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Resolved Cannot empty Time Machine backups from trash

J

JayS90

macrumors member
Original poster
Jan 2, 2011
40
0
London, UK
Right, so I've made a majorly idiotic mistake and manually deleted some time machine backups from the Backups.backupsdb folder on my external HD. Now I can't empty the trash ("The operation can’t be completed because an unexpected error occurred (error code -8003)"), and the backups are still taking up God knows how much space on my external HD.

I've spent hours on Google, browsing forums (Macrumours too!) and trying every terminal sudo command I've come across.

Can anyone help me? :(

//Edit

Re-formatting my external HD would have to be an absolute last resort, as I have gigs of stuff on there that I'd have to find somewhere to back up to first (and my MBP HD doesn't have enough space to store it all in the meantime).
 
Last edited:
D

desmith1944

macrumors newbie
Dec 10, 2011
4
0
Maybe a trash fix

Hi, I am a new MAC user, I just bought a IMac and I started having problems getting the trash to empty.
I came across a app called Trash it. Not sure where I found it now but, if you Google search you should be able to find it.
Anyway I loaded and ran the app. If makes it own Trash Icon. I went into my original trash and selected all and drug it into the new Trash it. My computer did nothing for about a minute. I decided to reboot and when I did my Mac trash was empty.
I hope this helps you and a lot of other users. Dave Smith
 
G

grahamnp

macrumors 6502a
Jun 4, 2008
969
4
I've had this problem many, many times. I've had luck manually deleting the .Trashes folder on the Time Machine drive's root directory. It will automatically be recreated.

Open terminal, type "cd /Volumes" and then "ls" to display all volumes and "cd <<TM volume name>>" to go into the TM volume.

Type "ls -a" to display all files, the -a is because Trashes is hidden.

"sudo rm -rf .Trashes" should delete the trashes folder.

Careful, messing that up could delete the wrong thing. Also, this hasn't always solved the problem for me.

Time Machine seems to (rather annoyingly) just do it's own thing. I've had it delete the files on its own time before and the free space was back after a certain period of time. I have no explanation for it but it seems to have fixed itself.

-----

Not entirely related but a word of advice: it seems that you've got data on the same drive as your TM backup, and this is what is stopping you from reformatting. Generally not a good idea to mix backups and your data on the same volume.
 
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Reactions: pyuriy, yms137, KnoeSS and 1 other person
J

JayS90

macrumors member
Original poster
Jan 2, 2011
40
0
London, UK
desmith1944 said:
Hi, I am a new MAC user, I just bought a IMac and I started having problems getting the trash to empty.
I came across a app called Trash it. Not sure where I found it now but, if you Google search you should be able to find it.
Anyway I loaded and ran the app. If makes it own Trash Icon. I went into my original trash and selected all and drug it into the new Trash it. My computer did nothing for about a minute. I decided to reboot and when I did my Mac trash was empty.
I hope this helps you and a lot of other users. Dave Smith
Click to expand...

Thanks for the advice desmith1944, but this was one of the first things I tried and it had no effect.

grahamnp said:
I've had this problem many, many times. I've had luck manually deleting the .Trashes folder on the Time Machine drive's root directory. It will automatically be recreated.

Open terminal, type "cd /Volumes" and then "ls" to display all volumes and "cd <<TM volume name>>" to go into the TM volume.

Type "ls -a" to display all files, the -a is because Trashes is hidden.

"sudo rm -rf .Trashes" should delete the trashes folder.

Careful, messing that up could delete the wrong thing. Also, this hasn't always solved the problem for me.

Time Machine seems to (rather annoyingly) just do it's own thing. I've had it delete the files on its own time before and the free space was back after a certain period of time. I have no explanation for it but it seems to have fixed itself.

-----

Not entirely related but a word of advice: it seems that you've got data on the same drive as your TM backup, and this is what is stopping you from reformatting. Generally not a good idea to mix backups and your data on the same volume.
Click to expand...

grahamnp, you're actually a life saver! :eek: this totally did the trick, it emptied the trash on my drive and I haven't had to re-format it :D

I have so learnt my lesson with Time Machine - after the headache it gave me last night I may start using Carbon Copy Cloner instead. Either way, I'm going to partition my external HD and have a partition dedicated to backups instead of mixing my data with them!

Thanks again, grahamnp! :)
 
K

Kateryna

macrumors newbie
Mar 16, 2012
1
0
Please explain to Mac dummy!

Hi grahamnp!
I run into the same trouble with Mac: I manually deleted backups, but as soon as I plug in backup disk, I see my trash ful with what I deleted!
I don't understand what terminal to open. Could you specify the program name or describe all action step-by step as for dummy? I'll be thankful for the rest of my life. I hope you answer. Thank you!

grahamnp said:
I've had this problem many, many times. I've had luck manually deleting the .Trashes folder on the Time Machine drive's root directory. It will automatically be recreated.

Open terminal, type "cd /Volumes" and then "ls" to display all volumes and "cd <<TM volume name>>" to go into the TM volume.

Type "ls -a" to display all files, the -a is because Trashes is hidden.

"sudo rm -rf .Trashes" should delete the trashes folder.

Careful, messing that up could delete the wrong thing. Also, this hasn't always solved the problem for me.

Time Machine seems to (rather annoyingly) just do it's own thing. I've had it delete the files on its own time before and the free space was back after a certain period of time. I have no explanation for it but it seems to have fixed itself.

-----

Not entirely related but a word of advice: it seems that you've got data on the same drive as your TM backup, and this is what is stopping you from reformatting. Generally not a good idea to mix backups and your data on the same volume.
Click to expand...
 
G

grahamnp

macrumors 6502a
Jun 4, 2008
969
4
No problem.

To get to terminal:

Go to spotlight (cmd + space and type '"terminal) or go to your applications folder -> utilites -> Terminal.

I don't actually understand what you mean by your trash becoming full when you plug your backup drive in. Are you talking about the .Trashes folder taking up space on your backup drive? I don't want to tell you to do anything else without actually getting that straight because the command line allows you to delete pretty much anything, even stuff crucial to the operation of the computer.
 
T

twfmike

macrumors newbie
May 29, 2008
19
0
Didn't work for me.

So, I had the same problem: manually deleted old time machine backups (won't do that again) and then have a full trash folder when the external TM drive is connected, and reduced capacity on the TM drive.

Tried grahamnp's suggestion. Terminal prompted for my password. I entered that and then..... nothing. Terminal seems to have gone off to do something (ie wont take any further commands) but no change to the trash folder.....

tried it twice, pretty sure I followed grahamnp's instructions precisely.

Any ideas???
 
S

swb1192

macrumors 6502
Dec 4, 2007
258
0
grahamnp said:
I've had this problem many, many times. I've had luck manually deleting the .Trashes folder on the Time Machine drive's root directory. It will automatically be recreated.

Open terminal, type "cd /Volumes" and then "ls" to display all volumes and "cd <<TM volume name>>" to go into the TM volume.

Type "ls -a" to display all files, the -a is because Trashes is hidden.

"sudo rm -rf .Trashes" should delete the trashes folder.

Careful, messing that up could delete the wrong thing. Also, this hasn't always solved the problem for me.

Time Machine seems to (rather annoyingly) just do it's own thing. I've had it delete the files on its own time before and the free space was back after a certain period of time. I have no explanation for it but it seems to have fixed itself.

-----

Not entirely related but a word of advice: it seems that you've got data on the same drive as your TM backup, and this is what is stopping you from reformatting. Generally not a good idea to mix backups and your data on the same volume.
Click to expand...

You are absolutely amazing. Simply amazing. Thank you so much.
 
G

grahamnp

macrumors 6502a
Jun 4, 2008
969
4
No problem.

twfmike, did you get it fixed eventually. This can take a long time and it does not tell you what it's doing, so it might appear to have frozen.
 
S

slinkydge

macrumors newbie
Aug 16, 2012
1
0
Please help

I have tried this and it's not working for me.


cd /Volumes ls cd SlinkyDGE then I hit return
Is -a then I hit return

at this point it displays the external hard drive as well as my iPod name, iPhone name, even an iPod name from years and years ago!! But not any files/folders.

any way

I type
sudo rm -rf .Trashes
put my password in
then I'm back where i started.


I do have data on the drive that I use for back ups. I didn't know this was wrong.

Also how are you supposed to get rid of old back-ups the right way??


even after a re-start it's still there.


Please help!
 
S

swb1192

macrumors 6502
Dec 4, 2007
258
0
slinkydge said:
I have tried this and it's not working for me.


cd /Volumes ls cd SlinkyDGE then I hit return
Is -a then I hit return

at this point it displays the external hard drive as well as my iPod name, iPhone name, even an iPod name from years and years ago!! But not any files/folders.

any way

I type
sudo rm -rf .Trashes
put my password in
then I'm back where i started.


I do have data on the drive that I use for back ups. I didn't know this was wrong.

Also how are you supposed to get rid of old back-ups the right way??


even after a re-start it's still there.


Please help!
Click to expand...

You need to press the return key more often.

cd /volumes RETURN
ls RETURN
cd /[drive name] RETURN
etc etc
 
L

ldcobb2

macrumors newbie
Nov 6, 2012
1
0
grahamnp said:
I've had this problem many, many times. I've had luck manually deleting the .Trashes folder on the Time Machine drive's root directory. It will automatically be recreated.

Open terminal, type "cd /Volumes" and then "ls" to display all volumes and "cd <<TM volume name>>" to go into the TM volume.

Type "ls -a" to display all files, the -a is because Trashes is hidden.

"sudo rm -rf .Trashes" should delete the trashes folder.

Careful, messing that up could delete the wrong thing. Also, this hasn't always solved the problem for me.

Time Machine seems to (rather annoyingly) just do it's own thing. I've had it delete the files on its own time before and the free space was back after a certain period of time. I have no explanation for it but it seems to have fixed itself.

-----

Not entirely related but a word of advice: it seems that you've got data on the same drive as your TM backup, and this is what is stopping you from reformatting. Generally not a good idea to mix backups and your data on the same volume.
Click to expand...

Okay, so I'm attempting this solution and I type "cd /Time Machine Backups" (the volume name) into Terminal and it says "-bash: cd: /Time: No such file or directory"

Any suggestions as to what I'm doing wrong?

Thanks

UPDATE: I got it to work! Thanks grahamnp!
 
Last edited:
C

cowaig

macrumors newbie
Nov 13, 2012
2
0
same problem

Hi noticed you solved the issue of removing TM backup from trash, gone thro the same route but no joy, im a bit of a novice to Macs, what is the volume name on the part cd <<TM volume name>> ??? any help would be appreciated
 
H

Haaker

macrumors newbie
Jun 26, 2012
28
2
Philadelphia area
grahamnp said:
I've had this problem many, many times. I've had luck manually deleting the .Trashes folder on the Time Machine drive's root directory. It will automatically be recreated.

Open terminal, type "cd /Volumes" and then "ls" to display all volumes and "cd <<TM volume name>>" to go into the TM volume.

Type "ls -a" to display all files, the -a is because Trashes is hidden.

"sudo rm -rf .Trashes" should delete the trashes folder.

Careful, messing that up could delete the wrong thing. Also, this hasn't always solved the problem for me.

Time Machine seems to (rather annoyingly) just do it's own thing. I've had it delete the files on its own time before and the free space was back after a certain period of time. I have no explanation for it but it seems to have fixed itself.

-----

Not entirely related but a word of advice: it seems that you've got data on the same drive as your TM backup, and this is what is stopping you from reformatting. Generally not a good idea to mix backups and your data on the same volume.
Click to expand...

Thank you, thank you! Your advice worked perfectly. I really appreciate it!
 
morespce54

morespce54

macrumors 65816
Apr 30, 2004
1,331
11
Around the World
grahamnp said:
I've had this problem many, many times. I've had luck manually deleting the .Trashes folder on the Time Machine drive's root directory. It will automatically be recreated.

Open terminal, type "cd /Volumes" and then "ls" to display all volumes and "cd <<TM volume name>>" to go into the TM volume.

Type "ls -a" to display all files, the -a is because Trashes is hidden.

"sudo rm -rf .Trashes" should delete the trashes folder.

Careful, messing that up could delete the wrong thing. Also, this hasn't always solved the problem for me.

Time Machine seems to (rather annoyingly) just do it's own thing. I've had it delete the files on its own time before and the free space was back after a certain period of time. I have no explanation for it but it seems to have fixed itself.

-----

Not entirely related but a word of advice: it seems that you've got data on the same drive as your TM backup, and this is what is stopping you from reformatting. Generally not a good idea to mix backups and your data on the same volume.
Click to expand...


Couldn't you delete only the "backup.backup" folder (or whichever folder you've deleted) instead of the whole .Trashes folder on the Time Machine drive? Seems more safe to me.
 
G

grahamnp

macrumors 6502a
Jun 4, 2008
969
4
Haaker said:
Thank you, thank you! Your advice worked perfectly. I really appreciate it!
Click to expand...

No problem!

Irock619 said:
Doesn't time machine delete backups on its own when space is needed ?
Click to expand...

Normally, yes. This is for when it fails to do that correctly.

morespce54 said:
Couldn't you delete only the "backup.backup" folder (or whichever folder you've deleted) instead of the whole .Trashes folder on the Time Machine drive? Seems more safe to me.
Click to expand...

You could, but one of the issues is that it gets stuck at that point and you go no further. Deleting it moves it to .Trashes so if it won't delete itself after that, doing this will force it. Just make sure nothing else was in the .Trashes folder, it recreates itself automatically after deletion so losing it is not an issue.
 
N

niklah9

macrumors newbie
Dec 11, 2012
1
0
Thanks!!!

grahamnp said:
I've had this problem many, many times. I've had luck manually deleting the .Trashes folder on the Time Machine drive's root directory. It will automatically be recreated.

Open terminal, type "cd /Volumes" and then "ls" to display all volumes and "cd <<TM volume name>>" to go into the TM volume.

Type "ls -a" to display all files, the -a is because Trashes is hidden.

"sudo rm -rf .Trashes" should delete the trashes folder.

Careful, messing that up could delete the wrong thing. Also, this hasn't always solved the problem for me.

Time Machine seems to (rather annoyingly) just do it's own thing. I've had it delete the files on its own time before and the free space was back after a certain period of time. I have no explanation for it but it seems to have fixed itself.

-----

Not entirely related but a word of advice: it seems that you've got data on the same drive as your TM backup, and this is what is stopping you from reformatting. Generally not a good idea to mix backups and your data on the same volume.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the help!! This worked like a charm!! I was dreading having to call Apple to get help with this, thanks again!
 
Q

QMH

macrumors newbie
Dec 13, 2012
1
0
Hi! I'm having this problem - after typing in "ls -a", there isn't any files being displayed. But in my trash folder, the backups are still there. Where could I gone wrong? This is frustrating! It's taking up a lot of my space.. :(


grahamnp said:
I've had this problem many, many times. I've had luck manually deleting the .Trashes folder on the Time Machine drive's root directory. It will automatically be recreated.

Open terminal, type "cd /Volumes" and then "ls" to display all volumes and "cd <<TM volume name>>" to go into the TM volume.

Type "ls -a" to display all files, the -a is because Trashes is hidden.

"sudo rm -rf .Trashes" should delete the trashes folder.

Careful, messing that up could delete the wrong thing. Also, this hasn't always solved the problem for me.

Time Machine seems to (rather annoyingly) just do it's own thing. I've had it delete the files on its own time before and the free space was back after a certain period of time. I have no explanation for it but it seems to have fixed itself.

-----

Not entirely related but a word of advice: it seems that you've got data on the same drive as your TM backup, and this is what is stopping you from reformatting. Generally not a good idea to mix backups and your data on the same volume.
Click to expand...
 
G

grahamnp

macrumors 6502a
Jun 4, 2008
969
4
QMH said:
I'm having this problem - after typing in "ls -a", there isn't any files being displayed. But in my trash folder, the backups are still there. Where could I gone wrong?(
Click to expand...


Which trash folder are you talking about? You type 'ls-a' to reveal the trash folder specific to your Time Machine drive, you do this when already viewing the root directory of the TM drive. You delete the entire .trashes folder itself, not the contents.

Does this help?
 
S

schupp411

macrumors newbie
Feb 9, 2013
1
0
Can't delete .trashes

grahamnp said:
I've had this problem many, many times. I've had luck manually deleting the .Trashes folder on the Time Machine drive's root directory. It will automatically be recreated.

Open terminal, type "cd /Volumes" and then "ls" to display all volumes and "cd <<TM volume name>>" to go into the TM volume.

Type "ls -a" to display all files, the -a is because Trashes is hidden.

"sudo rm -rf .Trashes" should delete the trashes folder.

Careful, messing that up could delete the wrong thing. Also, this hasn't always solved the problem for me.

Time Machine seems to (rather annoyingly) just do it's own thing. I've had it delete the files on its own time before and the free space was back after a certain period of time. I have no explanation for it but it seems to have fixed itself.

-----

Not entirely related but a word of advice: it seems that you've got data on the same drive as your TM backup, and this is what is stopping you from reformatting. Generally not a good idea to mix backups and your data on the same volume.
Click to expand...

I'm having similar issues but when I try to delete the .trashes folder I get the message:

Benjamins-MacBook:the terror byte Ben$ sudo rm -rf .Trashes
rm: .Trashes/501/.DS_Store: Invalid argument
rm: .Trashes/501/How.I.Met.Your.Mother.S08E12.1080p.WEB-DL.DD5.1.H.264-BS [PublicHD]/How.I.Met.Your.Mother.S08E12.The.Final.Page.Part.Two.1080p.WEB-DL.DD5.1.H.264-BS.mkv: Invalid argument
rm: .Trashes/501/How.I.Met.Your.Mother.S08E12.1080p.WEB-DL.DD5.1.H.264-BS [PublicHD]: Directory not empty
rm: .Trashes/501: Directory not empty
rm: .Trashes: Directory not empty
Benjamins-MacBook:the terror byte Ben$

Is there a way to delete the files in the .Trashes folder manually or is there something else I should try?
 
C

Ccrew

macrumors 68020
Feb 28, 2011
2,035
3
schupp411 said:
Benjamins-MacBook:the terror byte Ben$ sudo rm -rf .Trashes
rm: .Trashes/501/.DS_Store: Invalid argument
rm: .Trashes/501/How.I.Met.Your.Mother.S08E12.1080p.WEB-DL.DD5.1.H.264-BS [PublicHD]/How.I.Met.Your.Mother.S08E12.The.Final.Page.Part.Two.1080p.WEB-DL.DD5.1.H.264-BS.mkv: Invalid argument
rm: .Trashes/501/How.I.Met.Your.Mother.S08E12.1080p.WEB-DL.DD5.1.H.264-BS [PublicHD]: Directory not empty
rm: .Trashes/501: Directory not empty
rm: .Trashes: Directory not empty
Benjamins-MacBook:the terror byte Ben$

Is there a way to delete the files in the .Trashes folder manually or is there something else I should try?
Click to expand...

Try not pirating TV shows from torrents, or at least have the common sense not to post that you do in an internet forum? :)
 
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