Hard drive space incorrectly reported?

[dmk1974]

On my 2011 13" MBA, I see a pretty big disparity in how much space I have on my machine. In the drive "Info" it says I am using 46 GB. In the "About this Mac" storage section, I am using about 74 GB. When I created a fresh TimeMachine backup, it was about 61 GB.

Do I have some cache or something somewhere? My trash bin is empty. Attached are screen shots. Thanks!

 

[GGJstudios]

For space issues, there are a few things you can try:

• Begin by restarting your computer as a first step. This sometimes resolves issues.
• For Time Machine users on Lion, space may being consumed by Time Machine local snapshots, which can be disabled.
  OS X Lion: About Time Machine's "local snapshots" on portable Macs
• Search with Finder to see if the space is being consumed by a very large file or several large files. Adjust the 50GB in the illustration to whatever size you deem appropriate.
  
  
• Use OmniDiskSweeper, JDisk Report or GrandPerspective to see how space is being used on your drive. Some of these apps may show more detail than others, so try several.

 

[heisenberg123]

its the backups

they only show inthe about this mac screen and not when your command I the driver in finder


to remove backups do a time machine backup or disable time machines entirely

 

[dmk1974]

Thanks! I didn't know that TimeMachine backed up locally to the same drive (seems kinda stupid?). I frequently connect my external USB drive for the TM backups anyway.

I ran that script and then toggled TimeMachine off then back on. My "About this Mac" space changed drastically and basically matched the drive info. THANKS!!!

 

[heisenberg123]

Thanks! I didn't know that TimeMachine backed up locally to the same drive (seems kinda stupid?). I frequently connect my external USB drive for the TM backups anyway.

I ran that script and then toggled TimeMachine off then back on. My "About this Mac" space changed drastically and basically matched the drive info. THANKS!!!

np it is kinda stupid but in a way they local snapshots for timemachine probably makes the backup faster becasue its already saved all the changes since the last backup locally