Time Machine is full?

Leave it alone, Time Machine is designed to erase the oldest backups in order to make space so there isn't anything for you to do. However it wise to have a backup drive that is at least 2-3 times the size of the data you are backing up. Also, all HD's fail, so depending on the condition of your EHD at some point you will need to replace it. If you do decide you want to get a larger EHD you can move the data on your existing EHD to the new one. This isn't very difficult to do but you will need instruction so feel free to reach out when that time comes for help.

johnnyivan wrote:

Sorry, I tried. I can't understand any of it.

That's just me.

Okay, as stated earlier just leave TM alone. If you need assistance recovering something you can always go to your local Apple Store and speak to a Genius or you can call AppleCare for assistance.

I have been successful at deleting some of the oldest entries in Time machine.

It will give you back some memory but it is a V-E-R-Y slow process indeed, and to even think of doing this several times could take hours, unless your Mac is really fast.

What I did was select “Enter Time Machine” in the drop-down.

Then on the right side, go up as far as you can and click on the oldest backup you can click.

After the window opens look for the cog wheel (the gear thingy) and in there you can "delete this backup".

You will need to enter your password to proceed.

Is it worth it? Probably not. ReFormat, Erase and start a new. Your call.

Unless there’s something way back in there that you really might want to recover some day.

Have you ever needed to recover anything?

If so, then it's buy another drive.

Yeah Hi,

1. The ‘wiping’ of the Ext. HD is a simple process with Disk Util.

Just hit Erase, and the fact that it is an SSD, it should be an even quicker process, and it’s done. Just select the drives’ Name and Erase.

2. When you ‘hover’ over the oldest backup (the one at the top of the list on the right ) you actually have to LEFT click on it (NOT right click or double click) to get the window to open. This new window will show you everything that was backed up on that date.

The date will be listed along the top and in that window you will also see the cog wheel icon under that . Left click it, and in the drop-down, select delete backup. Then enter your password and the process will begin.

Note; there is very little feed back during the process, no progress strip and does not even tell you when it is done, as I recall. Actually, you can select 2 or 3 and hit delete each time and it will delete concurrently, one after the other but again it is a slow process and patience is required.

Also; it all happens in the background (so to speak) and you can go about doing other things with your computer while it does what it does, so you don’t have to sit there and wait.

Again, it is a very slow process for me here, but perhaps that it’s an SSD, it could be quicker for you.

The up-down arrows do work here, and allow you to step forward and backward in time, to each backup.

I hope this clears things up a bit.

Let us know if it works out for you.

TTabby

Like I said, unless there is some item, in some distant backup, on your External drive that you may need some day, erase it and just start over.

Yes, you will not have a backup until you restart Time Machine again, on the (now) empty External but after the first backup (which is that big long one) you will be all backed up again and TM will start backing up again, hour after hour.

Each new backup only backs up things which has changed, from hour to hour.

At the end of the day it groups it all together for that day.

Is your Mac perhaps very old? and you have worries it may die?

Erasing an External Drive has little or no stress at all on the Internal drive.

They are quite separate.

For that 1 or 2 hours that it should all take (at the most) it is quite unlikely that your Internal will fail at this time.

There are many who have no backup scheme at all.

Myself, I have a slow WD external for TM and is almost full too btw, and then another faster HD which I back up nightly using Carbon Copy Cloner which does an auto shut down when done. Then I have an auto start at 6AM for the next day. 2 backups are always much better than one.

So, don’t overthink this too much, and/but perhaps research it else ware, until you feel confident about how to proceed (google is your friend) Ask at Mac Rumors too.

It’s not that big of a deal, really.

Good Luck

Well, now you are trying to delve into the specifics of how it does what it does, and I am not able to give you details which I do not know about.

So to your last question, I do not know.

All it says in the documentation is, “The oldest backups are deleted when your backup disk is full.”

It does not tell us the details and that is probably because the developers like to keep those things a secret.

One would think that if it “deletes the oldest backups when your backup disk is full”, we have nothing to worry about and it will endlessly take care of everything on it’s own.

Perhaps, there is nothing to even worry about at all.

So, you could just wait until it “tells you” it is full and then decide what to do.

That’s about all I know with this, and that Apple link above explains it all quite clearly.

John, this explains how Time Machine works its magic better than anything I've read so far http://oldtoad.net/pondini.org/TM/Works.html

There are several informative links on this site http://oldtoad.net/pondini.org/OSX/Home.html

Please read How to use Time Machine to back up or restore your Mac - Apple Support, this will explain how TM works!!

http://www.baligu.com/pondini/TM/12.html