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.

[ms25]

@GraphicQuarter I have a feeling it's not up to Dropbox. They're going to stay with Apple File Provider API, because there doesn't seem to be much of a choice. If Apple updates the API to support external storage, that will be how Dropbox remedies the situation. If Apple fails to do this... I'm afraid we're out of luck. That's my take, at least.

[psalcal]

Why is it others like Sync.com have continued to offer external drive support?  Because they can.  Dropbox may decide not to, but saying they cannot is just incorrect when others do it.  

[ms25]

@psalcal I'm willing to bet that sync dot com is simply using the old kernel extensions, which Apple will make obsolete at some unknown time (They announced the depreciation a while back.) Either that, or they're achieving the functionality in some way that doesn't offer similar integration with the OS compared to what Dropbox users enjoy. This is my take at least. I've read elsewhere in these comments that sync dot com is dreadfully slow anyway... so it's difficult to see what they're doing as a solution for users who need to keep terabytes of data synced and offline. I think the bottom line is that Apple needs to get their act together with their API.

[GraphicQuarter]

You might be right, although that doesn’t explain why Dropbox can make this work now for some users. Apple aren’t blameless obviously, but I’m in too deep with them now. This has all been a frustrating realisation today, but at least I can afford to fix it myself. I’m sure Dropbox will lose customers over this though.

[psalcal]

@ms25 we shall see.  Sync has said they have no plans to stop supporting external drives.  Also Sync just released a new update which reportedly offers much increased speed.  I don't even care about integration with the OS as much as I care about support for external drives.  

[ms25]

A big issue for me is that most of my clients are Dropbox users with huge, unlimited accounts. They share folders which I add to my Dropbox to be synced locally. Sometimes those folders are huge. So it isn't just up to me to change services on my own machines... I'd need to convince some rather large corporations to do so as well.

[ArthurPix]

@ms25 I hear you, and many of us are in the same boat. But until Dropbox tells us they have a solution, we are all on borrowed time.

[UKD]

@ms25 Honestly I would not believe or trust anything that comes out of Dropbox's mouth these days sadly. If I'm not mistaken the new and finished version of the new Dropbox was supposed to be out in April. Where are we now? June! This was also supposed to have been completed last November. Where are we now? June the following year.

Dropbox has considered this thread as "closed" but yet for some reason it's on 54 pages now is it? They seem to drop in very now and again to dispel something and then state that they're "working on it" and that it's in beta and nearly finished. We'll be getting this in April. Where are we again? Oh yeah, JUNE.

So this is my advice to anyone who has large amounts of data on an external drive and a small internal drive. Avoid Dropbox. Find someone else who will listen to you, help you and whose businesses practices enhance your business needs. This USED TO BE Dropbox but now they're just your usual money grabbing behemoth who don't listen to their customers, don't communicate with their customers and actually look down on their customers. I mean HOW DARE WE COMPLAIN about a product that is no longer fit for purpose. I mean we only PAID money for it. 

Personally I am still in the process of moving my files. Sync DOT com is slower but comes with encryption and whilst I have seen that they have provided an update I am actually running on their beta because that has the SyncCloud feature that we have with Dropbox and need. I don't know if they've  updated their beta as yet or if the latest build has that feature available as a full blooded feature now.

So the no. 1 rule is PROTECT YOUR BUSINESS. Don't get caught off guard and do whatever you need to do. There are plenty of options out there and you just need to find one that fits your needs. Maybe even move it all on to a NAS and run that as your own cloud. 

[ArthurPix]

@UKD Well said, and if Synology were a bit easier to use, I might go with that option, since Apple APIs are unlikely to affect it. Drives are steadily getting cheaper and my current NAS has plenty of space to accommodate my needs, with dual redundancy. Then I might use Dropbox simply to back up my private cloud instead of vice versa.

[UKD]

@ArthurPix Synology's Drive is now really simple. They've improved it so much vs what is what a couple of years ago. It's mega fast to sync and the only limitation is your own internet speed and capacity. Had I known how much they had improved all this and their simplicity in both setting it up and syncing across Synology NAS's I probably wouldn't have bothered with using a 3rd party company. I may decide next year to not even bother and use my own NAS's. 

I have 2 x NAS's now. 1 sits under my desk in the UK and is a clone of my Dropbox which is about 27.9TB from 34.9TB capacity and for which part of it is now an archive system. And the 2nd one is a clone of what I have on sync DOT com and that is currently at about 2.46TB from 25.47TB.  That one sits in a server room Singapore. The 1st NAS is maxed out with all the drive slots filled so that's limited but as it's an archive now it's fine. The 2nd one is a new 8-bay and I have 6-bays left so there should loads of capacity for the future.

I have been super paranoid and did get my dropbox hacked once before. That's why I have clones or if you wanna be IT about it, backups, of everything. You only lose your data once. I've also, due to the hack, gone a bit mental with all my passwords. Now they're at something like 24 mixed letters and characters and symbols.

The thing with NAS's though is if you don't know how to set it up properly or are limited in funds then NAS's can seem expensive vs cloud storage but when you add it up YoY the costs are actually very reasonable. Major downside is the self maintenance and management of them.