Deleting from start up disc

The startup disc on my mini is almost full and there is a lot on it I don't need anymore. What is the best way to purge it?

Welcome to the Apple discussions.
If you can see files or applications you no longer want in Finder, drag or send them to the trash, and empty the trash. If you want to look at all the files on your system, in order of size, use this: http://www.free-mac-software.com/whatsize/ . Of course the most drastic would be to erase the hard drive, and reinstall the operating system and anything else needed from backup.

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How do i delete from start up disc

my start up disc is full and its is 136GB of "others" how do i delete this, what is others?

Here is the definition of OTHER:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT6047
You can delete items you do not want by placing them in trash and then emptying trash.
Or you may transfer data you want to save to an external HDD.
Ciao.

Deleting "Other" from start up disc

My start up disc is almost full and its filled with "Other"
Help me to trim the fat please!
I have too much Other

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.
What is "Other" and What Can I Do About It?- Apple Support Communities
OS X- What is "other" space in About This Mac?

HT1291 my start up disc is almost full, can i migrate from disc 1 to disc 4 in the same mac pro desktop machine

I have a mac pro quad 8, my start up disc is 500 gig, my time mach disc is 500 gig, i have these in position 1 and 2 in my comp, i have 2terra byt disc in possy 3 and possy 4 in the mac pro, can i migrate in the same mach. from start up disc to disc 4 and once completed can i then change disc 4 to strt up disc bay one position. as such then have a start up disc wich is two terra bytes? and if so how do i go about that. your help is much apreciated , thanks.

Yes, you can. Use Disk Utility to clone one disk to the other:
Clone Lion/Mountain Lion using Restore Option of Disk Utility
Boot to the Recovery HD:
Restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the COMMAND and R keys until the menu screen appears. Alternatively, restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the OPTION key until the boot manager screen appears. Select the Recovery HD and click on the downward pointing arrow button.
     1. Select Disk Utility from the main menu then press the Continue
         button.
     2. Select the destination volume from the left side list.
     3. Click on the Restore tab in the DU main window.
     4. Check the box labeled Erase destination.
     5. Select the destination volume from the left side list and drag it
         to the Destination entry field.
     6. Select the source volume from the left side list and drag it to
         the Source entry field.
     7. Double-check you got it right, then click on the Restore button.
Destination means the Disk 4. Source means the current startup drive - Disk 1.
Note that a Time Machine backup drive needs to be a minimum of twice the capacity of the drive it backs up. If you have a 1 TB startup drive, then you need a 2 TB backup drive if you use Time Machine.

Start up disc - urgent support needed!

My start up disc on my MacBook Air is full and now OSX won't boot up on start up. I have just a blank screen. How do I get into OSX to delete files from start up disc to make more memory available?

Take each of these steps that you haven't already tried. Stop when the problem is resolved.
Step 1
The first step in dealing with a boot failure is to secure your data. If you want to preserve the contents of the startup drive, and you don't already have at least one current backup, you must try to back up now, before you do anything else. It may or may not be possible. If you don't care about the data that has changed since your last backup, you can skip this step.
There are several ways to back up a Mac that is unable to boot. You need an external hard drive to hold the backup data.
a. Boot into Recovery by holding down the key combination command-R at the startup chime, or from a local Time Machine backup volume (option key at startup.) Release the keys when you see a gray screen with a spinning dial. When the OS X Utilities screen appears, launch Disk Utility and follow the instructions in the support article linked below, under “Instructions for backing up to an external hard disk via Disk Utility.”
How to back up and restore your files
b. If you have access to a working Mac, and both it and the non-working Mac have FireWire or Thunderbolt ports, boot the non-working Mac in target disk mode by holding down the key combination command-T at the startup chime. Connect the two Macs with a FireWire or Thunderbolt cable. The internal drive of the machine running in target mode will mount as an external drive on the other machine. Copy the data to another drive. This technique won't work with USB, Ethernet, Wi-Fi, or Bluetooth.
How to use and troubleshoot FireWire target disk mode
c. If the internal drive of the non-working Mac is user-replaceable, remove it and mount it in an external enclosure or drive dock. Use another Mac to copy the data.
Step 2
Press and hold the power button until the power shuts off. Disconnect all wired peripherals except those needed to boot, and remove all aftermarket expansion cards. Use a different keyboard and/or mouse, if those devices are wired. If you can boot now, one of the devices you disconnected, or a combination of them, is causing the problem. Finding out which one is a process of elimination.
Before reconnecting an external storage device, make sure that your internal boot volume is selected in the Startup Disk pane of System Preferences.
Step 3
Boot in safe mode.* The instructions provided by Apple are as follows:
Shut down your computer, wait 30 seconds, and then hold down the shift key while pressing the power button.
When you see the gray Apple logo, release the shift key.
If you are prompted to log in, type your password, and then hold down the shift key again as you click Log in.
Safe mode is much slower to boot and run than normal, and some things won’t work at all, including wireless networking on certain Macs.
The login screen appears even if you usually log in automatically. You must know your login password in order to log in. If you’ve forgotten the password, you will need to reset it before you begin.
*Note: If FileVault is enabled, or if a firmware password is set, or if the boot volume is a software RAID, you can’t boot in safe mode. Post for further instructions.
When you boot in safe mode, it's normal to see a dark gray progress bar on a light gray background. If the progress bar gets stuck for more than a few minutes, or if the system shuts down automatically while the progress bar is displayed, your boot volume is damaged and the drive is probably malfunctioning. In that case, go to step 5.
If you can boot and log in now, empty the Trash, and then open the Finder Info window on your boot volume ("Macintosh HD," unless you gave it a different name.) Check that you have at least 9 GB of available space, as shown in the window. If you don't, copy as many files as necessary to another volume (not another folder on the same volume) and delete the originals. Deletion isn't complete until you empty the Trash again. Do this until the available space is more than 9 GB. Then reboot as usual (i.e., not in safe mode.)
If the boot process hangs again, the problem is likely caused by a third-party system modification that you installed. Post for further instructions.
Step 4
Sometimes a boot failure can be resolved by resetting the NVRAM.
Step 5
Launch Disk Utility in Recovery mode (see above for instructions.) Select your startup volume, then run Repair Disk. If any problems are found, repeat until clear. If Disk Utility reports that the volume can't be repaired, the drive has malfunctioned and should be replaced. You might choose to tolerate one such malfunction in the life of the drive. In that case, erase the volume and restore from a backup. If the same thing ever happens again, replace the drive immediately.
This is one of the rare situations in which you should also run Repair Permissions, ignoring the false warnings it produces. Look for the line "Permissions repaired successfully" at the end of the output. Then reboot as usual.
Step 6
Boot into Recovery again. When the OS X Utilities screen appears, follow the prompts to reinstall the OS. If your Mac was upgraded from an older version of OS X, you’ll need the Apple ID and password you used to upgrade.
Note: You need an always-on Ethernet or Wi-Fi connection to the Internet to use Recovery. It won’t work with USB or PPPoE modems, or with proxy servers, or with networks that require a certificate for authentication.
Step 7
Repeat step 6, but this time erase the boot volume in Disk Utility before installing. The system should automatically reboot into the Setup Assistant. Follow the prompts to transfer your data from a backup.
Step 8
If you get this far, you're probably dealing with a hardware fault. Make a "Genius" appointment at an Apple Store to have the machine tested.

Can i delete updates from my start up disc on MacBook

My start up disc is full!!! Can I delete Updates files which contain large amounts of space as they are generally installers that I assume I can get elsewhere should I need them in the future?

You should not have any problem by deleting installers, but I would recommend you to make a backup of your files before modifying any system folder.

When I turn on MacBook Pro it telling me that my start up disk is full and I need to delete files. How do I get to start up disc?

When I search a file called start up disc, nothing shows up. How do I delete files so when my computer starts up, I no longer get a message stating that my start up disc is full and that I need to delete some files?

There is a boot drive inside the computer and it's storage space is filled up.
You need to create a external storage drive and transfer some of your files off the internal boot drive.
TimeMachine doesn't work for this as it's just a rotating backup image of what's on your boot drive, it's not a storage drive for more space and to save things permanently.
So what you need to do is get three external drives from the office or computer store.
I suggest 3-4 separate drives at 1TB each (or more capacity if you really got a lot of stuff), USB 2 is currently fine, the newer USB 3's are more expensive but your Mac doesn't have USB 3 ports, so get the less expensive USB 2 drives and save some money. If you can get Firewire 800/USB combination drives, those would be a better choice as Firewire 800 is the fastest for most Mac's. Only the very new ones have Thunderbolt and the new drives for that are rare and expensive.
Make sure they are self powered drives with their own power supply, not port powered as those are a bit flaky as Apple can just determine the device is drawing too much current from the computer and turn it off.
Note: sometimes if your computer is so full, you might actually have to delete some files in order to be able to get it to function transferring files, so pick ones that you can get new copies again, like free iTunes podcasts or movies for instance.
TimeMachine Drive
The first drive you connect to the Mac is going to pop up a window to ask if you want to make this a "TimeMachine Drive" go ahead and allow it to do that, it's backing up everything on your internal boot drive, it's going to take a long time.
Once it's finished, disconnect this TimeMachine drive and label it as a "TimeMachine Drive"
Extra space /Storage drives
The second drive you connect is going to be your "extra storage drive" basically to free up space off the internal boot drive by transferring files to it.
Formatting:
You first need to format this drive, you use Disk Utility in the Applications> Utilities folder.
On the left will be the 'name of the drive' + "media" click that and then click the Partition tab
Now click 1 Partition, Option: GUID, format OS X Extended (Journaled), give it a name like "StorageOne" and click Apply.
Now click the Erase Tab and Security Option> Zero All Data and click Erase (use the same name) this will take a long time, like 2 hours per 1TB. It's going to check the drive for any errors and make sure it's working.
Note: If the drive fails to format, then perform the Zero All Data first, then visit the Partition tab.
Once the second drive is finished, then do the third drive in the same manner, this time naming it "StorageTwo"
Transferring Data off to the Extra Storage drive
Connect only StorageOne drive and visit your User/Movies folder, it's likely the biggest culprit of oversized files. Create a new folder on the StorageOne drive called "ExtraMovies" and transfer the contents of User/Movies to the "ExtraMovies" folder via drag and drop methods.
Confirm the files were transferred and then delete those movies by dragging them to your Trash can and selecting "Empty Trash" from the Finder menu (if you select Secure Empty Trash on large files it takes a really long time to finish as it's scrubbing the drive, likely unnecessary except for sensitive files)
If you have a large amount of User/Files elsewhere, you will have to search yourself and repeat the same steps to free up room on your internal boot drive.
Once you have made some free space, download this free program to help you visualize where all your space is being taken up.
http://grandperspectiv.sourceforge.net/#download
Once you have completed moving files to the StorageOne drive, connect StorageTwo and copy the contents of StorageOne folders to StorageTwo drive. Both drives have to be connected of course.
Rule of thumb
Maintain TWO separate hardware copies of your User data at ALL TIMES
Because you need more room, thus the storage drives are for extra space. The TimeMachine drive is a backup of your internal boot drive and the second storage drive is a backup copy of the first storage drive. So that way your sticking with the rule of thumb, get it?
Don't connect TimeMachine while your transferring files, or formatting drives, you don't want it to "kick in" while your doing all this heavy work or transferring a large amount of files, I think it does so every hour, which you are going to taking quite some time to do all this work.
Once your all done making room and copying files to the Storage drives, disconnect them and label them and date them.
Reconnect TimeMachine drive
Then connect the TimeMachine drive and it will make a NEW backup of your now newer configuration on your boot drive and keep it updated every time you connect it.
Again, TimeMachine is NOT a storage drive for permanent keeping of data, it deletes old stuff as time progresses. So even though you can "go back in time" and recover a file you transferred then deleted off the your internal boot drive, it won't keep everything forever like a storage drive can.
Consider Cloning your boot drive.
TimeMachine drives can only restore, they are not bootable like a clone is, so a TimeMachine drive isn't a heck of a lot of help if your hard drive fails to boot the computer, so a "hold the option key bootable clone" made with third party software is a very useful as you get to use the computer just like it was before and can get online, grab files off the internal drive and so forth. Even erase and reverse cloning!
The trick with a clone is you make one and keep it disconnected, updating it from time to time. If a software update or install hoses your machine, you can option boot off the clone, grab the latest copy of your files and reverse clone the clone with the updated files back onto your OS X partition, reboot the computer and it's like nothing happened.
It's a advanced technique, you will have to learn a lot more perhaps before attempting it, but it's a lifesaver.
Cloning requires another separate external hard drive and free cloning software.
You can read more about it all here. Take your time, you have a lot to absorb.
https://discussions.apple.com/message/16276201#16276201

ON START UP IT TELLS ME THAT MY start up disc IS FULL - HOW DO I EITHER DELETE ITEMS - FFRAG ROM WHERE ?! - OR DE

Hi
On start up it tells me that my start up disc is full - how can i either find where to delete items from it - or can you defrag as you could in windows ? Help !

For information about the Other category in the Storage display, see this support article.
Empty the Trash if you haven't already done so. If you use iPhoto, empty its internal Trash first:
iPhoto ▹ Empty Trash
Then reboot. That will temporarily free up some space. Do the same in other applications, such as Aperture, that have an internal Trash feature.
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 free 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.
See this support article for some simple ways to free up storage space.
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.
If you have more than one user account, make sure you're logged in as an administrator. The administrator account is the one that was created automatically when you first set up the computer.
Install ODS in the Applications folder as usual. Quit it if it's running.
Triple-click anywhere in the line of text below on this page to select it, then copy the selected text to the Clipboard by pressing the key combination command-C:
sudo /Applications/OmniDiskSweeper.app/Contents/MacOS/OmniDiskSweeper
Launch the built-in 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 to be careful. 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, sorted by size with the largest at the top. It may take a few minutes for ODS to finish scanning your 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.

IMac saying "start up disc is nearly full please delete some files"

My iMac is one week old today. I've got hardly anything installed on it and Macintosh HD say's I have 252.87GB available space.
Yesterday I started getting an pop up saying "start up disc is nearly full please delete some files". I can't understand why as I have so much free space available.
I've googled around and not found anything that could help. Just a few people saying use Disk Utility etc. I've done all that now and it still comes up.
Any help welcome
Thanks

Hello d:
Welcome to Apple discussions.
Run repair disk from your software install DVD.
If you still get the message, call Applecare - you are well within the warranty period.
Barry

HT201364 How do I delete from my start up disk

HOW DO I DELETE FROM MY START-UP DISK.....I WANT TO INSTALL OX MAVERICKS AND MUST DELETE FOR MORE SPACE

You should never, EVER let a conputer hard drive get completely full, EVER!
With Macs and OS X, you shouldn't let the hard drive get below 15 GBs or less of free data space.
If it does, it's time for some hard drive housecleaning.
Follow some of my tips for cleaning out, deleting and archiving data from your Mac's internal hard drive.
Have you emptied your iMac's Trash icon in the Dock?
If you use iPhoto, iPhoto has its own trash that needs to be emptied, also.
If you store images in other locations other than iPhoto, then you will have to weed through these to determine what to archive and what to delete.
If you use Apple Mail app, Apple Mail also has its own trash area that needs to be emptied, too!
Delete any old or no longer needed emails and/or archive to disc, flash drives or external hard drive, older emails you want to save.
Other things you can do to gain space.
Once you have around 15 GBs regained, do a search, download and install OmniDisk Sweeper.
This app will help you locate files that you can move/archive and/or delete from your system.
STAY AWAY FROM DELETING ANY FILES FROM OS X SYSTEM FOLDER!
Look through your Documents folder and delete any type of old useless type files like "Read Me" type files.
Again, archive to disc, flash drives, ext. hard drives or delete any old documents you no longer use or immediately need.
Look in your Applications folder, if you have applications you haven't used in a long time, if the app doesn't have a dedicated uninstaller, then you can simply drag it into the OS X Trash icon. IF the application has an uninstaller app, then use it to completely delete the app from your Mac.
Download an app called OnyX for your version of OS X.
When you install and launch it, let it do its initial automatic tests, then go to the cleaning and maintenance tabs and run the maintenance tabs that let OnyX clean out all web browser cache files, web browser histories, system cache files, delete old error log files.
Typically, iTunes and iPhoto libraries are the biggest users of HD space.
move these files/data off of your internal drive to the external hard drive and deleted off of the internal hard drive.
If you have any other large folders of personal data or projects, these should be archived or moved, also, to the optical discs, flash drives or external hard drive and then either archived to disc and/or deleted off your internal hard drive.
Good Luck!

Am getting message from MacPro that my start up disc is full - but I can't find it and can't figure out what to do to help situation. I've been making a number of imovies, which generates junk files. help?

I am getting message from MacPro that my start up disc is full - but I can't find this "start up disc" and can't figure out what to do to help situation. I've been making a number of imovies, which generates junk files and material that I should toss in the trash, but it is not clear to me what items I can toss and which items I can't toss. Can you help? Using the imovie "help" support the system showed me under the menu item "go" where the "start up disc" should be - but that wasn't actually available on my menu! Thanks for your help!

Disk Utility
Get Info on the icon on Desktop
Try to move this to the MacBook Pro forum
Your boot drive should be 30% free to really perform properly. 10% minimum
Backup, clone, use TimeMachine, use another drive for your projects and movies, replace and upgrade the internal drive even.

How can I remove items from my start up disc and create more space on it?, How can I remove items from my start up disc and create more space on it?

My Mac Book Air tells me that the start up disc is nearly full land that I do not have the capacity to load Maverick. How can I remove items that I may not need from this disc?

Move them to an external hard drive, formatted as HFS Extended (Journaled).

How do you remove items from the start up disc

How do you remove items from the start up disc?

Freeing Up Space on The Hard Drive
You can remove data from your Home folder except for the /Home/Library/ folder.
Visit The XLab FAQs and read the FAQ on freeing up space on your hard drive.
Also see Freeing space on your Mac OS X startup disk.

ITunes Match has stopped uploading - every file errors and says waiting - I have tried to delete the files and use other formats etc. I have had the service since Day 1 and NEVER had an issue. It didn't start until the Delete from Cloud switch to Hide

iTunes Match has stopped uploading - every file errors and says waiting - I have tried to delete the files and use other formats etc. I have had the service since Day 1 and NEVER had an issue. It didn't start until the Delete from Cloud switch to Hide from cloud - the files that do not upload show grayed out on my other devices.

Have you confirmed that you successfull purged iTunes Match by also looking on an iOS device? If so, keep in mind that Apple's servers may be experiencing a heavy load right now. They just added about 19 countries to the service and I've read a few accounts this morning that suggests all's not running perfectly right now.

Start up disc problems and my imac will not boot from the cd.

Hi All,
I have a start up disc that needs repaired, according to ONYX so then reading the apple support guide it seems I boot from my OSX CD that came with my iMac and use First Aid. However when I insert my OSX CD my imac reads it fine, as it does with any other cd, yet when I re-boot, holding down C, it won't boot. It restarts, but fails then to read the CD and just re-boots again, and again, and again.
How can I fix this?
Thanks all, I appreciate it.
From abour this MAC:
OSX 10.6.8
2.93 Ghz Intel Core 2
8gb 1333 DDR3
Start up disc Mac HD

thanks, but disc is spotless.
When I put the disc in while machine is on it is read perfectly, appears immediatly and can be opened with no issues. It is only on re-boot ti then appears not to engage with the system.
I was advised to re-boot holding the "c" button from the MAC forum which I have done. I have also restarted using the restart button on the OSX disc loading screen.
mark

Deleting from start up disc

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