Disaster: Dropbox removing external disk support for Mac users :(

[Jon C.10]

In case anyone's unaware... if you're a Mac user storing your Dropbox on an external drive, you'll shortly lose that ability.

https://talk.tidbits.com/t/dropbox-drops-support-for-storing-files-on-an-external-drive-and-onedrive...

https://help.dropbox.com/installs/macos-support-for-expected-changes

Just confirmed this with DB support (see below).  Gutted - been with Dropbox for years and our entire video team flow is based around it 😕

>Hi there, I read today that you are scrapping the ability to store the Dropbox folder on external disks, on OSX. I'd like to ask more about this please.

> Hello Jon, and thank you for contacting Dropbox Support. My name is Joseph, and I will be more than happy to look into your request, right away.  

That is correct Jon, as part of the Dropbox for macOS update, the Dropbox folder must be located in ~/Library/CloudStorage.

>This is a showstopper for us, and will mean we have to move to another service. We have a large distributed team using DB for video work, no way it'll fit within internal drives.
Is there a workaround?

> I totally understand and I apologize for the inconvenience. Unfortunately, there is no workaround on this as changing the location of your Dropbox folder is no longer supported by macOS.

>This change doesn't seem to have hit us yet - we're running a variety of machines inc Ventura
What will trigger its enforcement? Can we stay on an earlier OS or Dropbox version?

>The updates happening automatically every time the Dropbox app is restarting, for example if your device never restarts it should maintain the older version but we can't guarantee full functionality on older versions of the application.

>So what will happen - if we have a Dropbox folder on an 8TB drive and a tiny internal drive - will it try to clone stuff across and eat up the space? What's the mechanism?

>That's right, it will try to move the content on your internal drive until it has no space and gives you an error.

>Is Smartsync still supported? I.e. will it move stuff to being online only if it won't fit?

>It is, however it is now known as online-only.

[shinbeth]

"This has nothing whatsoever about what is being discussed, which is about Dropbox removing external drive support."

Dropbox is removing external drive support because they realised it's no longer needed.

End of thread. Solved. You're welcome.

"Any drive *other* than the boot drive is now classed as an 'external drive', even if its in fact Internally fitted on a Mac Pro"

???

[psalcal]

A few things on the topic of internal SSD drives @shinbeth .  

The problem with your line of logic is you assume people work like you do.  We don't.  

Some people record lots of live musicians playing together.  Some people record one track at a time.  Some build beats and rap on top of them.  Some use a ton of bandwidth-hogging string libraries, while scoring to video.  Of course, for the latter purpose, you are right that large internal drives are ideal for that audio playback.  BUT your one size fits all perspective is not a real world thing.  An internal 8tb drive is completely foolish for most of the rest of us people.  For the film scorer, well, there's your use case.  But the rest of the 99% of us?  Hell no, my friend.  

In an article from 2009, the internal hard drive of Macs were able to easily play back 255 tracks at 24/96k (the most tracks Logic supported at a time).  Those were SSD SATA3 drives.  Those are indeed faster than a thunderbolt 4 drive, which does top out at 2mbps.  I suck at math but you can figure out how many tracks the 2mbps SSD could record and play back.  But let me say for all but a few of us, that is PLENTY.  So the mythical 8tb internal drive is complete overkill.  

Also, I have never once in my professional life experienced a single recording studio where they recorded audio from a band (multitrack) to the system volume.  That's not for performance anymore but it is for redundancy reasons.  If that single source of failure goes down the entire studio goes down.  That is a non-starter.  

In the video world, if you are working on short form content, by yourself, one project at a time, then maybe that 8tb internal drive will do you.  In the corporate world where I work, we work on 100TB RAIDs.  We work on multiple projects at a time, we pass them among roles (rough, color correction, sweetening, etc).  We DON'T hand the machine off to each person.  They instead access the SAN over fiber or 10gbe.  8TB is NOT enough for serious work on longer form video with multiple streams of 8k video.   In this case your internal 8TB drive is woefully inadequate.  

Also for many of us the idea of putting all our media on our boot drives is a TERRIBLE idea if there is a drive failure.  In your world, you would absolutely have MULTIPLE machines with 8tb internal drives with the same drive image AND back them up together daily in case of a failure.  With the above mentioned RAID systems, they are designed so multiple drives can fail and you don't lose data.  Your mythical 8tb system is a very bad idea in that world.  

Certainly my friend if you edit for YouTube and you do fewer projects at a time, you have great media management and you work by yourself, your internal drive option seems like a terrific solution!  But unless you have a backup system you can immediately switch to in case of a failure or OS problem, you are walking on thin ice if you are a pro working on a deadline.  The important thing is to NEVER think one size fits all.. somehow you are the expert and know everyone else's use cases and workflows?  No offense, but it's clear you do not.  

At any rate.. it's clear from this thread that there are a great many of us who disagree with you.  Respectfully, it seems very foolish for you to come into this thread and tell us what we SHOULD be doing, even if in many cases we are professionals who have been doing this kind of work for over a decade.  

[shinbeth]

@psalcal 

You're crying in the wilderness bro. None of what you terribly wrote added value for Pro use.

"Also for many of us the idea of putting all our media on our boot drives is a TERRIBLE idea if there is a drive failure.  In your world, you would absolutely have MULTIPLE machines with 8tb internal drives with the same drive image AND back them up together daily in case of a failure.  With the above mentioned RAID systems, they are designed so multiple drives can fail and you don't lose data.  Your mythical 8tb system is a very bad idea in that world."

Absolutely not since like I said Time Machine makes a perfect clean copy of my entire system on two different external SSDs I keep in different locations + Dropbox at all times that's a winner here I can never encounter a failure. You say that 4 different systems (Mac + Time Machine on two different external SSDs in two different locations + Dropbox) could fault at the same time? Lol bull**bleep**. Also RAID systems can absolutely fault or burn or else and you'll be screwed. My solution is safer than yours, cheaper and I don't wanna go into RAID systems. Your mythical system is indeed a very bad idea in this world.

Just wait for the next-gen 100/200TB SSDs to come to market (https://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/worlds-first-200tb-ssd-is-nearly-here-but-you-cant-use-it/) and all the problems will be solved, no need for your crap system. Having all your data on your Mac boot drive is a non-issue with Time Machine. I'll spend the 20k for 100TB drive if need be, plus another 20k on two external 100TB SSDs if my storage needs increase. Unless you work as an Enterprise with a dedicated system yes your RAID system can be interesting but I'd rather go with Dropbox Enterprise then (and yet those RAID systems would be need to be duplicated in many locations so that in case of burglary, fire etc. you're not **bleep**ed). Anyway 99% of us don't need such a hassle and we're better off with fast local SSD + Time Machine + Dropbox.

[KyleKoch]

@psalcal - your assessment is spot on. There are many of us who require DB to be on external drives when media is local. The logistics to manage video assets within a DB folder located on the OS drive does not make any sense when you have a 50TB+ of cloud storage.

@shinbeth - please don’t jump the gun and assume your needs are the same as everyone else. Perhaps take some time to read through the case studies here beforehand.

[psalcal]

I'm not going to go back and forth @shinbeth  .  I made a case based on real world experiences.  You do you, I'm OK with that.    

I can tell you have not worked in a fast paced pro audio or video environment.  There is no world where waiting for a Time Machine machine restore during a critical edit is acceptable.  Ever.  And that assumes you have no hardware failure and can simply wait for that Time Machine backup to restore from that spin drive backup.  That is just not a thing in a pro environment.  

Those RAID drives are backed up.  There is a complete backup strategy in place involving LTN, cloud storage, and offsite storage.  Again.. if you worked in that world you'd understand.  

That you don't get it just shows you haven't experienced that.  That's OK, by the way, if it works for you I think it's wonderful, but that you cannot see why it's not a universal fix just shows you don't have experience in those other worlds.  No offense meant.  Be well, friend.   

[shinbeth]

@KyleKoch 

Same here please don't assume your needs are the same as everyone else. Please take the time to read all my former comments before jumping to conclusion. You guys on this thread are a minority of users and you're making it big like your life depends on it lol whereas Dropbox was never meant to be syncing external drives in the first place. They only introduced this feature a while ago as a favor and I see no reason to further extend it since it doesn't really make sense.

[shinbeth]

@psalcal 

Ok point taken. Well then I hope it will work out for you, really. I can understand why a RAID system would make sense in your work environment indeed. Alright let's hope for the best then.

But my experience with Dropbox dev and comm teams is that they're retarded. But let's hope still!

[psalcal]

@shinbeth The way I reading things here, @KyleKoch did nothing to try and tell you what YOU should do.  We are simply disagreeing with your assessment about what is a good workflow for us.  

Why would you feel the need to come here and tell me, someone who has worked for over a decade in pro audio and video editing how I should be doing things?  Especially when it's quite apparent your experience is not in the same environment.  

I'll say one more time, I think the workflow you mention is TERRIFIC for you, bud.  I would never criticize your way.  I just gave you a bunch of real world reasons why your workflow doesn't work.  It's OK if you choose to do otherwise.  

[shinbeth]

@psalcal 

I know, I can't help it, I'm terrible and rude 🙂

But yeah we eventually found a common ground here hehe

Let's hope Dropbox address both our needs along the way

[psalcal]

@shinbeth of the cloud storage providers, I have worked professionally with Box, Dropbox, and Google Drive so far.  I even tried to see if iCloud was workable (no).  For my money Dropbox is the best fit.  Do you have something you like better you could recommend?  

I'm a little pissed at them right now because the latest update has stopped my folders from syncing (the update which forced the internal drive storage).  But still.. they are the best I've found.