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Forum Discussion
Jon C.10
2 years agoCollaborator | Level 8
Disaster: Dropbox removing external disk support for Mac users :(
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...
- 4 months agoHi Everybody,We’re excited to share that external drive support for Dropbox for macOS on File Provider is now available for testing as a beta feature. This is available to some users today and will be available to additional users on a rolling basis. In order to be eligible to test this feature, please follow the instructions in this Help Center article.Keep in mind that participation in beta programs is subject to the certain terms and conditions. There are certain additional participation requirements:
- This beta is only available to US-based users
- You must be on macOS 15 beta
- You must have an external drive that is APFS formatted and encrypted
Please let me know if you have any further questions!
Arno K.
2 years agoHelpful | Level 6
I've contacted support and they have actually been very helpful.
Today I got a followup on the mail, which might solve the issue with the external drives.
The app Dropbox is now updating my all my files (which may take a day or two), so I'll have to wait until it's finished to be sure it works.
I'll post an update once it's ready.
For now, I can share my setup and possible solution provided by the Dropbox support.
My setup might differ a bit form others so keep this in mind, but I do think it could work for many of you.
Also, please take caution. I don't now if everything will be synced as before untill the update process has finished.
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My setup:
iMac, 512GB harddisk space
Holding base Dropbox folder (with about 50GB of data synced)
Now relocated to the cloudStorage folder due to Apple's policy with a symlink to this at the old location (automatically created by the Dropbox update).
2x External drive 1TB
Synced via the Dropbox Backup
I'm not sure this these were located at the Dropbox Backup tab before, but they are now.
Both drives have an .dbx-external-drive extension in the Dropbox cloud.
This setup has worked for over a year and stopped working after the MacOs + Dropbox update
The drives were stated as disconnected on the Dropbox Backup tab and could not be reconnected.
If you have the base Dropbox folder located on an external drive, this will propably not work, but as a workaround you could create a new empty one at your working station (might allready be done by the update) and add the external drives via the Dropbox bakcup option.
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The solution (?), provided by Dropbox:
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For me, it was the last step of the solution which made the drives visible again by DropBox; checking the removable drives box in the Security and Privacy tab. Just in case, I'll copy the complete reaction with all steps provided by Dropbox:
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Could you please check that all options listed in the Sharing and Permissions section of each external drive's Get Info page (navigate to external drive and press command + i) are set to ''Read & Write'' please?
I have attached below help articles from Apple explaining further the process:
https://support.apple.com/en-ie/guide/mac-help/mchlp1038/mac
https://support.apple.com/en-ie/guide/mac-help/mchlp1203/12.0/mac/12.0
Additionally, can you please ensure that "Removable Volumes" are enabled for Dropbox by the following steps:
- Open System Preferences.
- Click Security and Privacy.
- Click the Privacy tab.
- Click Files and Folders.
- Check the box next to Removable Volumes under Dropbox.
Once the above has been applied to each drive, can you please reconnect the drive were you should hopefully be prompted to backup again as desired.
Should the issue persist after completing the above steps, I kindly request that you advise us of what you encountered when attempting the above (with screenshots if possible) to enable us to investigate further.
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