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problem opening documents in dropbox app on laptop "word unable to read this document"

Hi there

I have one dropbox account for work purposes. After working perfectly, I'm now having issues with the dropbox app on windows laptop. Error message: "word is unable to read this document. It may be corrupt. Try one or more of the following: open and reapair the file/open the file with the text recovery converter". this is affecting 90 per cent of the documents I try and access from the app.

I have ensured I'm logged in to the same account (I only have one anyway), uninstalled and reinstalled the app and used selective sync for the folders I need to see in the app. following exactly the same steps on a different laptop, it all works perfectly.

So, is there something about a setting on my work laptop that could be causing this?

help very much appreciated! thank you

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Nancy

Welcome aboard the forum, @LisaMac! Let’s take a look.

If you open your web Dropbox account and download a file to another location on your computer (outside of Dropbox), can you open it normally then?

Can you provide a screenshot of the error you’re receiving, as well as one more showing the syncing icons next to the files you can’t open on the desktop app?

Keep me posted for any updates.

SigurdurBjornsson

Hi Nancy,

I'm having a similar problem. I just got a new computer and installed the Dropbox app and added my dropbox folders to the folder system on my pc. Everything was working perfectly on my old one, but now I get this error message for every Word document:

I can't open any documents actually. I can download documents from Dropbox web and open them though. Then there are these sync signs on every document:

Everything seems to be working normally on my old pc.

I am paying for additional storage space.

I would very much appreciate help on this.

All the best, Sigurdur

Jay

Hi @SigurdurBjornsson, this looks like an orange box icon, which could indicate a conflict with OneDrive on your machine, is it currently running?

Could you try marking those files as available offline to see if this helps with opening them?

SigurdurBjornsson

Hi Jay, thanks for the reply

I'm not logged into OneDrive.

It's so strange, most of my files have this orange box on them and I can't access it. Three times this has happened but after a while and/or restarting my PC everything is back to normal.

It's very inconvenient not being able to access my files, I use Dropbox every single day for all my work files. Do you know if there is any way to prevent this from happening?

All the best, Sigurður

Jay

This error usually occurs when there is another cloud provider on your machine, which is affecting the sync icons on Windows.

Generally, marking the files as available offline would help, since the files are then stored on your machine and you shouldn't get another issue like this.

Kim2000Kirk

I am having the same problem. I had to reinstall Windows on my laptop and I set up Dropbox app and downloaded all my files - not I am getting the same message. It says my files "are available offline" but I can't open any of the documents from my computer files, only by going to Dropbox online. I checked and One Drive is installed but not set to sync. So that is not a problem. I need to be able to access my Dropbox files off line. I have been paying for this service for years.

Kim2000Kirk

I somehow got it to work. I went into Dropbox setting on my computer and changed it from "read only" so that I can modify the files and it updated all the files in my DB folders and now I can open them.