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Files aren't syncing on my Windows device, but no firewall or network issues.

Dropbox (DB) periodically stops syncing but there are no firewall nor network issues. I just find out that files have not been updated despite my working online for hours with no issues. This is not a firewall issue either.

I can uninstall and reinstall the desktop app and things work again...for a while. Inevitably the sync fails eventually. On occasion I can stop the DB processes with Task Manager then restart the app and the sync SOMETIMES starts again. But just now I tried that and it didn't work. Likely I'll either have to re-start or more likely uninstall and reinstall the app.

Anyone else have this problem, and if so, did you resolve it? I can't figure this out. It seems to be pretty random.

I'm on Windows 11 Home.

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User 1556073

My Dropbox folder is where it is put during installation (on the system HD at the user level). I don't know about symlinks or junctions, but since it is sporadic, I don't think that's the problem. Similarly since it is sporadic, I don't think it's a date and time problem (I don't see how to check time and date on the DB account, but again, it is a sporadic problem so I don't think that could be the problem.

Note that after trying a bunch of things and then re-starting the app and file that had the problem, it now seems to be working. Not sure what I did that fixed it...

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Mark

Is your Dropbox located on an internal drive with no symlinks or junctions?

Time and date correct and matching whats at www.dropbox.com/home ?

User 1556073

Note that after trying a bunch of things and then re-starting the app and file that had the problem, it now seems to be working. Not sure what I did that fixed it...

Theresa

Hi @User 1556073 and welcome to the Dropbox Community.

I am glad to see you got your issue resolved, thank you for coming back to let us know that everything is working smoothly once again.

Separately to that, I’d love to hear how you use Dropbox. If you’re open to sharing, I’m all ears 👩‍💻.

I’m always curious to learn about different workflows, and who knows, we may have some tips to share with you or maybe inspire suggestions that we can bring to our internal team.

T 😺 (Dropbox Community Manager)

User 1556073

Hi Theresa. I use DB in a few different ways (sometimes to share photos with friends and family, sometimes to swap data files for databases). The key use is to sync a shared password storage system with a co-worker who is hundreds of miles away. That's the most crucial use as we both need it up to date daily and even hourly. That file master copy lives on his computer and is synced via DB, but what has happened is that on my end the sync fails and then my "copy" is not up to date and I can't access certain systems due to the out-of-sync password file system. I can usually fix it but it generally takes a lot of time. I'd love to know what it fails (what the cause is) so I might be able to fix it. Sure would be nice if the sync were more robust.

HTH