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Forum Discussion
Dropbox duplicates a file before uploading to cloud folder
Hi there. I'm on Mac OS 11.2.3.
I'm trying to upload a batch of 50+GB files using the Dropbox app (they won't transfer using a browser because of the size limit). The files are in an external H...
Mirvish wrote:
How do I stop Dropbox from making this useless copy, and instead just copy from the external HD directly to the cloud?
You can't. That's not how Dropbox works. The Dropbox application can't upload directly to your account in the cloud from an external drive. The only way to do that is through the Dropbox website which, as you mentioned, as a file size limit. The Dropbox application is a file synchronization utility, and any files it syncs need to first be stored in the local Dropbox folder. Once a file is uploaded it can be marked as Online-only using Smart Sync and removed from the local drive, but the file needs to start out as Local in the Dropbox folder.
Rich
Super User II
Super User II
Mirvish wrote:
How do I stop Dropbox from making this useless copy, and instead just copy from the external HD directly to the cloud?
You can't. That's not how Dropbox works. The Dropbox application can't upload directly to your account in the cloud from an external drive. The only way to do that is through the Dropbox website which, as you mentioned, as a file size limit. The Dropbox application is a file synchronization utility, and any files it syncs need to first be stored in the local Dropbox folder. Once a file is uploaded it can be marked as Online-only using Smart Sync and removed from the local drive, but the file needs to start out as Local in the Dropbox folder.
Thanks, Rich.I appreciate you took the time to answer me. Your answer was more technical and more clear than the one I got from Dropbox's customer service. I understand now that maybe Dropbox is not the service I need to transfer large files inside ramified folder structures (video files from Sony cameras). Cheers!
