Desktop app is stuck 'Starting' when it loads up and doesn't sync

[Bert M.]

I am a paying customer and very frustrated with Dropbox. I am ready to drop DropBox and look for other alternatives.

Since Friday of last week it has been trying to sync 100Gb in files and it is taking an eternity. Now is stuck in "Starting."
I have rebooted the Mac (10.6.8). I am using Dropbox 3.0.3. I have tried going to Preferences, holding the option key and "Fixing Permission." I also read in the Internet about deleting the hidden cache folder but I have not done it yet since I don't know what to expect.

Any assistance is appreciated.

[Sanchez]

Hey @mlaw, 

Would you mind taking a minute of your time to fill out a survey sharing your experience using our Dropbox Community? You can access the survey here: http://bit.ly/2lNKIxT

Thank you!

[Leon E.]

I have exactly the same problem since about a couple of months. I have tried all the "possible" solutions and still stuck on restarting. I am driving myself crazy as I totally have become dependant on dropbox.

If somebody has the solution to fix it, will be greatly appreciated.

[Jane]

Hey Leon E, sorry to hear you’re experiencing an issue with the Dropbox desktop app. 

As I’d like to work on that with you, let me just do some basic troubleshooting, so as to narrow down the possible causes.  

• Firstly, are you running the latest Beta or a Stable Dropbox client? 
• Have you checked whether there  are any external locations Symlinked to your Dropbox folder? 
• I’d appreciate a screenshot (omitting personal info) of what you’re seeing in your next post here as well, so as to get a better insight of what’s happening. 

Once I have this info, I’ll do my best to analyze the case with you. 

I’ll be awaiting your next reply here! 

[boazs]

i have the same problem too. it is only on one computer. it is so frustrating, especially since i am a paying customer. is there any solution?

[Tom H.]

Unforuntaly, simply saying I have the same issue, doesnt give us much to go on. Can you please tell us what steps you have taken ?  if any ? Results of said troubleshooting steps ?  The thread is 5 pages long and there is already some great advice in it. 

Further more what OS are you using? Not all of us helping out here use the same OS. So I may not be the perfect fit to answer your questions  where as anohter user may be better at your OS. 

[boazs]

my dropbox stays on "starting" for about 45min - over an hour , then it stays on indexing for another 30min at least and only then starts to syncronize.

it happens only on one of my computers.

i tried to unlink and relink but with no improvement.

tried to temporary turn off the macaffe antivirus, but no improvment.

any suggestions?

[Sir_B]

Don't know if this is relevant, but I had a similar problem. I'm using Windows 10, and on booting, the Dropbox-Icon was grey and said "Starting", but seemed to be frozen as nothing further happened. Furthermore, on right-clicking on the icon, a Dropbox Window appeared, but never vanished until I ended Dropbox in Task Manager. This happened quite regularly for the past couple of days.

For my particular case, this turned out to be a Windows Problem. I noticed a strange message on shutting the computer down, originating from Task Host Window. Apparently, the Windows Task Host keept some background tasks, including Dropbox, from running properly. If this is something that might fit your situation, have a look at this video. In the top comment there, you will find a solution that works fine for me. YMMV, obviously.

[Jane]

Hey boazs, thanks for posting on the Dropbox Forum on the syncing issue you’ve experienced, I’m wishing you the best for 2018! 

- I agree with Sir_B’s advice, as s/he’s pointing you towards the right direction. Have you checked any background applications that may be accessing the Dropbox folder? These may kill syncing in the background.

- Secondly, could you check whether Dropbox is listed under the list of startup programs on your device? 

 #1. Right click the Dropbox icon in the system tray at the bottom right of your screen, by the clock on Windows, or menu bar at the top of your screen on Mac and Linux

#2. Click on the gear icon in the Notifications panel and select "Preferences" from the menu 

#3. Verify that the box next to "Start Dropbox on system startup" is checked.

If the issue persists, you can try using these links (Mac/ Windows) to check if Dropbox is listed as one of your Startup items or to add it to your Startup folder.

Please keep me updated on how the option above works for you, so as to send over the most relevant next steps! 

[Shailen S.]

It was also stuck on Starting. Then I closed everything and started again. Now, Dropbox is stuck on indexing, for the last 2 days - left my computer overnight. Following this tip, I tried to unlink my account, and Dropbox will then close itself, and not unlink at all. If I open my Dropbox again, it still tries to sync endlessly. This is madness. Those issues have been over 3 years now. Please do something. 

[Jim B.45]

"There's no way to speed up any of Dropbox's processes. All you can do is just let it work."

This is the standard response to the fact that Dropbox is a buggy piece of crap. A properly implemented sync client does not take hours to start, then turns red and says that it can't access my Dropbox folder and asks for my password -- the Dropbox folder is owned by me, in a folder owned by me, and dropbox is running as me. And then after I enter my password, it says "starting..." again and probably will do so for hours and then fail. I'm a good programmer with over 50 years of experience and I don't write crap like this and I know that crap like this is not acceptable.

The reason that Dropbox is starting is because I had to restart it after it hung for hours, loading no files but with a tooltip saying that it was processing at over 6MB/sec with 17 seconds to go ... lord knows what that time means, when it still had hundreds of thousands of files to download. This is incompetent, buggy crap.

Before Dropbox hung for hours, it managed to download 40GB in a DAY.  This is buggy incompetent crap.

Dropbox has said for years that performance "declines" if you have more than 300,000 files ... they have never explained why and have never fixed this. Properly designed sync clients don't have this limitation. Dropbox's "solution" is selective sync, which is no solution at all. And selective sync deletes the local files (but not all of them!). There's no way to move the files elsewhere, turn on selective sync, then move them back and sync ... Dropbox insists on reloading everything. Properly designed sync systems don't work like that.