all 'FILE EXPLORER' FILE icons flashing whenever dropbox is running

[alan78]

As of today drop box is causing the file icons in ANY/ALL open explorer windows to flash constantly between the correct icon image and the default windows 'no icon' icon.

if i KILL the dropbox process magically all the icon switching stops, thi sis constant and doesnt seem to stop!

What can i do?

I also seem to have 3 DropBoxThumnbailGenerator.exe processes running?

Thanks

[Lusil]

Hi there @alan78, 

Welcome to the Dropbox Community!

Let's see what we can do on this. 

At first, could you please let me know what the Dropbox icon shows when you hover over it in your system tray?

Also, could you please confirm for me if you've tried rebooting your computer? Maybe that will do the trick. 

Let me know what you find!

[tuneman76]

A customer of mine is having the same issue. The flashing mostly occurs on her desktop but occasionally in other folders as well. When I pause Dropbox it stops.

It started after upgrading the account from free to plus and then copying 22 GB of data into the Dropbox folder.

I restarted the computer twice and the behavior continues.

When I hover over the Dropbox icon in the system tray it just says it's syncing the data.

My customer is running Windows 7 Pro 64 bit.

[Lusil]

Hey @tuneman76, 

Welcome to the Dropbox Community - I'd be more than happy to help! 

Although it sounds like the desktop app is trying to sync the new content throughout their account, to ensure I have a solid understanding of what the behavior is, could you please elaborate a bit on what you mean that there is "flashing"?

For example, are file icons in their Dropbox desktop app flashing? Does this happen to other folders outside of the Dropbox folder? Are there any errors? 

Any additional info would be very helpful. Thanks!

[tuneman76]

It's just as alan78 has described it above except for me it's the desktop icons and occassionally icons from other folders as well. None of the folders mentioned are in the Dropbox folder. There are no error messages.

[Lusil]

Thanks for getting back to me, @tuneman76. 

Initially, I'd recommend giving the desktop app some time to sync the new content and, in the meantime, check out this article. Although it lists ways to tackle high CPU/RAM usage, maybe one of them will do the trick. 

If the behavior persists though, I'd suggest asking the user who is having this issue contact our Support team directly due to account-specific info that may be required. 

In any case, let me know how it goes or if you have any other questions!

[alan78]

it is all file icons on the desktop and any open explorer windows.

They repeatedly switch between the default windows icon and the icon for the file type.

this has nothing to do with the dropbox app visibly although the issue stops when I stop dropbox via the task manager.

no errors

[Walter]

Hello peeps (@alan78 & @tuneman76)!

Sorry to jump in but have you by any chance tried a reinstall of our desktop app on the affected computers? 

If that doesn't help, could you give a clean, advanced re-install a go and let us know if you're still noticing this issue?

[robertcz]

Same issue here, but with well over a million files in my Dropbox, I am not particularly keen to reinstall and wait a week or two for a reindex. Will monitor this thread. Am interested in whether a solution comes up.

My situation is the same: Windows 7, 64bit. Haven't tried killing dropbox yet, so am not sure whether it is a dropbox issue like the other posters, but will once it finishes syncing if I really have to.

Robert

[MTN_SSC]

Same issue here Windows 7 64 Bit. All explorer folder icons to default and back. Could not restart or shut down because Start button kept collapsing on every flash.