Smart Sync still taking up local space

[Mark]

Sorry i cant help any further :(

[reminiz]

I’m having a very similar issue and hopefully we can solve it together.

I’m using the MacOS format too, I chose online-only from the very first install (during installation), and find that Dropbox still likes to download a significant amount of data before settling itself, not to mention giving the fans on the MacBook a workout for hours.

I also have the same Dropbox synced on a PC which has no issues with online-only with only 250mb used.
The mac in comparison is using about 40gb. Mind you the Dropbox total size is somewhere around 470gb.

So this is still very strange behaviour that Mac needs to store so much.

Now my issue comes similar when I deleted Dropbox off my Mac, storage still showed that 40gb being used in my Documents and data. Even after manually dragging the files to the bin and emptying trash.

I went into About Mac > Storage
And looked/navigated back and forth through there and eventually the Mac caught up and realised it had emptied/deleted the Dropbox folder and documents and data showed a few kb only. I don’t have an exact solution but maybe try the below on a fresh Dropbox install:

I would try creating a new Dropbox folder somewhere new on the computer and choose online-only from install.

Be warned though, it seems Dropbox still wants to download a chunk for the initial sync.

I feel the High Sierra and Finder integration are not great for this current Dropbox version. More their fault than Apple. Bad coding.

Anyway I’m in the middle of syncing once again to see if it will finally sync online-only, I’ll just have to live with it taking up 40gb, I have a 500gb SSD after all.

[Lusil]

Hey there @reminiz. I just wanted to let you know that I was able to locate your ongoing communication with a member of my team and I’ve made sure to pass on your comments along. I’d kindly recommend, due to account-specific info required, to continue this discussion via email with them. Rest assured, they’ll do their best to assist you on the matter. Thanks! 

[aw8]

I could live if it was just taking up 40 GB... my Mac thinks the entire harddrive is full, and all the files it thinks are local I know are in dropbox online-only synced folders (over 200 GB of files)

I wrote to dropbox support and they had no resolution. They stated it was an issue I needed to take up with Apple, but it seems more of a problem on their end to me - their software is not communicating with the local harddrive storage system. 

This is extremely frustrating as I can't download anything to my computer - the Mac thinks the harddrive is full (despite the fact that I KNOW the files are all synced to online only and not taking up local space!) 

[Funsan]

Hmm, not sure I am on board with the Dropbox admin askinga user to take this offline with the admins. I am another user having exactly the same issues with MacOS thinking the drive is full after a Dropbox smart sync.

Come on Dropbox I am paying royally for your service for all my employees - a ssolution please, rather than passing the buck. When I read your marketing for this service, it didn't mention this rather fundemental issue for Mac users - hardly a small cohort of people at this stage.

[reminiz]

I feel your pain, my dropbox on my mac now says it's using 131GB but only 918.6MB on disk.  (see screenshot)

However my Storage only shows 408GB of 500GB being used, which is better! So there's an improvement here.

It would seem that MAC OS is excluding the Dropbox folder size as part of Documents (even though it shows up under Storage Management).  

But I'm not right at the threshhold like most of you, I have room to breath.  I also think Dropbox is downloading WAY too much for having Smart Sync set from the get-go.  My ISP download usage will show that clearly.

Goodluck... 

[JimmyYetti]

Having this exact same issue right now, the answers in other threads were weird, marked solved when they clearly weren't

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@Funsan wrote:

Hmm, not sure I am on board with the Dropbox admin askinga user to take this offline with the admins. I am another user having exactly the same issues with MacOS thinking the drive is full after a Dropbox smart sync.

Come on Dropbox I am paying royally for your service for all my employees - a ssolution please, rather than passing the buck. When I read your marketing for this service, it didn't mention this rather fundemental issue for Mac users - hardly a small cohort of people at this stage.

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[Lusil]

Hey! Some of you mention that you have Smart Sync enabled; do you by any chance have any files that are online-only?

If so, please check the actual file size by:

1. Ctrl+click on a file.
2. Select Get Info
3. Find the file size and in brackets you should see the size it takes up on your disk. If the file is set to online-only, then the size on disk should be minuscule.

When looking at the size on disk, please bear in mind the number of files being calculated since, for example, 100,000 minuscule files when added up can be large. 

If the size on disk seems to be much less than the total amount of the file size, then Smart Sync is working as normal and this is OS related since it only goes by file size and not size on disk. In that case, I’d kindly recommend getting in touch with Apple support for more info. 

Let me know how it goes! 

[Juunas]

Hi,

I just tested taking everything online-only and then syncing some folders to local. I sent screenshots and detailed description of the problem to you over email, ticket #8217407.

Also, please don't brush this off as an Apple only issue: clearly it's to do with how the implementation works from your side with/to macOS - nothing your customers can solve on their own by contacting Apple Support. I'm positive the issue would be easier solved if your Smart Sync engineers worked with Apple to get this working instead of making it a task for your paying customers to solve it for you...

Joonas

[Jane]

Hey Joonas (@Juunas), I‘ve made sure to reply to you on your second post!