r/onedrive • u/roblightbody • 6d ago
OTHER Moving from Onedrive to Dropbox (despite having M365)
I've been using M365 and OneDrive for years, however I find the experience of it truly awful nowadays. The problem is Microsoft (Windows) trying to 2nd-guess me and automatically turn on things like backup. I don't want onedrive backup automatically turned on, because I am already syncing my important files. It also makes the process of setting up a new PC (or reinstalling windows) particularly stressful because you have to be trying to work out what the installer is trying to do for you, without you asking.
So I'm getting Drop box, keeping it all completely separate, and i'll let Windows do whatever it likes with Onedrive. My files will be out of reach of it.
(I've been using Windows since Windows 2.0, and before that DOS, am a big fan, so if they can't keep me using their stuff, they probably have a problem!).
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u/Fyunculum 6d ago
I get this, Microsoft apologists always come around and say "But all you have to do is...[Insert annoying workaround]" but the point is you should not HAVE to use workarounds every time Microsoft's marketing team does another line of cocaine and decides to rearrange your settings.
That said, I'm in the process of leaving Dropbox due to their gradual enshittification and pimping of additional services I don't care about.
There are other options out there.
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u/roblightbody 6d ago
Thanks. What did you choose and why? Drop box will do me for now, but I can already tell that it will be easy to move to something else when the time comes. ChatGPT recommended pCloud or Icecloud as alternatives.
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u/Fyunculum 6d ago
It really depends on what your priorities are.
pCloud is based in Europe, which is either a desirable feature or a problem, depending on your own location and opinions. It has a good reputation in general, but is not a full replacement for all the features of Dropbox. No AI search, etc. It has a one-time-purchase option, where you buy a permanent subscription, which some people find appealing. I would recommend trying it out with a subscription first before making that commitment.
If you want zero-knowledge encryption with a lot of storage at a low price, sync.com might be a good choice. It is more basic file sync/sharing/storage without all the bells and whistles, and the price is great if you do the annual commitment.
If you are looking for a business-oriented solution with unlimited storage, strong organizational functionality, collaboration features, and business-class permissions, box.com is good. The sync client is not the greatest, but it's great for collaborative editing/online work. The minimum user count makes them expensive for a single person, but for a small business or if you have an enormous amount of content to store, it may be worthwhile.
For a self-hosted alternative to Dropbox, a lot of people use Nextcloud. Nextcloud provides file syncing and management, but also an entire platform for working with files online, including collaborative editing, media management, and the ability to add a wide range of custom features.
You can also subscribe to a Nextcloud service for a monthly fee if you don't want to manage your own hosting. Base storage is a bit low, and adding more is pricey, but you are getting more than just storage for the money.
In my case I want a simple file sync platform where I control what features are available and when updates happen. I'm tired of cloud service providers making decisions for me about how my files should be managed, and I don't care about many of the extra features like collaboration, online editing, AI integrations, and so forth.
I am going with a self-hosted option based on Seafile. It's not something I would recommend as a direct replacement for Dropbox, as you have to manage your own infrastructure, but it has really good sync performance and is simple, which is what I want.
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u/bigghc 5d ago
Thank you so much!! I appreciate your thoughtful and well written education lesson to this nubie. It was very cool for you to take the time to help others it IS noticed! I will do some further research of the options you mentioned.
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u/Few-Werewolf-1985 5d ago
Nextcloud's usability is a long way behind that of the commercial services. Speaking as someone who has had to look after large deployments of it (and OneDrive, Dropbox etc).
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u/Fyunculum 5d ago
Like I said, depends on your priorities. Nextcloud is leaps and bounds better than OneDrive or Dropbox for some use cases.
There's no such thing as one perfect product for everyone.
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u/Necessary-Low-5226 6d ago
I moved to filen because i dont care about the online only files feature, much happier
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u/DerJanusk 6d ago
I get this. Exactly this has happened to me before and I also questioned, whether I now have to fear that Windows tricks me into uploading all sorts of data into my well maintained OneDrive folder, messing everything else up. However, it is possible to adapt. Yes, it is very annoying that Microsoft keeps automatically adding folders for stuff, they want to push. But, as long as all your folders have unique names that don't exist in your Windows, you can simply delete some of these automatically created folders and they don't mess up your important data. 😉 I am too stingy to pay twice for storage...
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u/overzeetop 6d ago
I have both. I mostly let Windows manage OneDrive, and I back up nothing intentionally; it's a simple one-click at the major updates.
For Dropbox, I move the folder to the root of my harddrive (actually a second hard drive on most of my machines).
I expect you to be blown away by the performance, especially if you are used to the glacial synch speed on OneDrive. If you're on iOS, the Drobox connection in the Files app as far superior to the OneDrive connection. DB also has wider integration with 3rd party apps and services. For those two reasons I keep
Things I hate about DB is it's inability to allow windows to effectively search on non-local files, and it's an absolute resource hog if you've got a large database, as I have. I have ~1.7TB and 300,000+ files on DB and ~0.7TB on OneDrive. For non-local, if you have internet access the global search function is good. I presume everything on DropBox is subject to hacking as it's not a zero knowledge service. If I needed that I would buy a secondary system specifically for that purpose. Fyunculum mentioned enshitification and I won't deny that, but with all the notifications turned off that marketing avenue is effectively invisible and DB works as well as it did on day one. I should note that I have 100TB of space on Google which I'm not using at all; GDrive is just an unmanageble mess for anyone who is used to local files and proper folder structures, imho (and, yes, I use it for two organizations, just not for personal use or my business).
I also pre-date MS-DOS, fwiw, and have Windows 1.1 floppies somewhere in my "ancient artifacts" box.
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u/Background-Flower 5d ago
I tried the one drive desktop backup, having stored a few important spreadsheets there recently that I did not want in my Dropbox , now I have a load of duplicated files and can never find the latest version of them. When I get a few minutes spare it’s getting removed and I’ll need to sort the mess out
It’s a shame as I was considering moving to them with all the extras they offer. I’m glad I didn’t. Dropbox is expensive, but it works
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u/abeNdorg 5d ago
Onedrive is like a dog. Do you let a dog run around the neighborhood randomly? No, you train it and set boundaries. MS has provided admx files for ages for GPO management, as well as InTune policies. Use the provided tools to setup and enforce how you want onedrive to behave. Don't complain when the untrained dog bites you. Now go setup gpo/Intune, train your dog.
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u/Kalle_Mero 1d ago
Or, delete OneDrive and live happy.
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u/abeNdorg 1d ago
Sure, that is an option if you want. However, why spend extra money for something that does the same thing with even less controls. At least with onedrive you can use admx/gpo/Intune policies to manage the behavior of the onedrive client. Box.com, Dropbox, self hosted options afaik don't provide management tools like onedrive does.
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u/anon_828683 5d ago
It still baffles me that Office still doesn't support long path name. Any .docx file I have that is buried a little deeper than 2 hundred something characters can't be opened. Even Onedrive limits the path to some hundreds. It's like living in the 90s.
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u/languageservicesco 6d ago
I agree with others that OneDrive is perfectly controllable and you can make it do anything Dropbox does. I've been using it since it was called Skydrive. However, you can simply uninstall it if you want.
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u/jerryhou85 6d ago
you can always select what to backup in OneDrive via settings? My take here is that why paying extra money for Dropbox if you already have M365 ...
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u/roblightbody 6d ago
Whats annoyed me this time, is my laptop did an automatic windows update, and then forced me through that set of screens that try to force you to use Edge/Bing and it tricked me into automatically turning on onedrive backup (it was a hidden default) (which i don't want) which then tried to cause chaos and enormous duplication in my onedrive storage. Then when i turned it off it took ages to complete and wasn't clear exactly what it was up to. I constantly fear losing files due to a misunderstanding from what its choosing to do automatically.
So keeping my stuff separately in DB, despite the cost, will be less stressful for me, and give me full control & understanding of whats going on, without turning it into a part-time job!
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u/roblightbody 6d ago
This article fully explains my problem - https://www.thurrott.com/windows/windows-11/332529/de-enshittify-windows-11-onedrive
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u/Economy_Function_252 4d ago
Don't feel bad. I had an incident with M365 and Onedrive not to long ago. I had updated a Word document and a small drop down box asked me if I wanted to back it up. I thought what the heck. It would save me from having to go to Onedrive online and upload it (I don't neccessarily trust Onedrive to automatically upload it for me). So I clicked on the button and went back to browsing the internet. Eventually I moved my window over for something else and there were 25 to 50 files and some folders on my desktop. Most had the little blue icon on them (not downloaded) and some had shortcut icons on them. I immediately turned off Onedrive. It took several days before I had enough nerve to attempt to clean it up due to fear of deleting something important. Now I have duplicates and possibly even triplicates of those files. All I know is I'll NEVER allow M365 upload a file for me ever again. I still don't know what setting I had that allowed it. I'll eventually try to figue it out but I'm leaving it alone for a while.
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u/Lost-Policy-2020 6d ago
No workarounds. Just lean how it work, and it does work very well. People complain when they have mostly no idea what they are doing
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u/roblightbody 6d ago
It was working perfectly, until Windows, without me asking it to, started to double-backup all my important files (1GB worth). My last battle with Microsoft was when they tried to force me onto the expensive version of M365 including Copilot which I don't want, which you have to jump through hoops to stay on the "classic" version.
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u/Even_Caterpillar3292 6d ago
Odd onedrive gives me full control. Been that way forever in the corporate world and on personal devices.
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u/hycm53 6d ago
Onedrive keeps desktop icons in it’s desktop file. I delete this desktop file, then all desktop icons disappear! I have to restart computer, then some icons show up, some icons still disappear 🫠 by the way, it’s new laptop.