Backup - OneDrive Issues

Winuser · Feb 27, 2024

Edwin said:
They're getting aggressive with everything, Edge, OneDrive, hardware compatibility..., hell, next they'll be dictating what kind of Desktop background we can have!

And charging us to use it.

Winuser · Feb 27, 2024

Edwin said:
Again!!!

View attachment 88483

First of all, no such folder exists on OneDrive...
secondly, I have one fecking lousy mp3, I want a spare copy of it in the Cloud, that's all!!! Is that such a hard task to accomplish without all the other dictatorship!?!?!?
Weird program!!!

Are you using a MS program or app to play your music and got that screen? If so I'm glad I use either VLC or MPC-HC to play my media files.

glasskuter · Feb 27, 2024

Edwin said:
They're getting aggressive with everything, Edge, OneDrive, hardware compatibility..., hell, next they'll be dictating what kind of Desktop background we can have!

Edwin said:
They're getting aggressive

pparks1 · Feb 27, 2024

retiredat44 said:
That's the same reason why MS is defaulting peoples User Folders to OneDrive.

Well, also people use the default folders and they find it very convenient when their computer dies, and they buy a new one and plug it in and log in and low and behold...all of their data comes back. This is a very nice feature for those who don't regularly back up their stuff. That's sadly a lot of people.

pparks1 · Feb 27, 2024

Winuser said:
All I can say to that is that they don't know what they don't know. MS should be ashamed of themselves for not making OneDrive a option that user have to choose when setting up their computers.

Like i said before, for some it's like magic and it just works. their files are available on multiple computers if they want, available from a web browser, accessible via a cell phone.

It like email, I use gmail now. I don't want a mail client and I don't want to store my mail on my local computer. I want it accessible from any and every machine I use. I want to be able to format and reinstall the OS on my device without having to worry about whether I backed up my files.

I cannot see why MS would be ashamed giving people simple access to their files from all of their devices.

pparks1 · Feb 27, 2024

Winuser said:
If I was to delete a file on OneDrive that is synced to my local OneDrive folder it would still be there?

Technically yes. If you delete a file from your local computer, I would expect that the synced copy in the cloud would also be gone as it's going to sync those changes. Just like if you edit and update a file on your local computer, the version in the cloud gets updated. A deletion is nothing more than an edit that has removed everything. I said technically yes, as it's still in the recycle bin in the cloud and you can get back to it. And you can get back to it's previous file revisions.

glasskuter · Feb 28, 2024

The negatives and positives of Onedrive has been talked to death many times over. Like with all threads related to this particular subject, we've run wild into our personal opinions and preferences rather than sticking to the poster's particular problem. It seems to happen every time this subject hits the forum.
@kodakjack seems to have dropped out of the thread. KJ, I apologize that your thread was not kept to helping you. Were you successful in copying all your personal files? If so, creating a new local user account as I suggested in post #18 will be the easiest way to get your system back into a workable, familiar state and you will not have to buy additional onedrive space..

TraderGary · Feb 28, 2024

I've used OneDrive for more than 15 years and find it absolutely invaluable. I have a local 1TB SSD on my main computer, System One. An individual can subscribe to Microsoft 365 for $69 USD annually, which includes 1TB of cloud OneDrive. I keep all my data and all my photos in my local OneDrive folder, and it's mirrored in real-time on my 1TB cloud OneDrive.

On my main System One computer I have Files On Demand turned OFF. This gives me a constant real-time mirror with cloud OneDrive. All files both locally and in the cloud are always identical.

My System Two computer only has a small 256GB SSD, so I have Files On Demand turned ON. This way the only files I have locally on System Two are the files I'm actually using and have actually downloaded.

With OneDrive, all my data and photos are always available and always up to date in real-time on all my devices, my computers, my tablets, and my smart phone. Over the years this has been invaluable to me.

In 15 years, I've never lost a file with OneDrive. I attribute this to taking the time to have a full understanding of how OneDrive works and how to use OneDrive.

My backup strategy utilizes 3 totally different methods, one of which must be offsite.
1. Microsoft OneDrive
2. Microsoft File History
3. Macrium Reflect Images

TairikuOkami · Feb 28, 2024

Winuser said:
When you lost your files on OneDrive did you go to your online OneDrive account and see if they were in the Recycle Bin?

I removed files online, including the recycle bin, because those were unencrypted sensitive files, so I freaked. I did not know, that onedrive had already removed local files. I learnt my lesson, I keep onedrive folder on a second partition and after install, I re-sync it after moving system folders. Onedrive is nicely integrated into Windows, but it is not very user friendly, like any other MS app.

Winuser · Feb 28, 2024

pparks1 said:
I cannot see why MS would be ashamed giving people simple access to their files from all of their devices.

I can think of four reason right off the top of my head.
1. They are not giving user a choice of where they want their personal files stored when setting up a new computer.
2. They are giving users a small amount of free storage. They know that in time most users will reach that limit and that will give them a chance to sell the user more storage space.
3. They make it almost impossible for the average user to move their data to a local drive without outside help. For most that would mean they'd have to pay someone.
4. There are still users that have slow and/or limited internet access.

pparks1 · Feb 28, 2024

Winuser said:
I can think of four reason right off the top of my head.
1. They are not giving user a choice of where they want their personal files stored when setting up a new computer.

It's trivially easy to change the location of My Documents, My Pictures and My Music when you setup a new computer. You don't have to leave these in the OneDrive folder....it's just where it puts it by default.

Winuser said:
2. They are giving users a small amount of free storage. They know that in time most users will reach that limit and that will give them a chance to sell the user more storage space.

Well, Microsoft is a for-profit organization. They don't provide you with Windows for free, they don't provide you with Office for free. Apple provides you with only 5GB of free space in their iCloud account. All of these companies are out to make money.

Winuser said:
3. They make it almost impossible for the average user to move their data to a local drive without outside help. For most that would mean they'd have to pay someone.

Almost impossible......Really????? In my first response to #1 above, i said it was trivially easy.

Winuser said:
4. There are still users that have slow and/or limited internet access.

Yes, some people are limited. I'd venture to say that they are not the majority. Why cater to the lowest common denominator? The vast majority of people are multiple device these days, phones, tablets, PC's, and such and people enjoy having their data available on the go. Not all, but many.

Edwin · Feb 28, 2024

I wanna know why when I go to Manage Backup and choose not to Use these folders, it sends all content to the Recycle Bin!
Why does it do that!?!?!?

pparks1 · Feb 28, 2024

Winuser said:
3. They make it almost impossible for the average user to move their data to a local drive without outside help. For most that would mean they'd have to pay someone.

I will admit that they did make this a bit harder than it used to be. You always used to have a location tab for Documents, Pictures and such when you looked at the properties on the library icon in the left pane and you could just create C:\data\documents and then change the location of Documents to point to C:\data\documents and it was moved.

On a brand new install of 11, using an MS account, and having OneDrive enabled and syncing....the Location tab is missing. Therefore, you have to right click on OneDrive, hit settings and choose the Manage Backup option

From here, you toggle MyDocuments, tell it to stop backup.

Now we can see the Location tab on My Documents and just repoint it at C:\data\Documents or where ever we want to put it.

TraderGary · Feb 28, 2024

I agree that Microsoft made a really poor choice making Windows Backup to OneDrive a default choice.

Leo Notenboom of AskLeo does a superb job of illustrating what actually has happened and what to do about it. Leo is a retired Microsoft department manager.

pparks1 · Feb 28, 2024

TraderGary said:
I agree that Microsoft made a really poor choice making Windows Backup to OneDrive a default choice.

Leo Notenboom of AskLeo does a superb job of illustrating what actually has happened and what to do about it. Leo is a retired Microsoft department manager.

@TraderGary,

Yeah, I was surprised to see on a new install (which I do rarely), that Backup was automatically turned on....thus eliminating my normal ability to just reset the location of the folder via properties as i normally do.

I watched his video all the way through, and I think that I don't find OneDrive very confusing as I have always used it like it was originally setup and intended to run. I've always had a dedicated data location in my OneDrive folder that I manage on my own and I put things that I want into that folder knowing it will be local and synced to the cloud, and then I have all of my other locations on my PC's hard drive where I store things locally that aren't part of OneDrive. And my experience as a systems engineer for 25+ years helps, as I am very used to having network drives and being very cognizant of where I store my files and being organized about it. It's easy for me to discern where it's at and whether it's local or not.

TraderGary · Feb 28, 2024

@pparks1, my experience and time as an IT systems engineer is close to the same as yours. Except that I retired early to trade stocks full time.

As stated earlier, I started using OneDrive over 15 years ago and cannot imagine using Windows without using OneDrive.

You and I have the experience to use OneDrive and fully understand how to use it and what is going on. Unfortunately, the average user doesn't have that experience and finds himself totally lost with OneDrive. I think Leo's video does an excellent job of explaining how it actually works.

pparks1 · Feb 28, 2024

Edwin said:
I wanna know why when I go to Manage Backup and choose not to Use these folders, it sends all content to the Recycle Bin!
Why does it do that!?!?!?

I'm confused by this, I don't see that as the behavior.

Right now, this test machine is setup with Manage Backup turned on and mydocuments, pictures and desktop are being backed up.

Inside of the OneDrive\MyDocuments I have documents and inside of OneDrive\pictures i have pictures

Now, If I go turn off the documents backup feature, I get a message saying that my files and such won't be protected in OneDrive if I stop the backup.

But if I go ahead and do that, I see that MyDocuments is not set as backed up.

In the OneDrive documents folder I still see 100% of my files. They are all there, nothing is in the Recycle Bin. And If I create a new file in the OneDrive Documents folder, it works and is synced to the cloud.

Edwin · Feb 28, 2024

pparks1 said:
I'm confused by this, I don't see that as the behavior.

Here's exactly what happens:
I have mp3's in my User/Music folder, just like everybody else.
I install OneDrive.
I go to Manage Backup and choose to enable Music folder.
OneDrive creates an additional Music folder inside of the Personal/OneDrive folder, over and above my User/Music folder, and puts/recreates the mp3's in it, and sends copies to the Cloud.
If I go to Settings/Choose folders and uncheck 'Make all files available', all local content is deleted, all content in the OneDrive/Music folder, all content in the User/Music folder. All content is in the Recycle Bin.
The online content remains.
OneDrive should not be touching the content in my User/Music folder! It can recreate the content anywhere else, I don't care, but, it should not be emptying my User folder!

pparks1 · Feb 28, 2024

Edwin said:
Here's exactly what happens:
I have mp3's in my User/Music folder.
I install OneDrive.
I go to Manage Backup and choose Music folder.
OneDrive creates an additional Music folder inside of the Personal/OneDrive folder, over and above my User/Music folder, and puts/recreates the mp3's in it.
If I go to Choose folders and uncheck 'Make all files available', all content is deleted, all content in the OneDrive/Music folder, all content in the User/Music folder.
The online content remains.
OneDrive should not be touching the content in my User/Music folder! It can recreate the content anywhere else, I don't care, but, it should not be emptying my User folder!

Okay, thanks for the details. I see exactly what you are saying.

This part seems to be confusing. "Unselected folders will be hidden from File Explorer".

It's not that files are being "hidden", it's that they are being removed from File Explorer on the local drive. but this deletion is intentionally not being synced to the cloud and the content remains in the cloud.

I make use of this non-visible folder feature within my OneDrive. I have a few things that I have stored in my OneDrive account in the cloud, but I don't want that to appear if my kids walk up to my PC, and start looking through my OneDrive folder within File Explorer. But I guess I never really sat down to evaluate exactly what happened, but rather than just flagging the files as hidden files....which could be easily circumvented with file explorer or pulling out your physical hard drive and mounting it elsewhere, it has taken more of a full permanent solution by whacking the local files entirely.....thus requiring you to access them via the web browser in the cloud account < Which is exactly what I honestly want when I say to not make them visible on my local computer.

andrew129260 · Feb 28, 2024

I think the last couple points explain very easily why onedrive is confusing lol.

Thanks @TraderGary
for posting that video, thats a great explanation of whats happening.

Google drive backup does a better job and is easier to understand.

Google Drive: Share Files Online with Secure Cloud Storage | Google Workspace

Learn about Google Drive’s file sharing platform that provides a personal, secure cloud storage option to share content with other users.

www.google.com

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