clean install of everything. It was odd because I installed DB, it downloaded so much data I went over my data that month and had overage charges, then the next month DB synced more data that caused more overages and I'm guessing it's because it somehow reinstalled onto the 😧 drive, I don't know if there was an update or something about not enough space on the C: drive or what but I didn't do it. I just need to figure out the best solution to fix it.

Squick55
Explorer | Level 3

Okay, I guess I forgot but the SSD I installed was only 480 GB(the C drive) because my intention was to just use it for program files and thought I could use the old standard 2TB hard drive for my Dropbox folder. Last night I was thinking that it was a 2tb SSD divided up into 2 different drives, I don't know what I was thinking. So now my question is, being that my main objective is to be able to backup the downloads folder and the desktop, can those folders be moved to the other drive (D:) without screwing things up? We only have the one account on the computer so I'm not too concerned with them not being under a specific user.

 

Any help would be much appreciated. I really don't want to have to buy a bigger SSD just to make this all work.

Jay
Dropbox Staff

Thanks for the info. If you do plan on using computer backup, the Dropbox folder would need to remain on the C drive, so you won't be able to move it to another drive, either internal or external.


Jay
Community Moderator @ Dropbox
dropbox.com/support


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Squick55
Explorer | Level 3

So moving the downloads and desktop folders to the 😧 drive where the Dropbox folder is currently loicated wouldn't work? They would then be on the same drive. 

 

This is what I found for moving the downloads folder and would be the same for the desktop folder, then they would be on the same drive as DB. 

https://www.isunshare.com/windows-10/move-downloads-folder-from-c-drive-to-d-drive-in-windows-10.htm...

 

Jay
Dropbox Staff

Yes, in order to setup the computer backup, both the Dropbox folder and the Documents, Downloads, Desktop folders would need to be on the C drive. They'd also need to remain there permanently. 

 

Moving the Dropbox folder back to the C drive isn't the issue, since it can be done in the desktop app settings, although it sounds like you'd experience issues in the future with the space on that drive in general (since there isn't much space left on that disk afterwards).


Jay
Community Moderator @ Dropbox
dropbox.com/support


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