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I have a 500 GB hard drive which I previously attached to my Mac. I detached the drive without going through the eject procedure. When I did this a message showed up, which of course I did not read. I could not use the drive until I formatted again. Now, when I attach the drive it says it is formatted NTFS and has 280.39 of 500 GB free. When I open the drive in Windows Explorer, Finder, or in Linux, is only shows a handful of files totaling 54 MB. How can I find out what is taking up all the space.

Edit: Output of fdisk -l:

Disk /dev/sda: 68.7 GB, 68719476736 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 8354 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x00031a5e

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 1 8068 64804864 83 Linux
/dev/sda2 8069 8355 2300929 5 Extended
/dev/sda5 8069 8355 2300928 82 Linux swap / Solaris


Disk /dev/sdb: 500.1 GB, 500107862016 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 60801 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x288d48f2

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sdb1 1 60802 488383488 7 HPFS/NTFS
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  • Possible duplicate of superuser.com/q/227055/4782
    – NReilingh
    Jan 10, 2011 at 21:04
  • Please attach it to a Linux machine, and add the output of sudo fdisk -l to your question. Thanks.
    – Bobby
    Jan 10, 2011 at 21:05
  • Disk /dev/sda: 68.7 GB, 68719476736 bytes 255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 8354 cylinders Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes Disk identifier: 0x00031a5e Jan 12, 2011 at 0:40
  • Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System /dev/sda1 * 1 8068 64804864 83 Linux /dev/sda2 8069 8355 2300929 5 Extended /dev/sda5 8069 8355 2300928 82 Linux swap / Solaris Jan 12, 2011 at 0:52
  • Disk /dev/sdb: 500.1 GB, 500107862016 bytes 255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 60801 cylinders Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes Disk identifier: 0x288d48f2 Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System /dev/sdb1 1 60802 488383488 7 HPFS/NTFS Jan 12, 2011 at 2:07

2 Answers 2

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In Windows, use Disk Manager. In Linux, use something like fdisk or Gpartd. I think you may have a partition taking up space.

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  • I'm not so sure of that. He said Explorer says 280.39 of 500. If it was another partition it would only show the size of the partition, not the size of the drive.
    – Jeff F.
    Jan 10, 2011 at 20:57
  • He should check for hidden files then. Probably dot files (files starting with a .). If the original author is using Windows, then the Folder Option to view hidden files will need to be turned on. Under Linux, use ls -la in a terminal window (actually the same for the Mac as well if I recall correctly).
    – Mike
    Jan 10, 2011 at 21:09
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On OSX, *BSD or Linux

cd /Volumes/NAME_OF_DISK
du -a | sort -nrk1 | more

You will see all files on the volume (including ones that begin with .) sorted from the largest to smallest. The "." and ".." entries in this mode are misleading as they represent the current working directory and the parent. Ignore them.

df -h will show you the mounts in 'human readable format'

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