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Forum Discussion
Desktop App Severely Affecting System Performance
I love Dropbox. I can't say I've messed around with a bunch of different cloud storage services, but Dropbox has been more or less great for me for years. However, recently the desktop application ha...
This sounds exactly like my issue. Things are slow because Dropbox is totally thrashing the registry. Right-clicking on the desktop (or opening the Start Menu) requires checking a few dozen registry entries, but Dropbox's indexing causes a kind of denial-of-service attack on the Windows registry.
Dropbox support was pretty cool when we started talking offline and we were able to track it down to Windows being the real troublemaker. When Dropbox checks a file during re-sync, it sends out a request to Windows to update the little icon in the corner (green checkmark, etc.).
Historically, this was fine. Maybe(?) after the latest Windows 10 update (that's my guess; the Dropbox team reported they haven't been able to reproduce the behavior), that exact same "hey, Windows, update that file's icon" request now involves checking the registry for four values, which ends up closer to thirty actual registry operations. Who knows why. Windows doesn't seem to cache the values, so it repeats the check for every file. And Dropbox seems to update the whole folder hierarchy's icons each time (despite alleged "deduplicating logic"), so you end up with something close to 150 registry calls per file in your Dropbox!
No known workaround.
All we'd need is an "I don't want icon overlays" option in Dropbox and this problem would disappear. Alternatively: Windows could fix its broken code.
Lusil
Dropbox Staff
Dropbox StaffHey SunnyNonsense, thanks for checking in with us.
Have you tried a simple reinstall of the desktop app by any chance? To do this:
- Make sure that you save and quit all programs that access files in the Dropbox folder.
- Stop the Dropbox desktop app from running (click on the Dropbox icon next to your computer's clock > select your avatar > go to "Quit Dropbox").
- Uninstall Dropbox.
- Reboot your computer to make sure the uninstall is complete.
- Download and install the newest version of the desktop app.
Please bear in mind that if you're on a Basic plan, there's a three device limit. For this reason, if you have more than three, you'll have to unlink all unnecessary devices until two remain.
Let me know how it goes!
I'm having exactly--exactly--the same problem.
Since the last Dropbox "update" about a week ago, my computer is now unusably slow. Dropbox support is suddenly telling me (I have 3gig of DB space) that "oh, well, if you have more than 500,000 files, performance will be affected."
Utter bollocks. I've been a DB user for 10 years plus, if memory serves. I've had more than half-a-million files, in Dropbox, for at least 3-5 YEARS. Now, abruptly, performance is degrading?
It's not minor performance items, either. When I click Dropbox to pause synching, or to resume synching, it takes MINUTES--not seconds, MINUTES--for it to change over from one to the other. When I try to right-click on a file, in my file browser/explorer, to get a dropbox link, the drop-down menu can take 30-60 seconds to appear. This is a significant, significant change. I'm not running some small phablet or laptop here. I am running Win10, 32g of RAM, i7 Intel Core @3.6Ghz, with a SSDD C:drive, with more than 50% space available, running two RAIDS, both 2TB (so, 8TB of disk space all together, each raided pair being 4TB), etc. I've not had any problems or issues--until this last DB "update."
So now, they're telling me to remove 100k files. One Hundred Thousand files "to see if the performance improves." This is patent nonsense. This system is running fine, a few weeks ago; DB "udpates" and NOW, there's a problem?
And no, I'm not going to uninstall and reinstall DB and wait for 1.3M files to synch! That's insane, especially when DB is blithely telling me that nothing is going to change.
This is simply utter nonsense. In the world of computing, things don't SUDDENLY go boom, for no reason. If 500K were the magic number, I'd have seen this degradation years ago, and surely at least a year ago, not abruptly, after some "update."
So, what, Dropbox is trying to tell us--after years now of endeavoring to brand Dropbox as being for business--that it's only for home users? Hobbyists? People without very many files? If you have more than 500K files, now, Dropbox is UNUSABLE?
Is that what you're trying to sell, Dropbox? Really? Are you SURE that's what you want to tell people?
I, for one, already have Amazon S3 server space and I'm strongly considering it. I also have Hightail, of course, Gdrive, MS's OneDrive and so on. I'm sure that SOMEBODY out there wants to sell me cloud storage without this claim about performance degradation that seems to have appeared out of thin air. I am not feelin' the love here, Dropbox, not at ALL and I doubt I'm the only one. This thread shows that I'm not the only one and I expect to see more as this "update" ripples through the DB user base.
NOT HAPPY AT ALL.
Thank you for taking the time to articulate all of that.
I'm an early adopter, and IT support specialist. I have recommended Dropbox to many of my clients.
It seems that each update in the past year has made Dropbox slower, more glitchy and less usable.
The devs keep forcing features that no one asked for, and killing the original usefulness of what was one an awesome utility.
Running Dropbox is now worse than any virus or malware that I've seen in years.
I am done!Stevland A:
Where are you considering moving your shared/cloud content? If I may ask?
Hitch
- My first thought is Google Drive as I already use so many of the services in their ecosystem (Gmail, GSuite, Calendar, etc) as do many of my clients.
But I need to take a look at the playing field myself and assess what is available, pricing, ease of use, etc
