Files have a brown box on their icon and dont open in Windows 11

Anonymous
2022-02-12T17:29:29+00:00

What is going on here? There is no information anywhere so it obviously isnt a problem for everyone.

Most of my files stored on Dropbox now have a small brown file box icon on the lower left corner of the main icon for all MS Office files. They open perfectly well on the phone and a laptop running Windows 10 but not on my laptop running Windows 11.

I get an error message saying the program cant open it because the file is unsupported or may be corrupt.

Why the **** do they release an OS that doesn't work with their own programs??

Please help,

Thanks

Windows for home | Windows 11 | Files, folders, and storage

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  1. Anonymous
    2022-08-12T21:29:23+00:00

    This happened to me after significant Windows update. Turns out I just needed to restart Onedrive, sign back in and authenticate via notification to my phone.

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  2. Anonymous
    2022-07-28T22:57:35+00:00

    I just got off the line with Microsoft Support for this same issue with all of my files not working and having the brown box.

    Solution was OneDrive was not syncing or it was in the middle of syncing and updating after the windows 11 OS install.

    So check your OneDrive and make sure its synced and online. Simple fix.

    Good luck!

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  3. Diane Poremsky MVP 17,526 Reputation points MVP Volunteer Moderator
    2022-04-01T01:06:11+00:00

    Is there a OneDrive icon in the tray or overflow (the ^ icon) ? If yes, click on it. That should either sign you in automatically or bring up the sign in dialog.

    If its not in the tray type onedrive on the start menu and open it.

    This screenshot is from a computer that is not signed into OneDrive - I purposely ignored the 'not signed in' dialog when I booted it so I could see if it matched your screenshot.

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  4. Diane Poremsky MVP 17,526 Reputation points MVP Volunteer Moderator
    2022-04-01T00:50:20+00:00

    Are you signed into OneDrive?

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  5. Anonymous
    2022-03-31T20:31:51+00:00

    So, can you tell me how to fix this?

    I can't open any of the files that have this brown file box -- and I need to open them.

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