# LaCie hd - what am I doing wrong?



## mminegis (Oct 10, 2008)

I must be doing something wrong, as it does not make sense. I am using laCie external hd to store my image files. I now want to delete some of them on laCie, ie free some space, and store anew other files on it. When I do delete/move to trash files from laCie, the total usage space/free space won't change, though I am no longer seeing the folders/files just deleted. 

Do I have to do it in a different way? I am on Powerbook G4, OSX 10.4.11.

Thanks for helping!


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## Hughvane (Oct 10, 2008)

To see the change in space available, you must first delete (empty) the files from Trash.


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## mminegis (Oct 10, 2008)

the folders I deleted are not in Trash - I see them nowhere. I have just empited it, just in case, but the hd still says:

1.43 gb available

While all the folders on it add up to 108 gb. The capacity is 149 gb so should be around 40 gb free.

Or is there any other Trash bin hidden somewhere???


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## Hughvane (Oct 10, 2008)

What process did you use to move the unwanted files to Trash? I mean, did you drag-and-drop, or did you use Cmd-Delete? I know you've emptied the Trash now, but I'm puzzled as to why you couldn't see the trashed files therein before you emptied it. Please don't misunderstand, but is your LaCie drive connected and switched on while you empty the Trash?

Next - try Erase Free Space on your LaCie using Disk Utilities from your PowerBook.

Then, again using Disk Utility, Get Info on that LaCie drive. DU gives a very accurate account of space used, and for what. What format is your LaCie drive, ie. MS-DOS (FAT32) or HFS+? If the latter, then a surprising amount of available space is used for formatting. You say 149 Gb total - is that before or after formatting/initialising?

Lastly, FileBuddy is an excellent third-party utility that will show invisible files. You can trial FB for a period. Perhaps you'd care to try it to locate where the missing, supposedly deleted files, have gone from your LaCie HD.


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## mminegis (Oct 10, 2008)

Thank you! I have just followed through what you said and found the folders again in Trash! so a good 40 gb is back on my laCie now.


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## Hughvane (Oct 11, 2008)

mminegis said:


> Thank you! I have just followed through what you said and found the folders again in Trash! so a good 40 gb is back on my laCie now.



Cheers!


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## Satcomer (Oct 11, 2008)

Sounds like you are a curious one about what's on a hard drive. On a Mac don't fear because third party developers peened great programs like WhatSize that will tell you exactly what's on a hard drive, by name & size.


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