According to Finder and three utilities, my 285 GB external hard drive formatted Mac Journal Extended has only half a GB of free space left, but the four utilities only show about 145 GB used. That includes hidden files according to the utilities. I use this external drive to make manual copies of files for backups, and an Aperture backup vault. Any suggestions? Thanks.
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External hard drive full but folders add to half
- Thread starter Daysight
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Thanks Mike, that's one of the utilities I had tried.
I fixed the problem by deleting what appeared to be a folder I did not need with not a lot in it, and then emptying the trash. Maybe I should have just tried to empty the trash first. Anyway I got back 160 GB free space.
I fixed the problem by deleting what appeared to be a folder I did not need with not a lot in it, and then emptying the trash. Maybe I should have just tried to empty the trash first. Anyway I got back 160 GB free space.
It was likely the trash. When you delete things in an external it actually moves the files to a hidden trash folder on the external. So if you don't empty the trash before you disconnect the drive, the hidden trash folder fills up.