Restoring an overwritten file

[Felix_W]

Hello there,

today I accidentally replaced/overwrote a .kdbx file in my Dropbox basic account with another file having the same name. Now, I found that the replaced file was actually the current version and I have replaced it with an older version.. In my account, the only recent file versions displayed are already too old (10 days); the file resp. version I overwrote today is not listed.

Is there a way to restore the replaced version anyway? Could it be the case that replacing a file with another file having the same name means deleting it permanently from the Dropbox account (so it is not listed in the version history and can't be restored at all)? Or is it possible that Dropbox takes more than 4 hours to update the version history in the account (meaning the file in question is just not yet displayed)?

Thanks very much for any hints & kind regards,
Felix

[Rich]

The version you want to restore... when was it last modified? If it was within the last 30 days, then you should be able to restore it. If it was last modified more than 30 days ago, then it cannot be recovered.

• https://help.dropbox.com/files-folders/restore-delete/recover-older-versions

To be clear, it's not 30 days since it was overwritten by the new version, but versions of that file that were made within the last 30 days.

[Felix_W]

Hello Rich, thanks for your reply! The version I want to restore was last modified yesterday - though "modified" means replaced in this case (as I wrote before).. Before that, it was last modified two or three days ago - I'm just irritated because in the version history only the current version is displayed as well as three versions from the 26th of September, but nothing in between.. So, I'm wondering if replacing a file (with another file of the same name) leads to permanent deletion in the Dropbox account.

[Elixir]

All versions of the replaced file should be listed in the file history. Was your Dropbox running/syncing, and was upto date after you made the modifications and before you replaced the file? 

[Felix_W · Accepted solution]

@Elixir: I think that's the problem: Judging from the listed versions in the version history Dropbox hadn't synced since the 26th of September when I put the file in the Dropbox folder. I added new entries to the file and I worked with them during the last 10 days, but only on my Desktop PC (didn't check the sync function on other devices). So the file was in the Dropbox folder but actually just like a local file - and then I replaced it. So, it seems that only Windows or recovery tools can help me on this. And they don't, I've tried a lot over the weekend.. Anyway, I don't know why Dropbox didn't sync - will get back to the support team about that.

@All: Thanks guys, this thread is closed than.