Maybe stay away from terminal if you're unsure of bash/command prompt. There is an apple support article explaining how to do this. You can do this via a key command, and if still not working you can force empty through the terminal application (utility app also). If this doesn't show anything unusual or fix the issue you could then attempt to force empty trash. Before doing this I would advise copying your data to another drive if you have one. Run a verify disk and a permissions check/repair on the external hdd partition in question. Unable to unmount, remove files, trash files, view files etc.īasically as suggested use the utility app called disk utility. This could likened to a failing partition and can cause any sort of different issues eg. Could be a permissions issue with one file within the TM backups preventing you from emptying trash.Ģ.could also be an issue with the sparse image created when you have a TM backup (basically a TM backup is a disk image).
It could be a number of things causing this:ġ. Hey, are the files still in the trash when you have the ext hdd connected? After you've tried emptying I mean.
