For one reason or another, I had to clean reinstall Scrivener. I thought that my wip files would be safe when I used Revo Uninstaller. I didn’t realize that the default backup location for backups was: %APPDATA%\Literature&Latte\Scrivener\Backups. Apparently Revo Uninstaller happily deletes this path. Luckily I had two other backup locations. Although when I tried to unzip my Dropbox zip file it complained that only the scrivx file was there. Even though I saw the other folders, Files and Settings, were there. But that’s a different problem.
I never use uninstaller programs as I can’t control what they decide to delete. Frankly, I trust myself more. Other people say the same. But other people trust uninstaller apps. Whatever.
That being said, I keep my Scrivener backups (as zip files, keeping 25 copies) elsewhere:
~/Backups/Scrivener
Other apps that backup have their own subfolder under ~/Backups. Not buried and thus not out-of-sight. Not in folder synced by a third party sync service. Sync is not backup.
That folder and the rest of the system including the Scrivener project files which reside in a Dropbox-synched folder as offline files, are backed up (using 3-2-1 backup regime) so the backups are backed up and stored securely.
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I like to have my own Scrivener Project Folder on the C drive away from the program’s default location to avoid the issue you have. When you reinstall, you will have to again consider changing the default location.
You may try an app called r-undelete to check if your files are recoverable. It’s a free download and will tell you if it’s possible without a purchase. However, the undelete only works for free on old hard disk format, and requires payment for newer Windows formats—it will tell you which applies.
What Revo Uninstaller does, is unknown. If it scrapes the hard disk partition somehow, don’t expect to find something to undelete. That said, my experience is that the only way to truly delete forever is to format a partition with a format that isn’t the same as the prior format, aside from writing over the deleted areas, which is unlikely in the short term.
Aside from valuable advice by others above, I pin the Dropbox Backups folder to the Quick Access in File Explorer. That way you can periodically check if things have synced without much effort.
I take it you setup backup to Dropbox using File > Options > Backup and saving as a ZIP. Using that selection wouldn’t just sync your SCRIVX project control file but the entire SCRIV folder for each projects. Also, Dropbox has no technical ability to open a ZIP and strip out random content.
Opening a ZIP should be done as follows:
Drag the latest to Downloads, away from your normal work.
Click into the ZIP—Windows 11 allows this by default.
Drag the SCRIV folder into your Downloads folder.
Click on the SCRIV folder and add OLD to the filename, using rename.
Click into the SCRIV folder, find the project with its former SCRIVX filename.
Double click on it.
The project opens safely with its renamed filename.
Carry on from there, by saving the project to where it existed before.
You do all this renaming because if things go wrong through an overlooked step, you avoid confusing yourself.
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I see how your system of pulling the zip file out of dropbox to some safe location and then renaming it before extraction keep everything tidy and sounds like a good idea. I also understand that extracting a zip file in the dropbox folder is a bad idea as dropbox would immediately backup the extracted files and that could get messy. Even so, I don’t understand why when I extracted the zip file in dropbox folder it says it couldn’t find anything but the scrivx file even though I saw the other files in the zip package.
If you still have backups in Dropbox, move them out, or better still, copy it out so the original stays. Then extract. Then rename.
It’s an anomaly to me that Dropbox would have access to the content of a ZIP folder and move things around, irrespective of the offline/online setting. Dropbox would see each zip as a whole entity, to my mind.
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Yes, agree with above about zip. But (I’m not at my computer to test this idea) in macOS and I presume Windows when one uses macOS Finder and Windows File Explorer the zip in a Dropbox synced folder is automatically without-asking “opened” (?) and presumably the files are cached to the folder holding the zip where then Dropbox does its thing to sync since new files are detected, regardless of offline/online. If offline, files are kept on local disk, and if online, then anybody’s guess when and if files are removed from local. This just my understanding, which of course, might not be completely correct.
Hence, I agree, move zips out of Dropbox, to handle. I put them in my ~/Desktop (macOS) to unzip and then once unzipped move them to where I want them. I use ~/Desktop to help me eventually clean up old/un-needed things that were not deleted after handling. Like my real desk.
I’ve never had an issue with this as my “muscle memory” method using zip files for decades.
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It seems like keeping 25 copies is a waste of disk space, even if you have it. I can’t imagine a scenario where 24 copies would fail and one would be good. The default 5 copies seem adequate.
I’ve decided that the best method is to keep the Scrivener auto backup on a folder in dropbox (…/dropbox/Scrivener Backups), then maybe once a week do a manual backup to another folder elsewhere such as C:/user/[abc]/scrivener backups.
Well, of course, that’s a matter of opinion. I keep 25 copies so that I can go back to prior versions. I’m not concerned about failed backups.
Again, opinion. My opinion is that Dropbox Sync folders are not reliable as backups. Flaw (disk, accidental deletion, whatever) on local disk or on Dropbox Server automatically gets synched to the other device. Dropbox has a service call Dropbox Backup because of the distinction between backup and sync.
Hence I backup to a local folder, then use 3-2-1 Backup (not sync) Regime to backup everything, including the backups.
All automatic, but I do occasionally monitor and attempt to restore just ensure backups happening as setup.
Again, my opinion. Others can do as they see best.
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It depends o
It depends on how you work. At time I can open and close a project 5 times a day. Project that over 5 days and I’d have a working week of backups to depend on.
That said, the options are there to choose less, as per your requirements.
I have scripts that run backups of my Scrivener Projects, developed with AutoHotKey on Windows. When I moved to Mac I acquired Keyboard Maestro to do the same thing. I don’t sync between operating systems, since I generally work from one location, and laptops are feather light and hardly bulky these days.
My research PDFs, spreadsheets, docs and photos are all outside of Scrivener, accessed through links—I find it more efficient to work this way, in effect, never having to leave the Scrivener editor I’m working in.
I also have a script to compare what’s changed (added, deleted, renamed) in those research folders (the Scrivener projects folder too) and update only what has changed.
Hardly an inconvenience once setup and backs up to multiple locations in seconds and give me a feedback report. And this is aside from Scriveners backup to a local Dropbox folder and synched to Dropbox’s cloud service. Whether that falls into the backups and syncing is not the same meme that’s often seen here 
—I do know it works.
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There’s another point about having more than 5 backups.
When you reach the number of backups you have set, the oldest one is removed each time a new one is created. It can, and I believe has happened, that someone with only 5 backups, who has had a problem such that they have had to shut down and restart several times in a row, ends up with all the backups having whatever the problem is and the last good, non-corrupted backup has already been deleted.
For that reason, as well as what @rms has said, one should keep more than 5 backups. Security and peace of mind is more important than disk space. You can always go into your backup location periodically and remove old ones manually if disk space becomes an issue, but if all your 5 backups have the problem you’re trying to solve, you’ve no longer got a good one to restore.
Mark
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I see a good reason for these kind of back and forth comments. I hadn’t thought of the fact that you might be opening and closing projects many times in a day. I now understand why 25 backups may not be excessive in many cases.
Thanks to all for the ideas. I’m really glad to be a part of this forum.
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Note that merely opening and closing a project does not generate a new backup. Making a change to the project – however minor – does.
Personally, I only keep five backups. But I also have a Time Machine volume (Mac) with versions going back more than a year, and an online backup (BackBlaze) that goes back even further than that. I also make “milestone” backups at regular intervals – like after finishing a draft – and store those separately from Scrivener’s automatic backups. (And then they in turn are protected by Time Machine and BackBlaze.)
If you’re trying to recover data, the first thing to do is make copies of all the project and/or backup files that might be relevant to the problem. That way your efforts won’t risk making the problem worse by destroying a potentially good backup.
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I’m with you on that one, with the exception I do keep 25 backups, though considering dropping it to 10 once I’m in the new house with the NAS and the Time Machine disk permanently running.
Well, Time Machine won’t help a Windows User, and my dog wouldn’t deem it worth it’s while to lift a leg to Windows Backup.
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One of so many good reasons to go Mac! 
There are decent Windows backup apps including one or two free ones.
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Perhaps. Coming from Windows, I find Mac’s propensity to float windows in and out (or disappear) when you need them and pieces of the architecture that shrinks and grow without permission, irritating. Windows takes a sensible approach; a window is where you last worked on it and expect it to be.
Anyway, the focus of my post was a rant at Windows Backup.