DropBox backup plan, but I want to select multiple drives.

[IanG1]

I am interested in buying the backup 2Tb subscription for my desktop which has two hard drives in it. It says to just select the drive you want to back up. Do all the files have to be on one drive and not spread across multiple hard drives?

[Rich]

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@IanG1 wrote:

Do all the files have to be on one drive and not spread across multiple hard drives?

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The Backup plan allows you to back up one computer and one external drive.

• https://help.dropbox.com/plans/dropbox-backup-plan

[IanG1]

Hi Rich,

Yes, I got that, but most computers only have one hard drive. I have two hard drives within my desktop with different activity on them and I want to know whether Dropbox treats them as one computer or whether all the files within the computer I want to back up have to be on the same physical drive or whether I can add folders from both drives?

Thanks Ian

[Rich]

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@IanG1 wrote:

I have two hard drives within my desktop with different activity on them and I want to know whether Dropbox treats them as one computer or whether all the files within the computer I want to back up have to be on the same physical drive or whether I can add folders from both drives?

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The normal sync process for Dropbox will only sync the items located in the Dropbox folder that gets created upon install. If you want files to sync, you need to put them in the Dropbox folder. You can't sync other locations on your computer.

The backup feature of the Backup plan will only back up one computer plus one external hard drive. It will not back up two drives.

[IanG1]

Thanks Rich, I will take that as meaning a computer equals only one hard drive, even if there are two installed. In Windows I can add folders from multiple drives to the quick access menu and that would imply I could do the same with Dropbox, but it seems not. So I will have to set up my computer with one partition with 2 Tb and all I want to be backed up to be on that drive. It's a shame they don't have a proper support desk who would be able to answer these questions without relying on the goodwill of the community. Thanks

[IanG1]

Hi Rich, Thanks for your reply. So that sounds like to backup 2Tb of data I need a folder of that size when I create it. Does that have to be empty before the files are put in, or can I designate an existing drive and include the existing folders on it? It affects whether I somehow need to create an empty folder somewhere as well as the stuff to back up, or whether I can designate the hard drive with all my data in as it is. Given it is the active W10 drive with email and everything I would rather not have to move everything off the drive I want backing up, create the Dropbox folder and then add all the folders back.

TIA

[Nancy]

Hi Ian, I hope it’s OK if I jump in.

Just like @Rich mentioned, when the Dropbox app automatically creates the local Dropbox folder on your computer, you’ll need to manually move any files you want to sync to Dropbox within the same folder (it’s not possible to set another folder on your computer for this function). 

If the Dropbox plan you select offers 2TB of space, then you can add up to 2TB worth of data within the local Dropbox folder and sync it to your Dropbox account.

I hope this clarifies things, but if I’ve misunderstood something, let me know!

[IanG1 · Accepted solution]

Thanks Nancy, it is becoming clearer. I didn't know if when Dropbox created that folder it had to reserve the space at that point in time. As I have c 1.7Tb of data it would be physically impossible to create a second folder big enough to match that on a 2Tb drive.

I assume the Dropbox folder provides the logical boundary for the data in it and when I load stuff into it the content of the Dropbox folder increases logically but doesn't increase the overall space required on the hard drive.

So my order of work seems to be:

Turn the two logical drives on my main 2Tb hard drive into one by temporarily clearing the logical drive I am going to get rid of and store that on other drives

Turn the whole hard drive into a single partition

Load the files already on that drive inc Outlook files into the Dropbox folder

Add back the other files I want backing up that have been temporarily stored where back into the Dropbox folder. 

That way Dropbox will be backing up the 1.7Tb currently on on my main drives.

Does that sound correct?

Thanks

Ian

[Megan]

Hey @IanG1, that sounds like a good plan indeed. 😊

[IanG1]

Thanks to all who replied.

Ian