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My Windows desktop app gets stuck at start-up and it never connects to my old Dropbox folder.

Trying to reconnect my old windows PC to my dropbox account, I get stuck-in, rename dropbox folder, and "starting" loop, but the new dropbox folder is alway empty and the dropbox app seems to disappear without ever syncing or actually finishing the start up. I have deleted this device and reconnected it in the past without any issues, but now I can't seem to get it over the hump.

This old PC still runs window 10 always kept up to date. It has almost always been running dropbox without issue for many years. A few months ago I deleted it from my account to connect my new linux PC to dropbox. I activated the dropbox app that was still installed on my PC and it ran me through an install, sign in cycle. I did notice that the install now refuses to re-connect my old dropbox folder as I think it used to. Now it renames the old folder and creates a new one. I see a couple statuses in the "hidden icons" for the installing dropbox app. The reconnect process seems much more difficult than it used to be.

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TheSweede

Well after all my trials and tribulations, I think I finally got the app installed and working the way it used to. FYI, here are all the steps I went through to finally accomplish it.

Dropbox Re-install

Uninstalled app
Logged out of Dropbox on chrome browser
Rebooted PC
Went online to Dropbox.com and from Get App, selected Desktop App
Pressed blue Install button and a new copy of DropboxInstaller.exe popped up in my browser downloads “save as” window.
Hit save and open (maybe this is my first misstep) and a User account control window popped up asking if it was allowed to make changes to my device. I hit Yes. And a progress bar indicating downloading, then installing showed up. Should I have closed my browser and just run the .exe installer?
After several seconds, a “welcome to Dropbox” sign in window showed up.
Pressed the sign in button and a new browser tab with sign in or sign up window was opened.
Entered my user name and password and a welcome back window popped up.
Meanwhile noticed in the hidden icons that a blacked out entry indicating Dropbox 233.4.4938 had shown up indicating, “waiting to be linked to a Dropbox account”. Why didn’t the sign in I just did link the app to my account?
On the pop up welcome window hit “next” and window changed to upgrade offer, selected Keep Basic Plan and window changed to open Dropbox, advanced settings window.
This time I just went with open Dropbox. Should I have done advanced settings here?
Pop up disappeared and a progress pop up briefly showed up on the bottom right of my display. The main browser window updated to show “successfully logged in”. Not sure what got successfully logged in here, since the app was still indicating waiting to link.
Progress pop up went away pretty shortly thereafter and the welcome to Dropbox window popped up me to sign in or sign up again.
This is where it gets lost. I have an open Dropbox button on the main browser window and the new welcome to Dropbox sign in or sign up pop up window again. The hidden icon still says waiting to be linked to a Dropbox account.
Not really sure why there is an open Dropbox button on the main window, but I think that might just be for web browser access, so I went with the second sign in pop up option since the app was still waiting to link to an account.
Now the pop up says my plan supports 3 devices, which is why I thought I had made sure I only had my two Linux systems connected before I even started this install. This window only gives me the option to upgrade or sign out of some devices.
So I hit sign out of some devices, even though that didn’t really make sense to me.
Now the pop up shows this device in the list twice. One of which shows active and the other saying active in the last hour (my first sign in attempt?). So Dropbox is forcing me to try to enter the same third device twice. Looks like some kind of catch 22 making installation hopeless.
So I select the last active copy, which really was never actually linked as far as I could tell and hit the sign out and subsequent confirm sign out.
Pop up changed to a “You’re all set to install Dropbox on your Computer” with a continue with installation button. I thought I had already done this on the first go round.
Hit button, and pop up changes to Welcome Back pop up with next button. Hidden icon still shows Waiting to be linked status.
Hit next again and pop up changes to upgrade or keep basic option again.
Hit keep basic again and pop up changes to open Dropbox and advanced settings options again. I hit open Dropbox. This time the hidden icon status changes to starting….. and a pop up saying there’s already a Dropbox folder, which I imagine was created on the first trip down this path.
So this time I tried something new and picked a new location and it now seemed to actually start syncing.
So it worked, but not the way it used to be, so I went to preferences, and changed Sync from online only to available offline.
Deleted the empty Dropbox folder created in the first go round and then changed the Dropbox location from the new location back to the old location, which seemed to work
Almost there…., now I need to get my files that are still online-only back onto my hard drive. There wasn’t an obvious way to do this.
So I went into my moved Dropbox folder on explorer and selected everything and then from right click options selected make available offline. Wow, this was so much harder than it ever was before on windows. My use case is much simpler than enterprise and other users I suppose. I don’t really need to save disk space, I primarily have used Dropbox to maintain common files on my several personal compute devices. Seems that the disk saving defaults are a newer feature. Hopefully this is the way things used to be now. I can’t tell you how many times I logged in to my Dropbox account on this computer the last 2 days.🤣😂🤣

All comments

Nancy

Sorry to hear about this, @TheSweede, and thanks for reporting the issue on our forum.

Out of curiosity, how much time does it take from the moment the Dropbox app launches till it disappears completely from your computer?

Did you try reinstalling the Dropbox app today, and the same thing keeps happening?

Finally, as for the desktop app renaming your old Dropbox folder instead of connecting to it, are you selecting the “Advanced settings” link to choose your pre-existing Dropbox folder, before finishing up the setup process? When you click on that option, you can choose the parent folder of the already established Dropbox folder. For example, if you have your Dropbox folder in the path "D:\OtherDrive\Folder\Dropbox", you'll want to select the folder "D:\OtherDrive\Folder".

Keep me posted for any updates.

TheSweede

I haven’t tried reinstalling it again yet. I just uninstalled the app again. I uploaded the files I was trying to save to my Dropbox folder using the web interface on chrome. I’ll try to reinstall the app again a little later and take more detailed notes on where it takes me. Is it ok if I leave the chrome browser connected or should I log out before I try to reinstall again?

Nancy

Let me know how the reinstall goes, @TheSweede! You can leave your web browser connected to your Dropbox account in the meantime.

TheSweede

Well after all my trials and tribulations, I think I finally got the app installed and working the way it used to. FYI, here are all the steps I went through to finally accomplish it.

Dropbox Re-install

Uninstalled app
Logged out of Dropbox on chrome browser
Rebooted PC
Went online to Dropbox.com and from Get App, selected Desktop App
Pressed blue Install button and a new copy of DropboxInstaller.exe popped up in my browser downloads “save as” window.
Hit save and open (maybe this is my first misstep) and a User account control window popped up asking if it was allowed to make changes to my device. I hit Yes. And a progress bar indicating downloading, then installing showed up. Should I have closed my browser and just run the .exe installer?
After several seconds, a “welcome to Dropbox” sign in window showed up.
Pressed the sign in button and a new browser tab with sign in or sign up window was opened.
Entered my user name and password and a welcome back window popped up.
Meanwhile noticed in the hidden icons that a blacked out entry indicating Dropbox 233.4.4938 had shown up indicating, “waiting to be linked to a Dropbox account”. Why didn’t the sign in I just did link the app to my account?
On the pop up welcome window hit “next” and window changed to upgrade offer, selected Keep Basic Plan and window changed to open Dropbox, advanced settings window.
This time I just went with open Dropbox. Should I have done advanced settings here?
Pop up disappeared and a progress pop up briefly showed up on the bottom right of my display. The main browser window updated to show “successfully logged in”. Not sure what got successfully logged in here, since the app was still indicating waiting to link.
Progress pop up went away pretty shortly thereafter and the welcome to Dropbox window popped up me to sign in or sign up again.
This is where it gets lost. I have an open Dropbox button on the main browser window and the new welcome to Dropbox sign in or sign up pop up window again. The hidden icon still says waiting to be linked to a Dropbox account.
Not really sure why there is an open Dropbox button on the main window, but I think that might just be for web browser access, so I went with the second sign in pop up option since the app was still waiting to link to an account.
Now the pop up says my plan supports 3 devices, which is why I thought I had made sure I only had my two Linux systems connected before I even started this install. This window only gives me the option to upgrade or sign out of some devices.
So I hit sign out of some devices, even though that didn’t really make sense to me.
Now the pop up shows this device in the list twice. One of which shows active and the other saying active in the last hour (my first sign in attempt?). So Dropbox is forcing me to try to enter the same third device twice. Looks like some kind of catch 22 making installation hopeless.
So I select the last active copy, which really was never actually linked as far as I could tell and hit the sign out and subsequent confirm sign out.
Pop up changed to a “You’re all set to install Dropbox on your Computer” with a continue with installation button. I thought I had already done this on the first go round.
Hit button, and pop up changes to Welcome Back pop up with next button. Hidden icon still shows Waiting to be linked status.
Hit next again and pop up changes to upgrade or keep basic option again.
Hit keep basic again and pop up changes to open Dropbox and advanced settings options again. I hit open Dropbox. This time the hidden icon status changes to starting….. and a pop up saying there’s already a Dropbox folder, which I imagine was created on the first trip down this path.
So this time I tried something new and picked a new location and it now seemed to actually start syncing.
So it worked, but not the way it used to be, so I went to preferences, and changed Sync from online only to available offline.
Deleted the empty Dropbox folder created in the first go round and then changed the Dropbox location from the new location back to the old location, which seemed to work
Almost there…., now I need to get my files that are still online-only back onto my hard drive. There wasn’t an obvious way to do this.
So I went into my moved Dropbox folder on explorer and selected everything and then from right click options selected make available offline. Wow, this was so much harder than it ever was before on windows. My use case is much simpler than enterprise and other users I suppose. I don’t really need to save disk space, I primarily have used Dropbox to maintain common files on my several personal compute devices. Seems that the disk saving defaults are a newer feature. Hopefully this is the way things used to be now. I can’t tell you how many times I logged in to my Dropbox account on this computer the last 2 days.🤣😂🤣

TheSweede

I think this was the first time I actually did a complete uninstall/re-install since I first installed Dropbox on this computer years ago. It occasionally would say an update was available or needed which I always did. I certainly don’t recall ever having an issue on the few occasions I may have disconnected then reconnected this computer over the years.

Megan

Hey @TheSweede!

Thanks for letting us know that your issue is fixed, and for all the added details!

We'll be one post away if you need anything else! 😇

ianbakey

Thanks for the detailed explanation. I am currently facing the same issue, and it is very disruptive to the work space and time. Instead of actually working, i am spending work hours trying to solve this drop box issue.

Jay

Hi @ianbakey, thanks for your message. In order to look into this matter in more detail, I'd recommend contacting the support team directly for them to investigate further.