How do i find out what 'other' stuff on my hard drive is taking up all the space?

I continue to get a startup disk error message but have empited all trash (incl in app like iphoto) and what seems to be taking up most space is the yellow 'other line... Is there a way of knowing what this comprises of and the sizes that each file contains? Or is there an option to purchase soem additional space??
Help appreciated :-)

You may find this great User Tip from Kappy useful:
What is “Other” and What Can I Do About It?

Similar Messages

  • How do I find out where 'other' is on my hard drive?

    Firstly, sorry if this sounds stupid to all the technological people out there. Cause I'm really not - only got my Macbook Pro a month ago!
    Alerts have been popping up saying that my hard drive is full and that I need to free some space asap or it could cause permanent damage.
    I deleted all my music and photos and put everything into an external drive because I only really need my laptop for uni work anyway.
    Even after I did that however, it still says that I only have 47.4BG free out of 120.47GB! 'Other' seems to be taking up 47.13GB but I have no idea how to find it/get rid of it! I googled it and tried to find the printer drivers and language packs but they don't seem to be taking up much space at all.
    What should I do? Obviously those alerts don't come up anymore but I thought now that I've deleted all my stuff from it I might as well sort out this 'Other' thing too.
    Thanks a lot

    Here is a decent article on how to track down what is taking up space on you hard disk drive: http://www.tuaw.com/2011/03/10/mac-101-six-steps-for-tracking-down-hard-drive-sp ace-hogs/
    Good luck, and happy hunting.

  • How do I find out what's eating up my hard drive space?

    I installed Leopard quite a while back on my 1,8 GHz PowerPC G5 tower. I had to try twice and call Apple support because I was having problems installing it. I never seem to have much hard drive space, and I don't really have much on this computer. My iTunes library takes up a bit of room, but there's really not much else on the hard drive. I cleaned out some old stuff tonight and made some room, but I am wondering how much of my space is eaten up by the previous OS. Also wondering if Leopard is on here twice because of the double install attempt.
    I am trying to make room to install Logic Express 8. So where are the OS's on here so I can trash anything extraneous, and is there a way -- other than individually Apple I'ing everything -- to see what's taking up so much space on my hard drive. As you can probably tell, I'm not the most computer literate person. Thanks.

    Try a program such as Disk Inventory X or OmniDiskSweeper.
    (50778)

  • I've emptied trash, removed files, discarded everything I don't use and my startup disc is still full.  Half of it is 'other'.  How do I find out what 'other' is and remove it?

    I've emptied trash, removed files, discarded everything I don't use and my startup disc is still full.  Half of it is 'other'.  How do I find out what 'other' is and remove it?  I'm using a Mac OS X Lion 10.7.5 (11G63).  Any help will be treasured!

    Linda Steider wrote:
    How do I find out what 'other' is and remove it?
    See Pondiini's The Storage Display, for details.

  • I have a A4 document (569 pages) and within that A4 there are few A3's. Is there a way to isolate the A3's or find out what page numbers are A3's instead of scrolling through all the 569 pages???

    I have a A4 document (569 pages) and within that A4 there are few A3's. Is there a way to isolate the A3's or find out what page numbers are A3's instead of scrolling through all the 569 pages???

    thank you for the info... however I'm done buying pdf readers.... I've got three now, that should suffice.
    I don't think there's a problem such as you mentioned because the pages are all similar : text and drawings. Some of the pages with drawings work, other similar pages don't.
    I converted with Calibre to epub format and this seems to work !!!
    So good so far...
    Now I need to find a conversion to pdf to allow me to use goodreader or iannotate.
    Basically... the text is ok, because a conversion allows reading. So a shortcoming by Apple in my opinion. Again, all pdf's should be readable on such an expensive tool !!!

  • On my MAC, my storage reads 48 free GB out of 500GB.  OF that "other" which is in yellow, is 350 GB.  How do I find out what "other" is because I would like to know to delete it.

    How do I find out what the "other" programs are on my computer.  It is slowing the system down.  I am wondering if it is one of my kids graphic games.  The system is so slow and maxed out but not sure what the item(s) is that is clogging up the stroage.  I am use to a dell and right clicking it to show me.

    What is "Other" and What Can I Do About It?- Apple Support Communities
    Freeing Up Space on The Hard Drive
      1. See Lion/Mountain Lion/Mavericks' Storage Display.
      2. You can remove data from your Home folder except for the /Home/Library/ folder.
      3. Visit The XLab FAQs and read the FAQ on freeing up space on your hard drive.
      4. Also see Freeing space on your Mac OS X startup disk.
      5. See Where did my Disk Space go?.
      6. See The Storage Display.
    You must Empty the Trash in order to recover the space they occupied on the hard drive.
    You should consider replacing the drive with a larger one. Check out OWC for drives, tutorials, and toolkits.
    Try using OmniDiskSweeper 1.8 or GrandPerspective to search your drive for large files and where they are located.

  • How do I find out what "other" consists of on my iMAC

    Under About this MAC, Storage, I noticed that the vast majority of space (271 GB compared to the next closest at 16GB) taken up on my disk is "other" (not audio, movies, photos, backups, or apps) -  What the heck constitutes 'other"?   How do I find what the components of 'other' are that are taking up so much space?
    Thanks,
    Bob

    Use a tool such as OmniDiskSweeper to explore your volume and find out what's taking up the space. Proceed further only if the problem hasn't been solved. ODS can't see the whole filesystem when you run it just by double-clicking; it only sees files that you have permission to read. To really see everything, you have to run it as root. Back up all data now if you haven't already done so. No matter what happens, you should be able to restore your system to the state it was in at the time of that backup. Launch the Terminal application in any of the following ways: ☞ Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.) ☞ In the Finder, select Go ▹ Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens. ☞ Open LaunchPad. Click Utilities, then Terminal in the page that opens. After installing ODS in the Applications folder, drag or copy — do not type — the following line into the Terminal window, then press return:sudo /Applications/OmniDiskSweeper.app/Contents/MacOS/OmniDiskSweeper
    You'll be prompted for your login password, which won't be displayed when you type it. You may get a one-time warning not to screw up.
    I don't recommend that you make a habit of this. Don't delete anything while running ODS as root. When you're done with it, quit it and also quit Terminal.

  • How do I find out what "Other" is, in the "About this Mac", storage details bar graph?

    My new Mac Book Pro with 250 GB Flash Storage is already full with only adding a few apps. I purchased the new Final Cut Pro X, but store all video data on an external drive. Whats up? Why is 146 GB used up with "Other"? What is "Other!?" How can I find out the details of what's in other, and get rid of what I don't want or use?

    First, empty the Trash if you haven't already done so. If you use iPhoto, empty its internal Trash as well:
    iPhoto ▹ Empty Trash
    Then reboot. That will temporarily free up some space.
    According to Apple documentation, you need at least 9 GB of available space on the startup volume (as shown in the Finder Info window) for normal operation. You also need enough space left over to allow for growth of your data. There is little or no performance advantage to having more available space than the minimum Apple recommends. Available storage space that you'll never use is wasted space.
    If you're using Time Machine to back up a portable Mac, some of the available space will be used to make local snapshots, which are backup copies of files you've recently deleted. The space occupied by local snapshots is reported as available by the Finder, and should be considered as such. In the Storage display of System Information, local snapshots are shown as "Backups." The snapshots are automatically deleted when they expire or when free space falls below a certain level. You ordinarily don't need to, and should not, delete local snapshots yourself.
    To locate large files, you can use Spotlight. That method may not find large folders that contain a lot of small files.
    You can more effectively use a tool such as OmniDiskSweeper (ODS) to explore your volume and find out what's taking up the space. You can also delete files with it, but don't do that unless you're sure that you know what you're deleting and that all data is safely backed up. That means you have multiple backups, not just one.
    Deleting files inside an iPhoto or Aperture library will corrupt the library. Any changes to a photo library must be made from within the application that created it. The same goes for Mail files.
    Proceed further only if the problem isn't solved by the above steps.
    ODS can't see the whole filesystem when you run it just by double-clicking; it only sees files that you have permission to read. To see everything, you have to run it as root.
    Back up all data now.
    Install ODS in the Applications folder as usual. Quit it if it's running.
    Triple-click the line of text below to select it, then copy the selected text to the Clipboard (command-C):sudo /Applications/OmniDiskSweeper.app/Contents/MacOS/OmniDiskSweeper
    Launch the Terminal application in any of the following ways:
    ☞ Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.)
    ☞ In the Finder, select Go ▹ Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens.
    ☞ Open LaunchPad. Click Utilities, then Terminal in the icon grid.
    Paste into the Terminal window (command-V). You'll be prompted for your login password, which won't be displayed when you type it. You may get a one-time warning not to screw up. If you see a message that your username "is not in the sudoers file," then you're not logged in as an administrator.
    The application window will open, eventually showing all files in all folders. It may take some minutes for ODS to list all the files.
    I don't recommend that you make a habit of doing this. Don't delete anything while running ODS as root. If something needs to be deleted, make sure you know what it is and how it got there, and then delete it by other, safer, means. When in doubt, leave it alone or ask for guidance.
    When you're done with ODS, quit it and also quit Terminal.

  • How can I find out which mac format my external hard drive has

    I have a PD LaCie drive.  I had formatted it about a month ago, but now reading several posts, it appears that the best format is mac OS extended (journaled).  I am not sure if that is the one that I had originally chosen.  How do I find out which format my external hard drive has?
    Thanks.

    Select it on the desktop or in the Finder's sidebar and choose Get Info from the File menu. If it doesn't show up in either location, check the settings in the General and Sidebar tabs of the Finder's preferences.
    (63966)

  • My hard drive is full, i'm being told i have 284.03 GB of other.  How can I find out what these files are so i can delete them?

    My Mac is telling me that my hard drive is almost full, i have used 7.65 GB for Audio. 16.58 GB for Movies, 9.89 GB for photos, 788.6 MB for Apps and 284.03 GB for Other.  how can i find out what "other" is so I can delete it?  I hope someone can help me.

    If OS X is reporting you need to remove some items you obviously have a more severe issue.
    To fix your issue is likely too complicated and lengthy to go into all of it here as it sounds like a OS X issue, it will require the services of person very familiar and experienced with Mac's to first recover your data and then restore OS X back to a functional state which may or may not require new hardware/software installed.
    If your under warranty or AppleCare, take it in for service.
    You can also hire the services of a local Mac computer support technician experienced in these matters.
    Have them look at your Wifi, RAM amount, extra storage and computer backup proceedures in the process.
    Good Luck.

  • HT5622 I think my granddaughter bought a $3.99 app after I put the password in for a free app.  How can I find out what she purchased?  Can I get credit for it?  I just got an email from my credit card confirming the purchase.

    I think my granddaughter bought a $3.99 app after I put the password in for a free app.  I just got an email from my credit card confirming the purchase.  How can I find out what she purchased?  Can I get credit for it? 

    The password is good for 15 minutes to make purchases. You should receive a receipt in 24 to 48 hours for the purchases. There is a link to Report an issue. You could use that to start a conversation with iTunes Support about a refund.
    Apple considers all sales final. But has been known to offer a one time refund. So the question is, do you want to use your one time refund on this purchase or one more expensive in the future?

  • I have recently got a new replacement iPhone 4.  since I got this I have found that my data allowance is getting used up during the night while my phone is charging on the bedside table.  How an I find out what is causing this and stop it happening

    I have recently got a new replacement iPhone 4.  Since I got this I have found that my data allowance is getting used up during the night while my phone is charging on the bedside table.  How an I find out what is causing this and stop it happening?  Some nights the usage is 150 meg!

    You can not access the backup directly.
    Did you restore your replacement from this backup?
    If so then you already have everything in the backup on your device.
    If not, you can wipe the device and restore from this backup:
    Settings > General > Reset > Erase All Content & Settings
    What is it you are worried about losing that isn't already on your current device?

  • How do I find-out what version OS I'm running?

    New Apple user - how do I find out what OS I'm running on my Macbook Pro?

    Click the Apple logo in the top left corner and select "About this Mac"
    Version:
    10.8 = Mountain Lion
    10.7 = Lion
    10.6 = Snow Leopard
    10.5 = Leopard

  • HT5622 how do you find out what your rescue email address is

    I have a new iphone.  It asks me security questions to verify my identity.  I forgot answers and therefore it sends information to my rescue email to change questions.  How do I find out what my rescue email is?

    You can't after losing the answers. If guessing doesn't work, you need to ask Apple to reset your security questions; ways of contacting them include phoning AppleCare and asking for the Account Security team, clicking here and picking a method for your country, and filling out and submitting this form.
    They wouldn't be security questions if they could be bypassed without Apple verifying your identity.
    (105335)

  • HT202659 I am being told I owe for something in apps how do I find out what it is for ?

    I Am being told I owe for something in apps how do I find out what it is for ?

    Greetings Colorado girl 4,
    Welcome to the Apple Support Communities!
    I understand that you would like to view your purchase history to see what charges are on your iTunes Store account. To view your purchase history, please follow the instructions located in the attached article. 
    See your purchase history in the iTunes Store - Apple Support
    Cheers,
    Joe

Maybe you are looking for

  • Org.xml.sax.SAXParseException with XML Report Publish

    Anyone see the following error in XML Report Publisher? This happened after I ran Employee W2 XML Interface and ran XML Report Publisher for the output of the PDF output. --XDOException java.lang.reflect.InvocationTargetException      at sun.reflect.

  • HDMi to DVI D - No Audio

    Hello Everyone! So, I bought a cable (HDMi to DVi-D) and have it coming out of my Apple TV and into an older Sony 55" TV. The DVi-D input on the Sony has 2 RCA audio inputs under it but nowhere on the TV is there an optical input to take from the App

  • Brazil Boleto Barcodes - Single Barcode for multiple vendor invoices

    Hi All, I have the following two questions in Brazil Boleto process. 1) The vendor is giving a single boleto bar code for multiple invoices. However when we are entering the barcode in the Bank reference field, the last digits are getting changed as

  • Set value of hidden database item

    I have a simple non-tabular form for creating rows in a table. I need to set the value of a hidden database item to be the same as a database item which the user enters. I know this can be done by a database trigger and also by a custom update proces

  • How can I use the F11 short cut to go to next field in Microsoft Word 2011 on Macbook Air

    How can I use the F11 short cut to go to next field in Microsoft Word 2011 on Macbook Air?