How to free up space from my hard drive?

[Hebephrene]

The Harddrive on my Acer desktop is almost full so to free up space I am uploading redundant music files to One Drive. Then I am deleting them from the Hard drive but notice that this action is not credited, i.e. I have not yet freed up the space I need. How do I make that happen? Am I supposed to empty the trash, or is there a special place in dropbox I do that? Thanks. Oh yeah, I'm on I think Dropbox Family

[Walter]

Hi there @Hebephrene - thanks for posting on our Community and sorry to hear you're having issues with this.

Are those files in your Dropbox folder or on another location on your computer?

If you'd like to make up hard drive space on your computer through Dropbox, you could use the selective sync feature or even the option to make your files online-only.

As for your account's plan, you can check it out in your account's settings. 

In any case, please let us know more and we will pick it up from there. 

[Hebephrene]

Walter thank you for your response. I am going to try to make them online only but to answer your question these files are in my dropbox folder on my desktop and I have dumped them in the trash but that has not resulted in more drive space. Again, do I empty the trash to gain the space back I want? Best, Joel

[Hebephrene]

Additionally, when I right click on a file in my dropbox folder I do not see an option for online only. There is a Dropbox choice but even when clicking on that there is no option to make a file available in the cloud only and not on my desktop. Thanks

[Hannah]

Hey @Hebephrene, can you please send us a screenshot of the options you see when right-clicking on a file in your Dropbox folder?

[Hebephrene]

Hannah, I would love to but isn't that another very complicated convoluted process whereby instead of just attaching (one click) I have to identify the source, the image description and the dimensions? The battle is to simplify, not complicate, if I want to remain productive. 

[Megan]

Definitely see where you're coming from but it'd help us get a visual on this too @Hebephrene.

Also, to add more info about the space and deleting content: you shouldn't need to empty the trash in order for the space to be available again. 

Are you certain that it's your Dropbox content taking up space in your hard drive?