HDD space vanishes

[max¥¥]

A few days ago i went to download something and was prompted that i didn't have enough hdd space. i was shocked to see i have 80mb of space on my 1tb external, i cleared 20gb of space and left it. the next day i had 80mb free again. this is a problem as my server backs up the main data partition to this hdd.

I just ran Disk Inventory X, and it shows 711.9gb used, so thats almost 300gb that has just vanished.

anyone have any ideas?

thanks in advance
-max1zzz

[1911]

If you are not sure of what is taking up the space, try an application like
Grand Perspective, it will give you a visualization of what is using space and how much.

http://grandperspectiv.sourceforge.net/

[max¥¥]

Originally Posted by 1911

If you are not sure of what is taking up the space, try an application like
Grand Perspective, it will give you a visualization of what is using space and how much.

http://grandperspectiv.sourceforge.net/

ok, ran that, shows 711gb of files and 219gb of "Miscellaneous used space" which adds up to about the formatted capacity, but it gives no indication of what is using this 219gb, shows no files as being attached to it

[Weaselboy]

Are you running Time Machine on Lion or Mountain Lion? This uses some space for local backups that might be taking up your space. You can zero out the space by turning Time Machine off then back on.

[max¥¥]

Originally Posted by Weaselboy

Are you running Time Machine on Lion or Mountain Lion? This uses some space for local backups that might be taking up your space. You can zero out the space by turning Time Machine off then back on.

Nope, running leopard server (the comp couldn't run 10.7/8 as it is a xserve G4)

[1911]

Originally Posted by max¥¥

ok, ran that, shows 711gb of files and 219gb of "Miscellaneous used space" which adds up to about the formatted capacity, but it gives no indication of what is using this 219gb, shows no files as being attached to it

After you run Grand Perspective, you can move your mouse over the results to see the folder(s) that have offending sizes, that should show you what the issue is.

[gnasher729]

Originally Posted by max¥¥

A few days ago i went to download something and was prompted that i didn't have enough hdd space. i was shocked to see i have 80mb of space on my 1tb external, i cleared 20gb of space and left it. the next day i had 80mb free again. this is a problem as my server backs up the main data partition to this hdd.

I just ran Disk Inventory X, and it shows 711.9gb used, so thats almost 300gb that has just vanished.

anyone have any ideas?

thanks in advance
-max1zzz

Are you using Time Machine? Time Machine will use _all_ the space on the backup drive, and that's normal for it. It will also free up space by removing older backups when it needs to.

[max¥¥]

Originally Posted by 1911

After you run Grand Perspective, you can move your mouse over the results to see the folder(s) that have offending sizes, that should show you what the issue is.

it just says that the missing space is "Miscellaneous used space", it gives no files/folders using up the space

Originally Posted by gnasher729

Are you using Time Machine? Time Machine will use _all_ the space on the backup drive, and that's normal for it. It will also free up space by removing older backups when it needs to.

Nope, the backup is a rsync script run by cron half daily

[manual123]

Then the next thing I can think of would be to showallfiles and start at root and go hunting for the files. It make be junk files stored in temp folders in admin account or something along the sort. I had a vanishing problem in lion that was discovered via this method and it turned out to be temp folder for mail.app. Break it down in finder after showallfiles with folder sizes beside each folder and expand into them looking for the lost space. I wish i could give better visual but im at work and not using Mac OS X.. let me know if i can help more, ill send u an email address if you like.

[max¥¥]

Originally Posted by manual123

Then the next thing I can think of would be to showallfiles and start at root and go hunting for the files. It make be junk files stored in temp folders in admin account or something along the sort. I had a vanishing problem in lion that was discovered via this method and it turned out to be temp folder for mail.app. Break it down in finder after showallfiles with folder sizes beside each folder and expand into them looking for the lost space. I wish i could give better visual but im at work and not using Mac OS X.. let me know if i can help more, ill send u an email address if you like.

well, i tried the eqiv of that in terminal (defaults write com.apple.Finder AppleShowAllFiles TRUE) and the biggest folder is the spotlight one, but at 66mb it's not the problem)

[Les Kern]

Diskwarrior. Perhaps your directory is hosed?

[manual123]

Yeah perhaps it is, start with a disk verify to see if any directories are ghost.

[dazey]

I am a fan of using omnidisksweeper to find where space has gone (its a free app now)

[max¥¥]

Originally Posted by Les Kern

Diskwarrior. Perhaps your directory is hosed?

Originally Posted by manual123

Yeah perhaps it is, start with a disk verify to see if any directories are ghost.

Just ran diskwarrior for a second time, nothing, after rebuild the disk is exactly the same as before

Originally Posted by dazey

I am a fan of using omnidisksweeper to find where space has gone (its a free app now)

Just run it, dosen't see whats using the space, which is my exact problem, nothing sees whats using the space.

And i can't just reformat, as this is my biggest drive i have noware to put the files while i reformat