Started with a freshly formatted destination drive (h:)
Mode = "one way copy"
Compare = "date (different) or size" Checked options:
Delete files from destination that don't exist in the source
Synchronize sub-folder contents
Ignore seconds when comparing by timestamp.
The operation ran to completion but there were problems. D'Opus threw a UAC elevation request at one point. Granted. Several file copy errors, like on files in the "My Music" folder.
Ran compare when first pass was complete. MASSIVE mismatches present. Ran again to let it get what it didn't catch in the first attempt. Again with the elevation requests and file copy errors. Again, a Compare shows massive mismatches.
At this point, a Compare shows 20,201 files in 1,498 folders to be sync'ed, and 109 files and 117 folders to delete from the destination.
I can tell you there is no way that many files and folders were deleted off the source requiring a delete on the destination!
I notice in the source (c:\users\me) that there are "My Documents" "My Music" "My Pictures" and "My Videos" folders, whereas on the destination, these folders appear without the "My" part in the destination (h:\users\me). I'm assuming that's the reason for the massive disparity upon Compare after the synchronization is complete.
So my questions are:
What's going on here?
Is there a way to configure D'Opus to better accommodate this synchronization operation?
How, specifically, do I successfully sync the entire c:\users\me folder to the external drive?
Please try turning off Preferences / Folders / Folder Display / Display localized folder names (Vista and above), then restart Opus (just in case) and see if that helps.
The 'localized folder names' account for at least part of what you are seeing, since the real folders are called things like Music but (if localization is enabled) will be displayed as things like 'My Music', which may be confusing the sync if the source is localized but the destination is not.
(Even if that now works, I'd recommend looking into automated backup tools for backing up system folders like the top-level of the user-profile. It's not the type of thing the sync tool in Opus is designed for.)
Having disabled the "Display localized folder names (Vista and above)" setting, I'm still getting errors like "An error occurred copying 'My Music': Access is denied (5)" (and also My Pictures, My Videos, and My Documents) even though "My" no longer appears in either the Source or Destination versions of those folders.
As for the automated backup tool recommendation, I understand where you're coming from, but I already have D'Opus and figured it's a good choice for random, occasional, non-scheduled safeguarding of primary data on the computer. I'm already using Microsoft's included Backup & Restore utility to perform regularly scheduled image and backup to an internal 2TB drive dedicated to that purpose - as a backup drive. With the ever increasing threat of malware and RansomWare like CryptoLocker, internal backup drives could be compromised right along with the primary drives in the system. Backups to usually offline devices like USB-connected hard drives are a great fall back in case you get hit and your online backup drives are compromised. Although I could use Microsoft Backup & Restore to backup to a normally offline device, it's a pain because you have to reconfigure the program to select another backup drive and what to backup, then set it back to the normal daily schedule once you're done. It would have been nice if Microsoft included the ability to save and recall different backup jobs.