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Forum Discussion
Backup from Dropbox to External HD
I’d like to backup the entire contents of my large Dropbox account to an external hard drive. What is the best way to do this? Considerations: I have a complex web of folders and files, some of ...
Hannah
Dropbox Staff
Dropbox StaffHey rymanbugs, thanks for posting to the Dropbox Community today.
At the moment, there's no direct way to back up the contents of your Dropbox to your external drive.
With the new Dropbox for macOS app, the Dropbox folder is saved to ~/Library/CloudStorage and cannot be moved somewhere else.
If you don't have the space to make all your files available offline, to copy them to your external drive, a workaround would be to download your files in batches from the website and then move them there.
You can also use selective sync, to choose which folders to sync, make them available offline and then copy them to your external drive.
I hope this helps, but let me know if you have any questions.
I have been a business Dropbox user for 6+ years. I find it absolutely absurd that DropBox cannot support a simple task such as being able to easily copy (we are talking about cutting and pasting!) MY Dropbox files from MY Dropbox online account or from my computer. That ludicrous to ask a user to copy their files in batches just to accomplish a simple task like this. I feel like DropBox is holding MY FILES hostage.
I am also very surprised to find that I can't get my files out of Dropbox to travel with them on my backup drive. It is like they are in cloud prison and I have to work hard to get them out. There has to be a simpler way to access my own files for whose rent I pay a good amount of money to Dropbox!! Why should backup be a one way only street?
Hi Smekuria (and everyone else),
What I do is this: in Safari's preferences (general tab) I relocate the download folder temporarily to my external HD, then go to my online Dropbox, select the folder I like to be on my external HD and click in the ... menu related to that folder the option 'Download'.
Works for me: I now have a backup of my Dropbox folder on my external HD. It takes a bit of time, but it's easy and reliable.
Hans
