Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Time Machine backup smaller than it should

NunoBerny said:
There are still exclusions that were definitely not ordered by me!

I wonder where that info is being kept!
Click to expand...

Other than the things like cache and swap files that OS X excludes, everything is listed in that plist file.

How much off do you really think it is? If you add up the exclusions (Steam folder etc) what does that come out to.

If you actually look in the TM backup files, does it look like everything is there?
 
Weaselboy said:
Other than the things like cache and swap files that OS X excludes, everything is listed in that plist file.

How much off do you really think it is? If you add up the exclusions (Steam folder etc) what does that come out to.

If you actually look in the TM backup files, does it look like everything is there?
Click to expand...

My main HD reports it has 385GB used.
TM prefs says "estimated size of full backup: 313GB" (which is about as it should, already with Steam excluded, 60+GB)
Space used on the TimeMachine backup drive: 121GB

So, TM is excluding almost 200GB of data "by itself". That or the data size reports on the main HD are wrong somewhere (it's reporting more GB than are actually there). Not sure if this is even possible, though.


Looking at the actual TM files, all seems in order, but to be sure I'd have to go through each folder one by one and compare, which is close to impossible.
The folders seem correct, but it's hard to tell if the contents are ok, too.
 
The amount shown can be off, but a Spotlight reindex will fix it, and we did that in an earlier post.

Do you really think you have that much data on there? A standard install with iWorks and iLife apps is about 20GB. So do you really think you have another almost 300GB of data on there?

Maybe try the free app OmniDiskSweeper to get a overview of where that data is would help.

Where are you getting the 385GB used info from... the Finder?

Run the command below in Terminal to see how much space Time Machine's local backups is using.


sudo du -hs /.MobileBackups
 
Weaselboy said:
The amount shown can be off, but a Spotlight reindex will fix it, and we did that in an earlier post.

Do you really think you have that much data on there? A standard install with iWorks and iLife apps is about 20GB. So do you really think you have another almost 300GB of data on there?

Maybe try the free app OmniDiskSweeper to get a overview of where that data is would help.

Where are you getting the 385GB used info from... the Finder?

Run the command below in Terminal to see how much space Time Machine's local backups is using.


sudo du -hs /.MobileBackups
Click to expand...

Trying this gave me a "no such file or directory"error.


Yes, I'm basing the size on the "Get info" from Finder. That and TM prefs, that reports the same size.
I have quite a few programs and games (Mafia II alone is 11GB, for example) installed there. And my iTunes and iPhoto libraries.
Still, it seems too much, I have thought about that before...

I was trying out iBoostUp and, when using its "Disk Usage" option, noticed that there are TWO Macintosh HD: Macintosh HD and Macintosh HD 1.
This hasn't shown anywhere else, not in Finder or Disk Utility.
One (HD 1) shows with the icon I see on the desktop (but labelled as an ALIAS by the iBoostUp file requester, whatever that means), with the usual 385GB used.
The other (HD) shows as a folder icon (with 184GB size, doesn't say if it's used or total).

This is news to me. What the hell is happening here?!??! ;(
 
OmniDisk.png

This is what OmniDisk tells me.

The bulk of the 385GB seems to be taken by Volumes (179GB) and Users (120GB).
Both have apparently "mirrored" files or at least similar structures. Example: both have the Steam library (even though they are of different sizes!).

"Users" is also a folder inside Volumes. the 385GB size seems to be a sum of these two, plus 61GB from "Applications". But shouldn't "Users" be ONLY inside "Volumes"? Why is it taking size outside too?
Application is also present in two different places, one with 61GB (shown on the main OmniDisk tree), the other in Volumes, with only 41GB size.

This doesn't seem normal to me, but maybe it is...
 
Last edited:
NunoBerny said:
This is what OmniDisk tells me.
Click to expand...

Okay... first thing I want to say is YIKES! :eek: :D

You appear to have a complete duplicate of everything on your drive. You mentioned something earlier about migrating from another drive... any idea what you did that may have caused this?

Let me explain how a normal system should be, then we can look at what you have. A normal system has Volumes at the root, then all mounted volumes/disks (like Macintosh HD or external drives) would be listed after that.

So what you should have is something like this:

/Volumes/Macintosh HD/Users/bernie

What you have going on is what I described above, plus this:

/Volumes/Macintosh HD/Volumes/Macintosh HD/Users/bernie

Somehow you have copied/duplicated the entire /Volumes/Macintosh HD structure onto Macintosh HD and you are using exactly double the disk space because of this.

Nothing is wrong with Time Machine at all it would appear. Although it does look like those Steam files were corrupt, but that is a separate issue.

The quick fix would be just delete that /Volumes folder on Macintosh HD, but let's make sure it is not being used and also back it up just to be safe.

You said you have an extra external drive yes? Go DL Carbon Copy Cloner (the free 30 day trial) and use that to clone your entire drive to a freshly formatted external drive. Once that is done, shutdown the system and option key boot to the external one time just to make sure it works. Then shutdown and disconnect the external and set it aside in case we need it.

Then boot back to the internal, open finder and navigate to here (below) and do a command-i on bernie and note the created and modified dates.

/Volumes/Macintosh HD/Users/bernie

Now navigate to here (below) and note the created modified dates.

/Volumes/Macintosh HD/Volumes/Macintosh HD/Users/bernie

I suspect the dates will show the first is being used and the second duplicate has old dates and has been just sitting there since you did whatever you did to create this duplicate structure.

If and only if that is the case, run the command below and it will delete the duplicate structure.

Code: 
sudo rm -rf /Volumes/Macintosh\ HD/Volumes/

Once this is done reboot and make sure all is well.

I would keep that second clone disk a few days at least to make sure everything is okay.

I would also erase the Time Machine disk and start that over to make sure you have a clean TM backup.
 
Weaselboy said:
Okay... first thing I want to say is YIKES! :eek: :D

You appear to have a complete duplicate of everything on your drive. You mentioned something earlier about migrating from another drive... any idea what you did that may have caused this?

Let me explain how a normal system should be, then we can look at what you have. A normal system has Volumes at the root, then all mounted volumes/disks (like Macintosh HD or external drives) would be listed after that.

So what you should have is something like this:

/Volumes/Macintosh HD/Users/bernie

What you have going on is what I described above, plus this:

/Volumes/Macintosh HD/Volumes/Macintosh HD/Users/bernie

Somehow you have copied/duplicated the entire /Volumes/Macintosh HD structure onto Macintosh HD and you are using exactly double the disk space because of this.

Nothing is wrong with Time Machine at all it would appear. Although it does look like those Steam files were corrupt, but that is a separate issue.

The quick fix would be just delete that /Volumes folder on Macintosh HD, but let's make sure it is not being used and also back it up just to be safe.

You said you have an extra external drive yes? Go DL Carbon Copy Cloner (the free 30 day trial) and use that to clone your entire drive to a freshly formatted external drive. Once that is done, shutdown the system and option key boot to the external one time just to make sure it works. Then shutdown and disconnect the external and set it aside in case we need it.

Then boot back to the internal, open finder and navigate to here (below) and do a command-i on bernie and note the created and modified dates.

/Volumes/Macintosh HD/Users/bernie

Now navigate to here (below) and note the created modified dates.

/Volumes/Macintosh HD/Volumes/Macintosh HD/Users/bernie

I suspect the dates will show the first is being used and the second duplicate has old dates and has been just sitting there since you did whatever you did to create this duplicate structure.

If and only if that is the case, run the command below and it will delete the duplicate structure.

Code: 
sudo rm -rf /Volumes/Macintosh\ HD/Volumes/

Once this is done reboot and make sure all is well.

I would keep that second clone disk a few days at least to make sure everything is okay.

I would also erase the Time Machine disk and start that over to make sure you have a clean TM backup.
Click to expand...

I printed all your suggestions and will do it as soon as I have enough time to do it calmly... ;)

I knew something was seriously wrong. OmniDisk reinforced that.
Now, the big question is: what was being saved (stuff like Contacts, documents, etc, etc) to the normal place and what was being wrongfully put in the duplicate? 8/

I have no idea how I done this, but it seems a made a beautiful mess of it all.
Why doesn't the new/duplicate "Volumes" show up on Finder???? If it did, I'd have identified the problem much sooner.
 
NunoBerny said:
I printed all your suggestions and will do it as soon as I have enough time to do it calmly... ;)
Click to expand...

I think you need a couple beers for this. :D

I knew something was seriously wrong. OmniDisk reinforced that.
Now, the big question is: what was being saved (stuff like Contacts, documents, etc, etc) to the normal place and what was being wrongfully put in the duplicate? 8/
Click to expand...

I suspect everything is going where it should and not in the second dup. area as that is a non-standard path to the second Macintosh HD. I bet when you look at it you will see it has just been sitting there since whenever you did this. Try using Omni to navigate deeper in that dup area all the way down to your documents folders etc and I bet you will see there is nothing new there.

I have no idea how I done this, but it seems a made a beautiful mess of it all.

Why doesn't the new/duplicate "Volumes" show up on Finder???? If it did, I'd have identified the problem much sooner.
Click to expand...

Hard to say. Normally, you don't see the /Volumes mount point and that may be why.
 
Weaselboy said:
I think you need a couple beers for this. :D

Hard to say. Normally, you don't see the /Volumes mount point and that may be why.
Click to expand...

If I need to manually delete that folder, how can I do it? It doesn't seem to show, even if I use the "Go" option on Finder. Or the only way is the "sudo" way?

CCC is doing its stuff now. Now I'll wait...

Just to be sure, the command is:
"sudo rm -rf /Volumes/Macintosh\ HD/Volumes/"
With the "\" after the Macintosh or was that a mistake????
 
NunoBerny said:
If I need to manually delete that folder, how can I do it? It doesn't seem to show, even if I use the "Go" option on Finder. Or the only way is the "sudo" way?

CCC is doing its stuff now. Now I'll wait...

Just to be sure, the command is:
"sudo rm -rf /Volumes/Macintosh\ HD/Volumes/"
With the "\" after the Macintosh or was that a mistake????
Click to expand...

Use this exact command to delete the extra structure in Terminal. I put it in the "code" forum format so you can copy/paste it into Terminal without worrying about a typo.

The backslash is correct. That is called an escape character so the Terminal command correctly interprets the space after Macintosh.

Code: 
sudo rm -rf /Volumes/Macintosh\ HD/Volumes/

You will be prompted for your admin password.

Even if we managed to do this in Finder, Finder would move the whole 170GB to the trash then you would have to empty the 170GB of trash. The Terminal command will kill it directly.
 
Carbon Copy did the backup, but found 3 iPhoto, 1 iTunes, one Apple cache (Data) and 6 Steam files corrupted.
It reported the files were on bad sectors (could this mean a physical problem with the drive????)

I deleted all (the Apple one could be a problem, but it's cache-related, so I'm hoping it's not).

As for checking the created/modified dates, I can only do so in the "good" Users/Bernie. The other is hard to access and check.

Will delete the offending partition now. Fingers crossed.
 
UPDATE:

Ran the command you gave me.
Terminal gave no feedback, but the main HD used space remains the same!!!

This ghost duplicate seems harder to kill than expected. ;(
 
NunoBerny said:
UPDATE:

Ran the command you gave me.
Terminal gave no feedback, but the main HD used space remains the same!!!

This ghost duplicate seems harder to kill than expected. ;(
Click to expand...

Try a command-r boot to Recovery then run the command in Terminal from there. Be VERY careful to type it in exactly the same as my example.
 
Tried again through "normal" OSX Terminal and it worked.
The main HD is now only 203GB full!!!

All seems fine, but I'll wait a few days before I delete the CCC copy (have to delete, since it's on the USB HD I will use for...Time Machine backups!).

I can't thank you enough. I don't think I'd ever find it out by myself.
And by following your advice, I learned quite a bit about the way the MAcOS X works.

Thanks! ;)
 
NunoBerny said:
Tried again through "normal" OSX Terminal and it worked.
The main HD is now only 203GB full!!!

All seems fine, but I'll wait a few days before I delete the CCC copy (have to delete, since it's on the USB HD I will use for...Time Machine backups!).

I can't thank you enough. I don't think I'd ever find it out by myself.
And by following your advice, I learned quite a bit about the way the MAcOS X works.

Thanks! ;)
Click to expand...

Excellent! Glad it worked out. :)
 
Weaselboy said:
Excellent! Glad it worked out. :)
Click to expand...

It didn't work as well as I thought, though... ;(

For some reason, all data on my OTHER USB3 drive was also erased. Had 2 partitions and both were erased! ;(

It seems those drives were also stored on the "ghost" Volumes. I didn't remove them before (big mistake), since I never thought they would be touched (looking back now, it was quite obvious, since they were there whenever I looked at the ghost volumes...).

I'm now trying to recover using DiskDrill, but I don't know if I'll have to buy the full version or if the trial will do.

It's no tragedy, but I had a lot of stuff there. Hopefully all is not lost yet!
 
Last edited:
NunoBerny said:
It didn't work as well as I thought, though... ;(

For some reason, all data on my OTHER USB3 drive was also erased. Had 2 partitions and both were erased! ;(

It seems those drives were also stored on the "ghost" Volumes. I didn't remove them before (big mistake), since I never thought they would be touched (looking back now, it was quite obvious, since they were there whenever I looked at the ghost volumes...).

I'm now trying to recover using DiskDrill, but I don't know if I'll have to buy the full version or if the trial will do.

It's no tragedy, but I had a lot of stuff there. Hopefully all is not lost yet!
Click to expand...

Hmmm... all drives, in internal and external, mount to /Volumes. It sounds like somehow in all this your external drive mounted to that second level /Volumes folder and that is what it got deleted.

I still don't quite understand how all this got this way. :confused:
 
Weaselboy said:
Hmmm... all drives, in internal and external, mount to /Volumes. It sounds like somehow in all this your external drive mounted to that second level /Volumes folder and that is what it got deleted.

I still don't quite understand how all this got this way. :confused:
Click to expand...

I think the external drives were mounted BOTH on the right place and on the second-level. Or at least a link to them was on the ghost "Volumes".
So, when I erased the ghost, the external were erased too.
Removing the USB drive before the "sudo" operation would have avoided this, but I never thought of that. ;)

Recovery hasn't been going too well. I think I can get to the files, but with the wrong names. It will be a nightmare going through them, even separated by file type. Renaming thousands of mp3 files, for example, is not my idea of un, so I'll probably just discard the lot.
The few games I had there will obviously be impossible to rename, too, but I can re-downloaded them from GOG or wherever I bought them, so no big deal there.

Whatever I did, it was stupid. I may have copied an old System backup to the wrong place, but for it to behave like this...I don't know.
Time Machine identified the ghost as a duplicate, therefore neglecting to back it up. This bit is strange, too.

----------

Any suggestion about recovering the files with their original names?
They should be there, since the deletion is not "secure".
 
Weaselboy said:
You might take a look at Disk Warrior, but it is not cheap.
Click to expand...

Apparently, there's no program that can fully recover data while keeping the original name and folder.
Stellar Phoenix 6 is supposed to do it, but the demo version seems to do the same all the others do...

Some movies, pictures and PDFs were already saved. The tedious bit will be renaming all that.
Most of the stuff will be lost, but I can live with that. ;)
 
Necro bump 8 years later, haha. HUGE Difference in my clone, TM and original!

Using Big Sur, my 2021 iMac SDD shows 730gb. Cloning via CCC creates a 671gb backup . My Time Machine shows 652gb.

How is this possible?
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back