using OneDrive's "Backup" feature w/ OneDrive folder NOT on (C:) [advice needed, how to avoid duplicate folders]

[pkennethv]

Issue solved. Mods, feel free to delete this thread if you want.

 

I got a reply from Microsoft OneDrive support:

Quote

Let me explain you how OneDrive does the backup.

Suppose I enable the backup for Desktop folder. Once the backup is enabled, the location of the Desktop folder will be changed and the Desktop folder will now reside within the OneDrive folder. The location of the Desktop folder will be changed from C:/Users/User_name/Desktop to Drive_name/OneDrive/Desktop and all the files within the Desktop folder will be transferred to this new location. 

 

Now, to answer your query.

I approached my live chat session with the perspective of trying to find out if it was possible to not have OneDrive download a local copy of my Documents & Desktop from (C:) to my OneDrive folder on (D:) while still having a copy of it in the cloud. Ultimately, the live chat agent told me that those folders (Documents folder & Desktop) appearing within the OneDrive folder on (D:) were only effectively links or references to those folders/files on (C:), and that they weren’t actually taking up space on my (D:) drive. Is this true?

OneDrive is not making a copy of the files. Instead, OneDrive moved all the files from their original location (on the C: drive) to the respective folders within the OneDrive folder (on the D: drive). In this case, even though you can access the files from the Desktop/Documents folder under "This PC" in the File Explorer, they are actually present in the Desktop/Documents folder within the OneDrive folder. To check this, you can right-click on the Desktop/Documents folder and check the location to verify it is within the OneDrive folder. 

 

The files are not links or references to the original files. Instead, they are the original files which are now moved to a different location (within the OneDrive folder). They now occupy the storage within the OneDrive folder. If OneDrive folder is present on D: drive and files are available on the device (not online) then they will occupy the storage on D: drive. 

 

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[Windows 10]

 

Hi all,

 

For years, I have made my (D:) drive the location of my OneDrive folder because my (C:) drive is a costlier NVME SSD and the contents of my OneDrive wouldn’t benefit meaningfully from the additional speed of it.

 

More recently, I become aware of OneDrive’s “backup” feature which allows the contents of your Desktop, Documents folder, etc. (all of which are located on (C:) ) to be synchronized to OneDrive even though those folders exist outside of the OneDrive folder. That sounded like something I could benefit from, so I enabled it.

 

However, now, when I open up my OneDrive folder on (D:), there is a copy of my Desktop & Documents folder…which actually makes perfect sense in terms of “why this is happening from a technical perspective.” Practically speaking, I think it’s easy to see why I don’t need/want the contents of my Desktop & Documents folder on (C:) to also have a copy taking up space on (D:) of the same computer.

 

So what I’d like to know is if there is a way for the OneDrive app to not download a local copy of my Desktop & Documents folder? When I navigate to those folders on (D:) using Windows Explorer, right click, “Free up space” under the OneDrive section of the menu, it will remove the local copy of the file on both (D:) as well as (C:). What I would like is for there to always be a local copy of the file on (C:) but not have it also exist locally within my OneDrive folder on (D:).

 

Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks!