Idiot Newbie - HD full

[Paul]

Hi guys,

I am a complete fool, and I need your help please.

I downloaded and ran superduper last night after hearing about it from the TMU podcast.

I was just tinkering as you do, and decided to kick off a backup, but I didn't tell it to access my drobo, mistakenly I left it backing up to a sparse file on my desktop.

I then went to bed without giving it another thought. This morning I am greeted by a few messages form itunes about not having enough space and similar messages from superduper.

Here is where the kicker comes in, and where I need help:

I cancelled superduper, and dismounted the sparse backup, I have 'Hazel.app' set to move all image files from my desktop to an 'images' folder.

My mac is now effectly useless, the memory (4Gb) is maxed out and both processes are running at 99% I assume it's trying to move a massive backup file byte by byte with no disk space to move in.

I do not know whether to turn the mac off or just let it do about it's business, its not responding to anything, and just spinning the beachball.

It's been hours, any thoughts?

Paul

[dnanian]

I think you're going to have to try to turn it off, Paul...

[Paul]

Thanks, I can do that, I was just afraid that if I did it wouldn't be able to startup again.

Well if nothing else I certainly learnt a lesson today, what a plonker!

[dnanian]

That's possible, Paul -- but I don't think you have a choice. You'll certainly be able to start up in 'single user' mode, basically with a Terminal, and fix things -- or use "FireWire Target Disk mode" to access the drive from another Mac. I just hope it's not doing something critical when you power off (which is basically like a power failure mid-operation).

[Paul]

A-ha Genious idea, I forgot about target disk mode, I can use that to remove the backup img.

I'll report back, thanks for the advice and the glimmer of hope

Paul

[Paul]

Hi guys,

Just to say when i got home from work my macbook pro was still stuck in it's hung state, forcing a shutdown/reboot brought it back but it was still maxing out on memory/process but I was able to open finder and delete the backup file. I emptied the trash and all is back to normal.

Phew!

Thanks for the guidance, hope this serves to help someone else in the future

Paul