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i have an iphoto library which is 249.17GB in size
I have 348.69GB available on my internal mac book pro hard drive.
Finder message says
The item "iPhoto Library" can't be copies because there isn't enough free space
i have checked the trash from the terminal and its empty
What size hard drive is installed? How much free space? (Command-i on hard drive).
If you're on a laptop and using Time Machine, it's possible you have a lot of space taken up by Local snapshots. That space is not counted by the Finder or Get Info, but is counted by Disk Utility.
See #30 in Time Machine - Frequently Asked Questions for details.
I had exacly the same issue when copying a 15.87 GB virtual machine file to a MacBook Air with more than 30 GB free. Problem solved by turning off local snapshots as explained in the link provided by Pondini. Thanks!
I have the same issue and turning local snapshots off did not resolve it.
I am trying to copy my iPhoto Library (21.23gb according to get info) from my local drive to Google Drive (100gb space) to serve as a backup.
I get the same error message: "The item "iPhoto Library" can't be copies because there isn't enough free space". I tried turning local snapshots off as explained in Pondini's post but it did not work. I am not even using Time Capsule anymore, it is turned off and I do not have it connected either.
I appreciate any thoughts.
I don't use Google Drive, so don't know exactly how it works.
But according to About Google Drive for your Mac/PC, it creates a special folder on your Mac. When you put things into that folder, the contents are copied to Google. But there's still a copy in that folder on your Mac. (That's how a lot of the cloud storage apps work.)
So, you'll need to either have enough free space on your internal HD for a second copy of your iPhoto library in that folder, or move (not copy) your iPhoto Library into the Google Drive folder.
FWIW I turned off Time Machine altogether and that seemed to fix the problem. I am on a MacBook Pro with a 1TB solid state drive with around 300GB available and trying to move a 196GB iPhoto Library. Ran into the same problem as the OP, turned off local snapshots (didn't fix problem) and then turned off Time Machine completely and file now transferring. Also I'm running 10.9.2.
system says out of space when there is plenty
