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External HDD not available in the "Manage Backups" settings

I'm trying to set up a backup for my external 8TB Seagate Hub.

The drive is not offered as an option under the "Manage Backups" settings on the desktop app.

A USB memory card reader was recognized and offered as an external drive backup (that's not showing now either).

I've tried multiple USB3 ports and multiple USB3 cables. I've uninstalled and reinstalled dropbox on my PC. Still can't set up the backup.

Any suggestions?

Thanks in advance.

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Hannah

Hey @Danimach, thanks for posting to the Dropbox Community today.

How is your external drive's usage? Is it more than 2 TB at the moment?

And if you connect this drive to your PC and you right-click on it, can you see a "Back up to Dropbox" option?

Keep me posted!

Danimach

Thanks for your reply.

The drive's usage is currently close to 4 TB.

There is no "Back up to dropbox" option when right-clicking.

Hannah

I see, thanks for the update here!

If you go to this page and click on "Manage backups", do you see an option to back up the drive there?

Danimach

No - that link takes me to the main "dropbox backup" page and when I click "Already have a Dropbox account? Try Backup now" it opens the desktop app settings and once again only my 2TB external ssd is showing up as an option.

Jay

Hi @Danimach, just for clarification, since the link was slightly different, are you referring to the Manage Backups page on this link?

Danimach

It doesn't really seem to matter which link is being used. They all lead right back to the backup settings on the desktop app. And as I said, no matter what I do, the specific drive in question isn't appearing as an option.

Hannah

Hmm, is it possible that you're not signed in to your Dropbox account on our website?

Do you see your avatar (profile pic/initials) at the top right corner, when you go to any Dropbox page?

If you are signed in, can you check if you can access the backups page manually from the waffle menu at the top left corner of any Dropbox page?

Danimach

Hi - I am signed in and I can access the backup menu.

The drive I want to backup is not listed.

Hannah

Thanks for checking, @Danimach.

Can you also let us know some info about the formatting of the drive and maybe send us a screenshot, showing the drive's properties?

Danimach

Hi - Nothing out of the ordinary with formatting and properties. Sharing permissions are enabled as well.

drive properties.JPG

Hannah

Thanks for that, @Danimach.

Can we actually reach out to you via email, so we can investigate this further?

Danimach

@Hannah Sure - no problem.

Nancy

Hi @Danimach, hope it’s OK to jump in.

I was about to open a ticket for you, but I can see that you’re already in touch with our advanced team via email.

Can you please reply back to them, as well? I’ve also left them an internal message with your convo here.

Danimach

Hi again - I'm revisiting this issue with an update and a question.

I had already given up on the option of setting my external drive for backup and meanwhile have already uploaded more than 4TB of data to a standard dropbox folder without any syncing capabilities.

I was surprised that today when I connected the external drive to my PC, the hard drive backup dialogue was offered from dropbox. It seems that whatever the issue was, it has been resolved.

Now it seems that in order to create the backup, I have to start from scratch as far as uploading and syncing.
Is there any possible way to take the data that has already been uploaded and designate it as the synced backup or do I really have no choice but to upload everything again.

The reason I would prefer to use the backup and synced drive option is so that the backup will reflect any changes I make to files on the drive.

Thanks in advance!

Dani

Nancy

Welcome back, @Danimach! Glad to hear the dialog box now appeared.

Since the desktop app will start backing up your external hard drive, it will also need to sync those files anew along with the rest of your content, I’m afraid.

Danimach

That's what I figured.

The content on my external HDD hasn't changed since I uploaded it to dropbox so I was hoping that there was some workaround that would point the backup feature to the files on already uploaded to dropbox to compare the folder structure.

Re-uploading 4TB of data using dropbox backup is going to take a long long time!!! I'm currently at 730GB...

Danimach

After finally having my 8TB HDD recognized and offered in the "Dropbox backup" dialogue - I selected the relevant folders for backup and started the long process of re-uploading 4+ TB of data.

Unfortunately, after 1.14 TB - nothing is being uploaded. I even unselected some of the directories and am now trying to upload and sync just over 2TB but am still not making any progress past 1.14TB. The desktop app is currently showing 55% backed up but no progress has been made in 2 days (see screenshots 1 and 2). The web interface is showing th same 1.14TB but the status appears as done! (screenshot 3).

I've restarted my computer, I've unplugged and replugged my HDD, I've restarted the Dropbox desktop program and I've triple-checked all settings.

I'm using an organizational account with unlimited storage.

Any ideas?
Thanks in advance.

Dani

Walter

Hey there @Danimach, sorry to hear you're having issues with this.

I'm afraid your screenshots didn't make it - can you send them again so that we can have a visual too?

If you could also clarify the desktop app's exact status and version as shown in your menu bar/system tray at the moment, I'd appreciate it.

Let me know what you find and we'll take it from there, Dani.

Danimach

Hi - screenshots are now attached.

Dropbox V173.4.6706

Status: "Everything is up to date" on the bottom and at the same time showing the 54 percent complete on top!

Thanks in advance for any help

Nancy

Thanks for the screenshots, @Danimach! This is a bit odd, indeed.

Can you please try to disable the auto backup, as it shows on your first screenshot, restart your device and then, connect your hard drive again and restart the backup process, after your Dropbox app appears to be up to date?

Does the backup stop at the same point if you do this?