How to delete time machine local backup?

Shootist007 wrote:

Have you tried turning on the TM backup system? Supposedly once you turn that on it deletes all the Local backups, and or once you start to create a real TM backup to some type of external disk the Local BUs get deleted.

No. If you have Time Machine ON and are using a laptop, Local Snapshots are made hourly, space permitting; then are "thinned" down after 24 hours to one per day, then deleted entirely after a week.

It has nothing to do with whether the external destination is available.

See Time Machine - Frequently Asked Question #30 for the gory details.

I don't know if is it the same problem, but in the 256 GB's HD of my MBP 15" retina display I have 4 folder: Applications 22GB, Library 7.27GB, System 6.30GB and Users 82GB for a total of 118GB, but if I get info of my HD said that I used 222GB.
Where did they go the 104GB I missed?

It is more than a week that my Timemachine HD is connected to the computer, but i still not get back my missing GB.

thanks

Is Time Machine turned on? If it is it is making backups every hour, week, month and storing them on the local drive. These backups will not be listed in some folder/file size utilities/programs but they are still taking up space.

drzoom wrote:

I don't know if is it the same problem, but in the 256 GB's HD of my MBP 15" retina display I have 4 folder: Applications 22GB, Library 7.27GB, System 6.30GB and Users 82GB for a total of 118GB, but if I get info of my HD said that I used 222GB.
Where did they go the 104GB I missed?

It is more than a week that my Timemachine HD is connected to the computer, but i still not get back my missing GB.

thanks

There are other system folders that are normaly hidden.

In this case, where your disk is over 80% full, the extra space is probably not Time Machine's Local Snapshots, since they're deleted as/if necessary to keep 20% free.

So it's probably one of the other things detailed in Where did my Disk Space go?

@ Shootist007 My TM is ON, and I even tried to do a TM in another HD and I can see is backing up 233GB

@ Pondini I know there are some hidden folder, but missing 100GB in a 256GB HD it is a lot

drzoom wrote:

@ Shootist007 My TM is ON, and I even tried to do a TM in another HD and I can see is backing up 233GB

Doesn't matter. Local snapshots are on your internal HD. They don't take up new space, as backups to an external HD do; rather, when you delete something, it's moved to a hidden folder. But as posted, that only happens if your HD is less than 80% full.

@ Pondini I know there are some hidden folder, but missing 100GB in a 256GB HD it is a lot

Not necessarily, especially if OSX lost track of your exteral HD and backed-up to a "false volume" instead. Or, it could be one or more of the other things detailed inWhere did my Disk Space go? Work your way through the items there.

I also had similiar problem (missing 110GB on my 512GB SSD). But this is how I fixed mine: Go to System Preferences | Time Machine and turn off time machine. After a minute or so (to let the system delete all the local snapshots and to sync), turn Time Machine back on. Then, all my available capacity numbers are in sync again while I got my 110GB back!

The Local snapshots don't really hurt your available space, as they'll be deleted automatically if your disk gets to 80% full.

See Time Machine - Frequently Asked Question #30 for all the gory details.

Sure it hurts. I'm a photographer and when I get home to dump 32 or 64GB of RAW files and find that 180GB of free space is now gone and I can't clear it out easily, it puts me in a bad spot.

Why can't Apple just have an option to check or uncheck an option to allow or disallow local backups. Another workflow option would be to delete the local files immediately after connecting your external and doing a manual backup.

But no, have to manually turn-off time machine, wait for the deletes and then copy my stuff over. Not efficient...

Hotrodguru wrote:

Sure it hurts. I'm a photographer and when I get home to dump 32 or 64GB of RAW files and find that 180GB of free space is now gone and I can't clear it out easily, it puts me in a bad spot.

In most cases, if what you're copying isn't huge, the snapshots will be deleted as you copy if the disk gets over 80% full.

But yes, in some cases, if your disk is, say, near 80% full, including snapshots, and you're copying a single file or folder that's in the area of 20% of the size of the disk, OSX may refuse to copy it.

Why can't Apple just have an option to check or uncheck an option to allow or disallow local backups.

There is a Terminal command that will do just that. See the blue box in Time Machine - Frequently Asked Question #30.

That's not as convenient as an option on the TM Prefs panel, of course. You can request that here: http://www.apple.com/feedback/timemachine.html

Another workflow option would be to delete the local files immediately after connecting your external and doing a manual backup.

That would help in some cases, but if you then go travelling again, they won't be available.

I work in digital video and move 20-30gb files in and out all the time. my 15" rMBP now only has 3gb available of 256gb and is showing 194gb in the yellow "Other" category. I disabled local backup using the sumo command. Still can't get TM to give up the storage. It is beyond 80% full, but a talley of the actual data in folders is less than 50gb. Killing me.

Then your problem clearly isn't Local Snapshots, but something else.

See Where did my Disk Space go?

I tried evcerything by myself to resolve my problem but I couldn't.

I went to the Apple Store here in Santa Monica, and the best Genius guy there is in that store tried everything even him but without success... he worked even inside of the root of the computer but he couldn't resolve the problem.

I left my computer for 1/2 day and they rinstalled the OS. With the Migration I reimported everything and now is working

drzoom wrote:

I tried evcerything by myself to resolve my problem but I couldn't.x

Did that include everything in Where did my Disk Space go?

I went to the Apple Store here in Santa Monica, and the best Genius guy there is in that store tried everything even him but without success... he worked even inside of the root of the computer but he couldn't resolve the problem.

He clearly missed something. 😟

I left my computer for 1/2 day and they rinstalled the OS. With the Migration I reimported everything and now is working

If it happens again, start with the link above.

You can delete local backups using tmutil:

1. list all local backups (this shows you the path of local backups):

tmutil listbackups

2. delete the backups you like:

sudo tmutil delete snapshot_path

e.g. to delete all local backups of "My MacBook":

sudo tmutil delete /Volumes/Time Machine-Backups/Backups.backupdb/My MacBook/*