Reinstalling Dropbox App and Retaining D drive location for Dropbox folder

Thanks Rich, Megan, Hannah, Nancy. Having the installation place the Dropbox folder in the folder above the existing folder was the answer. Seems obvious in hindsight, but the installation does not tell you this.  But it did work. 

I’m glad to hear that worked, MWilcox! 

If you need something else, you can always give us a nudge.

i have the same problem as Mitch. I think I understand the idea of pointing the Dropbox  to  D;\user\me, however, in the drop down menu that appears when I try to change the location it keeps the DROPBOX folder at the end of the line. How do I edit that to only use   D:\user\me   ?

Thanks for your help,  jherber 

My message shows a SOLVED icon. I have received any suggestions or solutions.  Thank again, jherber

My message shows a SOLVED icon. I have  NOT received any suggestions or solutions.  Thank again, jherber

Hi jherber, the Dropbox app needs to store all the syncing files in a folder with the name of Dropbox, so it's not possible to remove the Dropbox name.

If you have any further queries, feel free to message back.

Howdy Jay. Thanks for the replay. I sent you an email replay because I could not get the link you sent to work. I finally figured out I was using an old browser, IE, and have no idea how I was doing that. I am using Chrome.

Your answer confuses me because I was following an earlier answer on this topic. I will include it below. It seems to conrtradict your advice.

The wording is "In which folder do you want the Dropbox folder?" I selected D:\user\me\Dropbox, and now I have a "new" Dropbox folder within my old Dropbox folder, both on D.

The question was asking what folder do you want your Dropbox folder to be located in; not what folder do you want your files in. Basically, you told it to create a new Dropbox folder inside your existing one. What you wanted to select was D:\user\me, and then Dropbox would have detected the existing folder and asked if you wanted to use it.

You likely have two options.

Exit the Dropbox application then uninstall it. Delete the newly created D:\user\me\Dropbox\Dropbox folder, being sure not to delete your original folder. Reinstall Dropbox again and when selecting a location for the Dropbox folder, be sure to select the folder ABOVE your existing Dropbox folder, so D:\user\me. Dropbox should ask if you want to use the existing folder.

When I tried to follow this advice, I ended up with a Dropbox folder on 😧 and inside that folder were these 'extra' files 

a.      dropbox.cache

b.     .dropbox

Can you get me straightened out? I am fighting an issue where my C: drive is full and I am trying to move Dropbox program and data to D:.

I think I now have data and programs on both C: and D:, but the Dropbox program on 😧 does NOT find the data.

Thanks, jherber

Essentially, the Dropbox folder is always created as a new folder. You can try moving the Dropbox folder to a different location entirely, and then just move it back to the location you mentioned earlier, which was D :\user\me. 

I have a similar issue to the OP in that I had to reset my Windows 11 Pro installation on Drive C. All of the data on my separate D drive was retained. My Dropbox folder has been on my D drive for years because I don't like keeping data on my C drive and because my Dropbox is now too large for the C drive.

I have uninstalled Dropbox and re-installed it several times to attempt to get it to recognize my Dropbox folder on the D drive. It always defaults to the C:\Users\my_user\Dropbox folder. I sign in, get the 6-digit code, and then click on Advanced Settings. The screen simply will not allow me to select a different location for my Dropbox folder. It shows c:\Users\my_user\Dropbox in the input field. When I click the drop-down arrow, I see a checkmark by  C:\Users\my_user\Dropbox and "Other location". If I click on Other Location, the set up simply ignores me and starts to do a Selective Sync. After some time, all of my Dropbox folders/files have been populated in C:\Users\my_user\Dropbox. 

In other words, Advanced Settings does not seem to work at all on my computer running Windows 11 Pro. 

If I go into the Dropbox app, select preferences > sync and try to move my Dropbox folder location to D:\, the error message is that there is already a Dropbox folder at that location. If I try to move the Dropbox folder to D:\Dropbox, I get a whole download of the Dropbox folder embedded in the directory structure, so my new location for a synced folder becomes D:\Dropbox\Dropbox - a file organization nightmare!

What am I doing wrong? Reinstalling the Dropbox desktop app and pointing it to an already existing Dropbox folder location shouldn't so hard.

#Desktop App  #Dropbox folder

Hi dearnold, If you're not on a Dropbox Basic plan with more than 3 devices connected, could you try an advanced reinstall of the app using the steps in this link?

During the installation process is when you get to see the Advanced Settings, before the default Dropbox folder is created. From there, you can choose the 'parent' folder to store the Dropbox folder, so if it's D:\Dropbox, you need to pick D:\.