What is the purple backup bar?

Question

Level 1

25 points

What is the purple backup bar?

I had 202 GIG of space free of my 500Gig computer.

I had a yellow "other" bar in my "about this mac" Storage information which was about 170 Gig (can't remember exactly how much), I deleted the trash I had which was about 80Gig, thinking that would increase my avail space...But it did not decrease it, it just added a backup purple bar instead (which wasn't there at all before)? The avail storage did not budge...

What happened and why hasn't the avail space increased? Seems like it got put in this Backups space?? And yes, I shut down and restarted.

Thanks

iMac, OS X Mavericks (10.9.1)

Posted on Apr 20, 2014 11:10 PM

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Answer 1

Apr 20, 2014 11:21 PM in response to Canozzie11

Restart your Mac in order to see a change in hard disk space.

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Answer 2

benwiggy

Level 4

1,485 points

Apr 21, 2014 12:59 AM in response to Canozzie11

These are local backups. Time Machine snapshots are saved to your local disk while your backup volume is unavailable. The space will be recovered next time you connect to your TM disk.

Even if backup data fills your disk, then it will be deleted when "real" data needs the space.

http://support.apple.com/kb/ht4878

The info in the Storage display can be variable. It's based on Spotlgiht indexing. "Other" is everything else that isn't audio, video, photos or a backup.

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Answer 3

Canozzie11 Author

Level 1

25 points

Apr 21, 2014 1:12 AM in response to Carolyn Samit

Hi Carolyn,

My last sentence stated I shut down and restarted. I did it twice, even left the computer off for 4 hours. Still the same.

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Answer 4

Canozzie11 Author

Level 1

25 points

Apr 21, 2014 1:14 AM in response to benwiggy

I did a Time Machine backup, it's still the same.

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Answer 5

benwiggy

Level 4

1,485 points

Apr 21, 2014 3:26 AM in response to Canozzie11

It's not a problem. You still have plenty of space on your hard drive, and if more space is needed, OS X will delete the backups to make room.

If you really want to disable local backups, there is a Terminal command to do so.

http://osxdaily.com/2011/09/28/disable-time-machine-local-backups-in-mac-os-x-li on/

But bear in mind that if you're not backing up regularly, you may risk some data loss.

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Answer 6

Canozzie11 Author

Level 1

25 points

Apr 21, 2014 3:33 AM in response to benwiggy

But why would it still be there? The fact is that when I tried to empty my trash, the data seemed to have jumped into my "backup"...that is strange behavior, no? Why wouldn't deleting 80 gig in my trash not be reflected at all in my storage space?

my computer is slow too, so I'm not liking the way it's behaving...I don't want to 'turn off' the local backup if that is what the default behaviour is supposed to be.

do you think if I just left it the way it is it would just fix itself at some point??

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Answer 7

benwiggy

Level 4

1,485 points

Apr 21, 2014 3:36 AM in response to Canozzie11

Yes, leave it alone.

The slowness is likely to be unrelated. Most causes of slowness tend to caused by third-party software that runs in the background constantly.

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