Okay so there doesn't seem to be much on the cause of this and I don't think it's something Apple has seen much of from the session I had earlier through chat/screen share.
W - Thanks for contacting CPU. My name is Will. Please give me a moment to look over your information.
W - Hey James, it looks like youre running into an issue where Time Machine is turned off, but your machine is still creating local snapshots. Is that correct?
Me - Yes that's correct. I've never had Time Machine enabled on this Mac, but noticed all my storage was being used up by the local snapshot feature.
W - Oh no! I completely apologize about these issues happening at all! It is never our intention for any issues to arise at all while using your MacBook Pro with Retina Display, that is for sure! How much space does it show that Backups are taking up on your computer?
Me - At the moment it says 117.25GB
W - Well, we definitely want to see about getting this issue all taken care of, as it is certainly not normal behavior! Are you currently chatting with me on the MacBook Pro with Retina Display having the issues?
Me - Yes I am
W - The reason I am asking is with some of the troubleshooting that we will end up doing, we may end up getting disconnected, which is never our intention. Now, I know that with local snapshots, the snapshots will automatically delete themselves when your disk starts getting full, but the fact that it is happening at all is very peculiar, so I am going to do some quick research to see what I can find out. Does that sound okay?
Me - Yes that sounds fine.
W - Fantastic! Thank you very much for your patience James. It shouldnt be too long.
Me - No problem.
W - Are you still there James?
Me - Yes.
W - Thank you very much for waiting patiently. Now, when youre looking at About This Mac, and seeing your Storage breakdown, it is showing that 117 GB as backups? Or is it categorized in another manner?
Me - It is categorized as backups. There is also a mobilebackups drive with data and I can enter TM and see all the snapshots that are being taken. Although TM is turned off in the preferences.
W - That is incredibly peculiar. I am going to get you with Brian, one of my Senior Advisors, as he is going to dive a little deeper into this issue, and see what we can figure out! Does that sound okay?
Me - Yes that sounds fine
W - Fantastic! Have a great rest of your day!
You are now being connected to another Advisor. Please standby.
B - Thanks for contacting AppleCare chat support. My name is Brian. Please give me a moment to look over your information.
Now Chatting with Brian
B - Hello there, James. Howre you todau?
B - today*
Me - I'm okay. A little confused over this issue though
B - Yeah, from the description, I definitely want to get a closer look before we decide on a path to resolution.
B - Would you mind if you screenshare with me so I can see whatd going on?
Me - Yes that's fine if you'd like to go ahead.
B - Okay, Ill paste the information on how to start that up here.
B - At this point, I could help you better if I could see what's on your display. We could use screen sharing for this. Screen sharing is completely secure and you can end the session at any time. Interested? This page explains how to set it up: Start Screen Sharing Session After you download the application, I'll be able to see your screen, but I can't access your files or control your computer. If there's anything that you don't want me to see on your screen, remove it from view before your session begins. Your session will be recorded for quality purposes.
B - Once you download the application from the link, open it up to start the session. Ill be able to guide you with a red cursor, but youll have to click on things for me since I cannot take control.
B - were going to wait for these to populate.
Me - Okay
B - When did you notice this start happening?
Me - Only this afternoon when I was having a look around. I'm not sure how long it's been going on for though
B - Okay, well, well figure out where it is, and take care of it.
B - Let me do some math here.
Me - Okay.
B - Your applications folder is unusually large, but things are adding up within a 20GB margin - which is usually other like temp virtual memory files that the system creates as being used.
B - Lets take a look at some of the larger folders.
Me - I may be able to answer that one...
B - Oh yeah, thats rather large. Which, doesnt translate properly here.
Me - For some reason that ended up being 'other' I think.
B - Thats probably backup, honestly.
B - Ill show you a place that is usually other
B - hold down option
Me - Doesn't seem to like that. Do you mean hold option and click?
B - While accessing the go menu, hold option. library should appear
B - im not sure why that isnt working. but we can get there a different way
B - Everything in the library folder here is always other
Me - Ahhh okay. That looks about right.
B - As well as the System and Library folders on the root of the HDD
B - Thats why im sure the WoW folder isnt
Me - I have a media server I connect to at home here, when I disconnect from it I see a mobilebackups folder on the Finder page. It's set out exactly like my TM backup folder is at work.
B - can you show me?
Me - mobilebackups drive*
Me - hmmm
Me - I can show you in Parallels
B - A shared directory shouldnt have any affect on the usage of your HDD.
Me - It appears in the windows 8 file explorer all the time
B - What I think is happening, is that spotlight possibly indexed the information incorrectly for some of your stuff that it didnt know how to index properly.
B - Can you make this window a little bigger>
B - ?
B - Parallels is probably backups
B - I dont even know what that is.
Me - Lol I make weird names/icons for folders.
B - Oh, okay. Gotcha.
Me - Keeps people from snooping when I'm away
B - I think there isnt anything wrong going on, aside from spotlight indexing some things as backups when it should really be other
Me - Just those two highlighted though
B - or applicaitons
Me - Well I still see this mobilebackups drive from time to time and when I can enter TM and see snapshots from the last three days.
B - But, it is a drive in the shared section right?
B - Or in devices?
Me - I don't think so... I think it pops up in devices, where finder sometimes goes to when i disconnect my server
B - Okay, thats just a mounted disk, which would be independent of your 251GB HDD.
Me - Well it's a little odd... it shows up all the time through my virtual machine. Hold on a sec. because this is really bugging me
B - Well, Il need to see it, to have an idea of why
Me - Can you see these? :-/
B - Can we get info on the mobile backups drive?
B - what is psf?
Me - That seems to be what parallels calls the root directory of the Mac. It seems to make them appear in windows as shared network locations.
M - so this one is Home on psf
B - Im not sure -
B - Go back to that window that had pdf as a computer.
B - psf
B - why isnt mobile backup there?
Me - Not sure. But it does appear further up that screen as a share from psf
B - get properties on that fodler
B - folder
B - open up terminal on the mac
B - cd /
B - there is a space
Me - My bad
B - sudo du -khd 1
B - it will ask for password, type it in, but it wont show up. so dont think youre doing it wrong.
B - go back to finder
B - /.MobileBackups (if it will let you) you may want to copy/paste
B - remove all of it
B - So it looks like you have one, but we cant tell if it is something new or old that has been hanging around.
B - What we can try is turning time machine on, restarting the computer, and then turning time machine off and restarting the computer. Usually turning it off (after being on) it will remove the mobile backups folder.
Me - In Time machine, it has hourly snapshots from today, and some from a few days back so I think it's still creating them.
B - Okay, give me a moment.
B - Okay.
B - Do you backup your computer in any other way?
Me - No.
Me - Not other than copy/paste of some work files on an external drive
B - Is there anything on the computer that is important that isnt backed up somehow?
Me - I don't think so. Might need some time to look
B - Okay, were going to disable the local snapshots manually.
B - I just want to make sure you keep your computer backed up in some other form.
Me - I have two work files that I should probably back up
B - Okay, do that, then Ill help you disable the local backups manually.
Me - Okay all done.
B - Go ahead and quit all application except for google chrome and the screen sharing.
B - sudo tmutil disablelocal
B - sudo
Me - I assume that did something...
B - Okay, itll probably take a restart to complete the process, but that should remove the mobile backups folder and stop it from continuing to make them.
Me - Okay
This has been really odd.
B - The size of the mobile backups folder was only about 40GB, so, you wont notice a huge increase in space.
B - And the backups section is still going to be skewed because of parallels and WoW.
Me - Yeah that makes sense.
B - But, if you need further assistance with this, well certainly be here. But go ahead and restart the computer and hopefully it wont continue. You should be able to quickly test it by trying to access the Time Machine menu bar. And enter time machine should be gone.
Me - Okay
Thank you very much for your help today
B - Is there anything else I can help with before we finish up this chat today?
B - Youre very welcome!
Me - Nope I think that covers it
B - Thank you for chatting with me today, James! Again my name is Brian. If there is nothing further I can help you with, I'll go ahead and end this chat and email you a transcript for your records.
Me - Can I save this chat log in some way?
B - Ill be emailing it to you
Me - Aaaah never mind
Me - Thanks Brian
To close the chat on your device, click the "end chat" link at the bottom of this window. Another window may come up after the chat ends with additional content, so be careful not to close the new window if you want to review the information there.
It was a pleasure chatting with you and I hope you've enjoyed your overall experience with me during this chat. Have a wonderful day!
