How to get back local copies of my files?

I tried odrive using the premium trial period to give Amazon Prime photos a try. Now thousands of my photos are in the .cloud format and no longer stored on my computer. I have tried to research a bit through this forum and it seems as though I am required to buy a year subscription to premium odrive (~$100) to be able to use the “unsyncing” feature of the app to get back all of my local content. Is this correct? There has to be a reasonable way to restore the original content on my local drive without either purchasing the premium version of this product or manually downloading all the synced content from the web. Help!

Hi @rtemplen,
Downloading all of your files recursively is a feature in the free product. You can read about how to do this here:

The basic steps are:

  1. Right-click on the folder you want to download and select “sync”
  2. Move the “Download” slider all the way to the right for “Everything”
  3. Check the “Include subfolders” box
  4. Click the big silver sync button

Just let us know if you have any questions about this.

Hi, every time i right-click on a folder and select odrive sync it states that this is a premium feature and asks if I would like to upgrade.Am I doing the process incorrectly or is there an additional limitation to this software?

Hi @rtemplen,
Are you choosing “sync to odrive”. If so, this is a Premium feature. It allows you to create sync relationships with folders outside of the default odrive folder.

With the free version you can still sync everything down from within the default odrive folder, which should be in your user home folder, unless you moved it. Sync Your odrive

From inside the odrive folder, navigate to the folder you want to sync and right-click on it. There should be several options with odrive icons next to them. You will want the “Sync” option.

For more information on the differences in sync features for free and paid, take a look at this post here:

Thank you. Doing this sync from the odrive c: drive location restores jpg files to both this c: odrive location and the original external drive why all my photos are located. I notice during this operation that the c: drive space is consumed or used during this but the original external drive space is not deduced or consumed. Does this mean all the original jpg files are still present but hidden on this external drive until i complete this sync? Is there a way to do this sync without consuming my precious c: drive ssd space? Is there a process for removing the odrive c: files after my originals are restored to my external drive that will not damage or delete the originals? In the end I am simply trying to restore the original state of my 500GB+ of pictures and remove the odrive program.

Hi @rtemplen,
Without Premium you cannot sync to an external drive, so you will need to copy/move the files from the odrive folder on your C drive to your external drive, after they have downloaded. If space is limited you may need to do it in chunks so you do not overwhelm your C drive.

Keep in mind that we do offer a “no questions asked”, full refund if you purchase Premium and then cancel within 30 days of purchase. This means you can use Premium for another 30 days, risk-free. That would allow you to sync to the external drive, directly.

Let me know if you have any questions on the above. Also, please send a diagnostic from the odrive tray menu so I can take a look at your current setup.

I believe I just sent you the diagnostics you requested. Please let me know if you received them successfully.
So if I were to purchase the premium version to sync my content back to my external drive, what is the process after that point to uninstall odrive and not damage any of the files and also remove the odrive folder? Also, I do not believe I received an answer to my question about the original files on my external drive, as I mentioned above the free space on that drive doesn’t seem to change when the files appear as jpg again once the associated file is synced to the odrive folder. Are these external files really there or just pointers to the odrive files?