Trash won't empty from External Hard Drive

Question

Trash won't empty from External Hard Drive

Hello,

I had a folder on my external hard drive that i wanted to delete. it had about 10,000+ items in it, about 40 GB. I moved it to the trash, emptied the trash, and then my computer crashed and told me i had to hold down the power button.

When i logged in to my computer again i tried to empty the trash, but there was nothing in there, the folder i tried to delete was not visible, and i can't press the empty trash button because there is nothing to delete. the folder is no longer visible on my eternal hard drive, and it is not visible in the trash. Where the heck is it?

So i kept my ext hard drive plugged in, created a text edit document on my desktop, moved it to the trash, and it was visible in the trash so now i can press empty trash. The empty trash status bar appeared and said 0 items remaining but just stayed at half way, the trash wouldn't empty. I saw Locum in activity monitor was using about 99 percent cpu, so i left my macbook pro like this for a couple of days, but the trash would still not empty.

Also, if i move anyhting else from the ext drive into trash, it just dissapears and is not visible. My ext hard drive has only a few gigs of space left and i need to free up some space from it but i can't.

Can someone please help me?

Thanks

Ps. I'm not a very technical person

MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.6.8)

Posted on Jul 30, 2013 6:07 AM

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Answer 1

baltwo

Level 9

62,362 points

Jul 30, 2013 1:06 PM in response to ListenToSkrillex

http://www.thexlab.com/faqs/trash.html

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Answer 2

Jul 30, 2013 6:47 PM in response to baltwo

Thanks for your reply. I've checked that link before, but it didn't really help (maybe i didn't understand what to look at). I'm still not sure what to do. Can you advise?

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Answer 3

baltwo

Level 9

62,362 points

Jul 30, 2013 10:46 PM in response to ListenToSkrillex

Launch the Terminal app in Utiliteis, type in this command, substituting the actual name for the ext HD:

ls -al "Volumes/"name of ext HD"/.Trashes/

Copy and paste the results.

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Answer 4

Jul 31, 2013 1:18 AM in response to baltwo

Hi. the name of the ext hd when i see it in the finder is Seagate Backup Plus Drive.

So just to be sure i write this in terminal?

ls -al Volumes/Seagate Backup Plus Drive/.Trashes/

And then I press enter.

And also what will this command do?

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Answer 5

WZZZ

Level 6

13,220 points

Jul 31, 2013 6:00 AM in response to ListenToSkrillex

Put Seagate Backup Plus Drive in quotes. The command will show the permissions for the external drive.

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Answer 6

Jul 31, 2013 6:53 AM in response to ListenToSkrillex

These are the results

Last login: Wed Jul 31 14:43:59 on ttys000

Farrukh-Sheikhs-MacBook-Pro:~ farrukhsheikh$ ls -al Volumes/"Seagate Backup Plus Drive"/.Trashes/

ls: Volumes/Seagate Backup Plus Drive/.Trashes/: No such file or directory

Farrukh-Sheikhs-MacBook-Pro:~ farrukhsheikh$

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Answer 7

WZZZ

Level 6

13,220 points

Jul 31, 2013 9:12 AM in response to ListenToSkrillex

Is the external on and mounted? Are you sure that's the right name?

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Answer 8

Jul 31, 2013 9:40 AM in response to WZZZ

Yes I'm sure. The ext hd was plugged in the usb port when I entered the command in terminal. The picture below basically sums up everything that's going on. The hard drive name in the sidebar, the trash progress bar doesn't move, Locum 95ish% cpu.

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Answer 9

Jul 31, 2013 9:42 AM in response to WZZZ

sorry about the quality. i think just click the picture to make it fullscreen.

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Answer 10

Jul 31, 2013 9:49 AM in response to WZZZ

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Answer 11

WZZZ

Level 6

13,220 points

Jul 31, 2013 9:59 AM in response to ListenToSkrillex

Try the ls -al command this way. First get the proper path of the external. To do that, just open Terminal and drag in the external. Then copy the path. It will show the path with backslashes where there are spaces. Next, with a new Terminal $ sign prompt, enter ls -al leave a space and paste in the path you got before and then the rest of the command. It will look something like this.

I'm making this one up. No quotes this time.

ls -al /Volumes/New\ External\ Drive/.Trashes/

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Answer 12

WZZZ

Level 6

13,220 points

Jul 31, 2013 10:08 AM in response to WZZZ

Leave off the quotes in the name of the external. And no " in front of Volumes. Just /Volumes

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Answer 13

baltwo

Level 9

62,362 points

Jul 31, 2013 12:03 PM in response to ListenToSkrillex

My bad. For some reason I put a quote in front of Volumes instead of a slach. The command should be:

ls -al /Volumes/"Seagate Backup Plus Drive"/.Trashes/

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Answer 14

Jul 31, 2013 1:37 PM in response to WZZZ

wzzz, I tried what you said and got this:

Last login: Wed Jul 31 21:33:22 on ttys000

Farrukh-Sheikhs-MacBook-Pro:~ farrukhsheikh$ ls -al /Volumes/Seagate\ Backup\ Plus\ Drive

ls: The Breakfast Club (1985): Input/output error

ls: The Jerk [1979].avi: Input/output error

total 6898288

drwxrwxrwx@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 3213 Jul 31 14:41 .

drwxrwxrwt@ 4 root admin 136 Jul 31 21:30 ..

-rw-r--r--@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 43012 Jul 31 17:30 .DS_Store

drwx------@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 189 Jun 29 12:17 .Spotlight-V100

d-wx-wx-wt 1 farrukhsheikh staff 189 Jul 26 23:15 .Trashes

drwx------@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 252 Jul 31 21:30 .fseventsd

drwxr-xr-x@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 756 Jun 8 14:06 Aba Hard Drive

drwxr-xr-x@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 630 Apr 3 02:32 Ableton

drwxr-xr-x@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 441 Apr 22 19:50 Ableton Installed Packs

drwxr-xr-x@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 945 Jul 4 11:31 Ableton Packs

-rwxrwxrwx 1 farrukhsheikh staff 1644118 Apr 26 2012 BackupPlus.ico

drwxr-xr-x@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 8946 Jul 10 21:01 Completed

drwxrwxrwx@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 315 Jul 26 23:26 Equilibrium (2002)

-rwxrwxrwx 1 farrukhsheikh staff 42352 Jul 31 08:32 FarrukhCV_AML Fin Crime 31JUL13.docx

drwxrwxrwx@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 252 Jul 25 01:47 Ip.Man.The.Final.Fight.2013.720p.BluRay.x264-PublicHD

drwxrwxrwx@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 441 Jul 25 03:21 Letters From Iwo Jima 2006 720p BRRip x264-HDLiTE 2

drwxr-xr-x@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 441 Jul 29 00:27 Macintosh HD April 5 2013

drwxrwxrwx@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 378 Jul 27 17:45 Midnight Run 1988 HDDVDRip 720p

drwxr-xr-x@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 126 Apr 4 15:15 My Online Documents

drwxrwxrwx@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 315 Jul 23 19:34 Oblivion (2013) [1080p]

drwxrwxrwx@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 378 Jul 25 01:12 Red (2010)

drwxr-xr-x@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 441 Apr 4 15:14 Seagate Stuff

drwxrwxrwx@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 315 Jul 25 01:15 Searching.for.Sugar.Man.2012.720p.BRRip.x264.AC3-JYK

drwxrwxrwx@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 315 Jul 25 01:15 Superbad Unrated (2007)

drwxr-xr-x@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 189 Jul 30 12:12 Superman Unbound (2013) [1080p]

drwxr-xr-x@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 189 Jul 30 12:12 The 6th Day (2000)

-rw-r--r--@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 528482304 Jul 30 12:13 The Adventures of Tintin (2011) [1080p]

-rw-r--r--@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 3001564328 Jul 23 20:17 The Hunger Games (2012) [1080p]

-rw-r--r--@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 1032 Jul 23 18:24 The Incredible Burt Wonderstone (2013) [1080p]

drwxrwxrwx@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 252 Jul 25 02:20 The.Dyatlov.Pass.Incident.2013.KORSUB.720p.HDRip.x264.AC3-JYK

drwxr-xr-x@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 2961 Jul 17 08:35 Torrents

drwx------@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 252 Jul 31 21:30 UTORRENT AUTO MOVE HERE

drwxr-xr-x@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 6426 Jul 21 23:48 Utorrent Torrents

drwxrwxrwx@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 1953 Jul 20 15:02 Utorrent move here 2

drwxrwxrwx@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 315 Jul 25 00:58 Wallander.Sveket.2013.720p.BluRay.x264-iMSORNY [PublicHD] 2

drwxrwxrwx@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 315 Jul 25 03:12 What Dreams May Come (1998) [1080p]

drwxr-xr-x@ 1 farrukhsheikh staff 504 Jul 10 22:24 Zain's Stuff

Farrukh-Sheikhs-MacBook-Pro:~ farrukhsheikh$

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Answer 15

Jul 31, 2013 1:36 PM in response to baltwo

baltwo, i tried what you said and got this:

Last login: Wed Jul 31 21:33:41 on ttys000

Farrukh-Sheikhs-MacBook-Pro:~ farrukhsheikh$ ls -al /Volumes/"Seagate Backup Plus Drive"/.Trashes/

ls: : Permission denied

Farrukh-Sheikhs-MacBook-Pro:~ farrukhsheikh$

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