backups clogging drive

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Level 1

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backups clogging drive

I have iphone 5, ipad, ipod.

I've noticed that the old versions of iOS backups (which I presume are for the phone) are stored in my main drive and are taking up signicant room on my drive.

I purposely only use the main drive for the operating system (WIN7), and was surprised to see the old iOS backups folders sitting in a directory.

Address: Maindrive\User\Username\AppData\Roaming\Applecomputer\Mobilesync\backup

I have 15 backup folders that take up about 18gig of space (My drive is only 120gig of which I have 10gig left)

Some are these are for my old iphone 4.

Are the older versions deletable?

iPhone 5, iOS 7.0.4

Posted on Feb 9, 2014 11:57 PM

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Answer 1

CarlAVII

Community Specialist

Feb 12, 2014 11:39 AM in response to NFC888

Hello NFC888,

We've an article that provides information regarding the management of backups created in iTunes.

Deleting a backup in iTunes

If you want to delete a backup created by iTunes, follow these steps:

Open iTunes Preferences:

Windows: Choose Edit > Preferences

Mac: Choose iTunes > Preferences

Click Devices (the iOS device doesn't need to be connected).

iTunes will show the phone number, IMEI, and serial number of the backed up iPhone when you position your mouse pointer over a backup (iTunes shows only the serial number for iPad and iPod touch). You can use this to find the backup you want to delete.

Select the backup you want to remove and click Delete Backup.

Confirm you wish to remove the selected backup by clicking Delete Backup.

Click OK to close the iTunes Preferences Window.

Note: Backups that have a date and time stamp in the backup name are copies of backups created by restoring the iOS device. The date and time in the left column are when the restore-from-backup occurred. The date and time in the right column are the last synced date; this shows how current the data is.

iTunes: About iOS backups

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4946

Cheers,

Allen

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Answer 2

turingtest2

Level 10

274,131 points

Feb 12, 2014 12:57 PM in response to NFC888

Relocate iOS device backups

Make a new folder called MobileSync at the root of the drive you want the backup data to live on, e.g. as D:\MobileSync
Use Windows Explorer to move current Backup folder at <SystemDrive>\Users\<User>\AppData\Roaming\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup into the folder you just made. If the backup folder is large this may take some time.
To make iTunes look for the data in the new location copy the text below, open a command prompt, right-click to paste in the command, edit the drive letter if needed, and then press <Enter>.
```
MkLink /J "%AppData%\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup" "D:\MobileSync\Backup"
```

Note that while this method works for iOS device backups it cannot be used to redirect sections of the media library.

tt2

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