Disk space mystery

Hello! Any ideas why my disk space randomly fluctuates, up to 2GB? I have about 2GB free space, then all of the sudden the last couple of weeks, it'll go down by itself to around 250MB or less. Then, it just goes back up. But, it seems to last a few days each time. I have not added any files or software, and I am at a loss as to what the deal is...
Thanks!

HI,
Might be a good time to check the startup disk for errors.
Insert Installer disk and Restart, holding down the "C" key until grey Apple appears.
Go to Installer menu (Panther and earlier) or Utilities menu (Tiger and later) and launch Disk Utility.
Select your HDD (manufacturer ID) in the left panel.
Select First Aid in the Main panel.
*(Check S.M.A.R.T Status of HDD at the bottom of right panel. It should say: Verified)*
Click Repair Disk on the bottom right.
If DU reports disk does not need repairs quit DU and restart.
If DU reports errors Repair again and again until DU reports disk is repaired.
When you are finished with DU, from the Menu Bar, select Utilities/Startup Manager.
Select your start up disk and click Restart
While you have the Disk Utility window open, look at the bottom of the window where you see Capacity and Available. Make sure there is always 10% free disk space.
Carolyn

Similar Messages

Disk space (mysteriously) disappearing

i've been running low on hard disk space so i tried deleting big files, but no matter how much i delete my new recovered space shrinks. i even deleted 40GB of music and movies and then my space over a few days ended up ar only 500MB. i continue to delete large amounts of photos like 20GB and the same thing happened — warnign low on space only 750MB.
i delete some more — like 15GB and now i only have 10GB free.. it's a bizarre situation. feels like some virus.
so today i discovered this:
there's a 60GB difference from what the User level folder info says and the Hard Drive level info says. what's happening to my space!!!
—Caleb

A tool like OmniDiskSweeper cannot be used to compare to the numbers the Finder will give you, for a variety of reasons. You can do better by using a tool that can authenticate to "root" permissions, which allows it to look everywhere. The WhatSize app can do that:
http://whatsizemac.com/
However, even then, there are certain things that the Finder won't report, since they will be deleted automatically when necessary. So you'll never get perfect one-to-one correlation with these kinds of comparisons.
For more help with this sort of thing, see:
http://pondini.org/OSX/DiskSpace.html

10GB of disk space mysteriously used overnight.

Hi all,
I left my MacBook on today when I went out, and it reported 27.99GB of space free, and I came home to find I have 17.34GB of space remaining. I've not installed anything or done more than open Safari and iTunes. Given I'd just been on a data purge to free up some space, I'm not terribly happy about losing 10GBs of space. Anyone know what might have happened to use up disk space so quickly?
Dave
Update: Using JDiskReport, I can see that 9.8GB of files were modified yesterday, yet they don't turn up in Spotlight searches.
Message was edited by: DaveBinM

Hi,
Download the free Grand Perspective and see whether it can help narrow down the location of the excess files.
S.

Lost 110 GB of disk space after deleting files in target mode... A mystery?

Dear all,
Yesterday, I used my MBP in Target Disk mode and deleted a directory with approx. 110 GB of files in it. Now I found out that this space is mysteriously gone: the available free space on my hard disk did not increase, and the files are not in the trash or anywhere where I can find them.
I tried Disk Utility doing ‘Verify Disk’ as well as ‘Repair Disk Permissions’, but with no success.
Could any one advice me how I can recover my disk space?
Thanks in advance....
/Rudi

Thanks, Tony.
No, they are not in the trash of the other computer. It would also have taken the computer a while to transfer these files (110 GB takes a while, even over FireFire 800).
The issue is not that I want to recover these files (I have backup copies), I just would like to have my disk space back. It is siting somewhere but 'lost' to the DOS.
Best, Rudi

Mysterious lack of free disk space

Recently im having a problem with my free disk space disappearing in osx.
running a du command shows a 90GB file usage in my /Library directory, but i cant seem to find or access it anywhere
i enabled hidden files
also ran
sudo tmutil disablelocal
my free space disappears. nothing shows up in finder or other file manager programs.
server:Library peffy03$ sudo du -h -d1
Password:
2.6G          ./Application Support
361M          ./Audio
34M          ./Automator
12M          ./Caches
0B          ./ColorPickers
100K          ./ColorSync
0B          ./Components
0B          ./Compositions
0B          ./Contextual Menu Items
1.1M          ./CoreMediaIO
99M          ./Desktop Pictures
415M          ./Dictionaries
0B          ./DirectoryServices
30M          ./Documentation
0B          ./Extensions
0B          ./Filesystems
1007M          ./Fonts
3.7M          ./Fonts Disabled
65M          ./Frameworks
0B          ./Graphics
18M          ./Image Capture
0B          ./Input Methods
254M          ./Internet Plug-Ins
28K          ./iTunes
0B          ./Java
0B          ./Keyboard Layouts
164K          ./Keychains
20K          ./LaunchAgents
28K          ./LaunchDaemons
188M          ./Logs
5.2M          ./Messages
56K          ./Modem Scripts
0B          ./OpenDirectory
8.0K          ./PDF Services
564K          ./Perl
17M          ./PreferencePanes
384K          ./Preferences
647M          ./Printers
176K          ./PrivilegedHelperTools
0B          ./Python
18M          ./QuickLook
5.2M          ./QuickTime
84K          ./Receipts
0B          ./Ruby
0B          ./Sandbox
140M          ./Screen Savers
0B          ./ScriptingAdditions
1.1M          ./Scripts
4.0K          ./Security
84G          ./Server
0B          ./Speech
0B          ./Spelling
4.1M          ./Spotlight
0B          ./StartupItems
0B          ./SystemProfiler
76K          ./Updates
21M          ./User Pictures
0B          ./Video
4.3M          ./WebServer
45M          ./Widgets
90G          .

30 seconds later
97228896          .
91052984          ./Server
57021568          ./Server/PostgreSQL For Server Services
38736148          ./Server/PostgreSQL For Server Services/Backup
33686588          ./Server/ProfileManager
33686580          ./Server/ProfileManager/Data
29436852          ./Server/ProfileManager/Data/backup
18285404          ./Server/PostgreSQL For Server Services/Data
18235408          ./Server/PostgreSQL For Server Services/Data/pg_xlog
4249724          ./Server/ProfileManager/Data/PostgreSQL
4210716          ./Server/ProfileManager/Data/PostgreSQL/pg_xlog
2696628          ./Application Support
1441632          ./Application Support/GarageBand
1031416          ./Fonts
662968          ./Printers

Used disk space on new MacBook: mystery!

We've just (about 3 weeks ago) bought a new MacBook for my wife to use. I'm completely mystified about the amount of disk space that is already used, and wondered if there is some problem. Here are the figures, from Disk Utility:
Total Capacity of Toshiba disk: 55.9GB
Macintosh HD capacity: 55.6GB
Available space: 36.2GB
Used: 19.4GB
I thought this looked like a lot of space already used, given that my we'd loaded on a modest amount of files from her old PC, almost all Word documents, very little pics, music etc. So I looked at how much space was being used by her home folder, the Applications folder and a couple of others:
Home folder: 1.88GB
Applications: 4.34GB
Music: 11.2MB
Pictures: 1.8MB
So, the total that we can account is not much over 6GB. What is using the other 13GB? Surely this can't be right?
Ian Wellens
G5 Mac OS X (10.4.8)
G5 Mac OS X (10.4.8)

Use whatsize to see what all is there.
http://www.id-design.com/software/whatsize/
Language files alone take up a couple of gig, garage band over 3 gig. With the OSX and all the extras that come with it it takes up around 16 gig.
With a clean install and getting rid of everything I didn't use or need I got it to less than 5 gig.
Mort

Error message "Insufficent disk space" with no reason

While I play back my soundtrack on Soundtrack Pro I sometimes get a message that SP has hit a "disk size" limit even though my drive has more than enough capacity. I was wondering if anyone got a similar message.
Thank you!

i've run into similar problems while assembling large files (4+ hours) out of multiple bits. After watching my primary hard drive mysteriously dwindle from 16GB free to <300gb free during a work session yesterday, i figured out a simple solution - save your project early to a secondary (or tertiary) drive that's got *a lot* of free space. i started my project again, and saved almost immediately to my open 120gb scratch drive. i then was able to work through the rest of my project without my primary drive's free space mysteriously disappearing and without getting any more errors.
if you don't have a space scratch drive in your box, just go get one. it will be well worth it.

I deleted unwanted photos from my iPhoto library, emptied iPhoto trash & Finder trash... this did not free up disk space. please help!

I deleted unwanted photos from my iPhoto library, emptied iPhoto trash & Finder trash... this did not free up disk space. please help!
I have a 15-inch MacBook Pro (Late 2011) with OS X Mavericks 10.9.5
Last week, my 500 GB Harddrive had 120 GB free space. I was feeling crumby and decided to make productive use of taking a day off to lounge around. I snuggled up with my laptop and dedicated hours to meticulously combing through my iPhoto Library. I had 13,000 pictures, and I got rid of those I didn't want. Having said "sayōnara" to about 6,500 pictures, I then emptied the iPhoto trash and the Finder trash. I took delight in the iconic paper crumpling sound of them vanishing into the digital void.
Everything seemed perfect: the photos I loved were still there, the photos I loathed were gone, both trashes were beautifully empty. Having thrown away all of those awful, boring, and unflattering images of poorly light lunches and selfies gone wrong, my iPhoto library was half the size as before! I felt renewed, a little lighter, somehow more free, and I expected my hard drive to be a bit different to.
I eagerly checked my storage stats. My heart sank to see that my 120 GB of free space, was still only 120 GB of free space. I restarted my MacBook; this did not help. I restarted it the next day; this also did not help. It's been 5 days and the hard drive still has 120 GB free space. This is not an emergency and it will probably be a good while before I clutter my laptop to the brim. Yet while I am glad I don't have to see cringeworthy pictures of my ex's unmentionables every time I'm showing off things I do want to remember, I'm still disappointed and now obsessed with solving this mystery.
What is going on? I don't see them, so where are they hiding? How do I get the free space I should have earned from throwing away 1,000's of photos?!

Thank you, Terence!
Yes, I only emptied the trash when it was really full, once I waited until the trash cans contained 2,600 photos and then I emptied them - Oooops! In the future, I'll keep in mind your suggestion of deleting less than 100 photos at a time.
I downloaded the iPhoto Library Manager and used it to rebuild my iPhoto. After a few hours of rebuilding, it generated a new copy of my iPhoto Library. This versions was nearly identical to the original (it was missing 5 photos and was therefore only 5 mb smaller). I guess my Library wasn't defective.
I checked my storage stats, and interestingly, using iPhoto Library Manager did help with the problem that developed after I re-indexed my hard drive. My hard drive is able to properly recognize data categories again, instead of listing almost everything as "Other". Understandably, my free disk space changed from 120 GB to about 60 GB, because my hard drive now contained a second copy of my iPhoto Library as well as iPhoto Library Manager. It seemed like all I needed to do was throw these away, but when I emptied the trash, my problem was not solved. My Hard drive now looked like this:
It appears to me that when I empty the trash, the things I throw away are just hanging around as backups instead of leaving! I went into System Preferences and turned of my time machine OFF. Now my hard drive looks likes this:
The back ups of the iPhoto files, and the program which I deleted, are still on my hard drive some where but now they are listed as "Other" instead of "Backups". Do you know where they might be and how I can delete them for good?

20gb of Disk Space Vanishes? On it's own?

Hi guys, I'm a long time mac user and have never seen anything like this.
I run a 2.53gz MBP 5,1. with 4gb of ram and 320gb HD. I have the drive partitioned with a 60gb NTFS bootcamp partition for WindowsXP that I use with Parallels 4. I use Time Machine to backup to a 2tb WD drive.
So, I've been running the machine all day long with approximately 24.5gb of disk space. I left my desk around 6:00 today and I just came back to find a low disk space error and saw that I only had 1.8gb left, and watched it drip down to 1.5, 1.3 and 1.1gb right in front of my eyes without doing anything at all! I rebooted and now the computer has been sitting steady at 5.7gb. I looked through my timemachine archive to earlier in the day and the last update was right after I left (with 24.5gb of disk space left) the next update is inexplicably at 1.7gb. I did get info on all the main folders in my root directory (Applications, Library, System & Users) and the identical folders now and there is almost no difference whatsoever in folder size! Yet, when you look at the bottom of the window in the time machine reference from a few hours earlier it says 24.5gb available, and then go back to the "now" window it says 5.7gb available...
I'm totally baffled. approximately 19gb of disk space just completely vanished and I can't account for the change or the increase in used disk space anywhere.
The only recent update was the Security Update 2010-001 that was issued on the 19th.
I have tried to restart. Reset the PRAM. Checked the SMART status using Disk Utility. Everything checks out.
The only thing I could possibly point to is an issue with Bootcamp and the NTFS drive. However I was not running bootcamp or parallels when this happened.
Time Machine was stuck at "Calculating Changes... (15%)" when I came back and the Time Machine drive is nearly full...but I don't think this should matter.
Also Time Machine hasn't completed a full backup since the drive was at it's original 24.5gb. I'm wondering if it got stuck when doing a backup and somehow is confused between what is backed up and what isn't and there is disk space being "held" somewhere by time machine somehow.
Any suggestions on what happened to the mystery 19gb?
Message was edited by: gabeotron

The two swap files sound OK, you will always have at least one of approximately 60MBs. The sleepimage is also normal: it will be about the size of the RAM you have, and contains the content of your actual RAM. The point being that if you put your computer into hibernate, or for a laptop the battery runs out of juice, when the machine is again brought back into action it can resume from where it was when things were stopped. So that is normal.
It sounds like perhaps a run-away log file could be responsible. You might take a look in
/private/var/log
Arrange by size and see what you've got. My biggest one is the folder for DiagnosticMessages, at 5MBs. Everything else is in the KB range.
If that doesn't turn up the culprit you can use the Terminal commands.
Francine
Francine
Schwieder

The Case of the Disappearing Disk Space

Last week when I noticed I only had 5.5 gigs on my hard disk, I decided to start deleting files and programs that I didn't really need anymore. I ended up freeing up about 7 gigs! However, I have since noticed something peculiar...
As I use my computer (mostly browsing and e-mail, no other downloading), my hard disk mysteriously gets filled up. And I don't mean a few megabytes here and there, but rather more than two gigs in just a couple of days! This doesn't seem normal to me at all. Even if I do save files, they are usually just small Word documents for school. A few minutes ago, Finder said I had 10.7 gigs on my hard disk with the trash emptied. After I restarted, it said I had 13.15. Since then, I've already lost .02 gigs and the only programs I have open are Mail and Safari.
Can someone please explain to me what is happening here? Thanks!

Okay, my hard disk is at 12.71 now and a random .rtf file reads 8 kb. I'll check it later (if I am doing this right...)
You don't seem to be doing it correctly. Open TextEdit, create a new window, and note down the usage of disk space reported by WhatSize by typing it out into this window. After the amount of free space on the hard disk has decreased, run WhatSize again and note down what is reported this time. Compare the differences in the two sets of notes.
Another possibility is to choose Go to Folder from the Finder's Go menu, enter /private/var/vm/ as the folder's path, and keep an eye on the number of items in this folder as you use the computer.
(14861)

Macbook warning "you're running low on disk space"

Hello, my problem is when I try to open a game that I download from the app store, like "the mystery portal" appears a message that said "you're running low on disk space" the problem is that I have 668 GB free on my disk. And I recovered my mac two months ago. I hope you can help me, thank you

Launch Disk Utility (Applications --> Utilities --> Disk Utility)
1. Select your Macintosh HD from the left pane --> Verify Disk
(If Problems, Select Repair)
2. Select your Macintosh HD from the left pane --> Verify Permissions
(If Problems, Select Repair)

Disk Space management

Is there a Disk Space management utility for Macs as there is for Windows. I had to re-install my Leopard OS and I've just lost 10 Gb of space. It may be something to do with archiving but a bit mysterious! You can probably tell from this that my computing knowledge isn't great!!!

There's a free program called GrandPerspective that I like.
http://grandperspectiv.sourceforge.net/
There are some other programs, as covered in this MacWorld article
http://www.macworld.com/article/50432/2006/04/spaceutilities.html

Mail logs filling up disk space: why? ok to delete?

Computer spec’s: 2GHz Mac Mini with 4GB of RAM and a 250GB flash storage. I am running OS 10.9.5 and Mail 7.3.
Problem: My storage has been mysteriously filling up, with about 200 GB in “other” in “about this Mac.” I would delete files and then it would fill up again. Using WhatSize, I determined that Mail logs took up 107GB, with two files accounting for most of this (details below).
Questions: Is it safe to delete Mail logs? Why are some so big? Why are dates so random? Can I prevent large mail logs in the future?
In Library/Containers/com.apple.mail/Data/Library/Logs, here are the dates and size of the largest files named in format: [long stream of numbers and letters]=imap.gmail.com.txt
July 15: 55.8 GB
Sept 3: 47.17 GB
Aug 6: 5.43 GB
Aug 6 3.64 GB
Then there are six files between 312GB and 867.2 GB and many others named in the above format and multiple files named in this format: [date]_GmailDelete.log dating back to May 21.
Thank you for your help.

Hi, I'm having a very similar trouble but I do not use Gmail. I have several mail accounts, essentially from 2 mail server providers (hosting and registrar companies), most accounts in IMAP but some still in POP.
I'm on a PowerBook pro, retina 15 mid 2012, 2.7 Ghz Intel Core i7, with 750 Gb SSD disk", running OS X Yosemite 10.10.2
Since one week I experience the same problem, disk space filling up without appearant reasons. In the Data/Library/Logs/Mail I have 541 files (!!), some of them very huge. I have deleted a 75 Gb file and another of 13Gb, but I still have files from more than 9Gb (ten file obver 1Gb).
I have changed passwords in my accounts and even to access my hosting proividers. But no changes.
Deleting the huge files in the Logs doesn't seem to affect Mails except the fact that I have to enter all POP / IMAP and SMTP passwords :-(
In the logs, the hugest files are "2015-03-18_IMAPMailboxSyncEngine.log", 2mail.mydomainname-d44f367b-6650-4ddf-9cc6-4fe08822ab6c.txt", "2015-03-21_SocketStreamEvents.log", "137778C8-7690-48F3-877E-48D400322117-mail.mydomainename.txt", and I have plenty like that.
The question is, where the problemn comes from ??
When deleting the log files ... the problem is not solved because it continues to filling it with new logs, again ..
Thank you for your assistance and help.

I am not able to update iTunes keeps popping up message saying no free disk space I checked and there is enough to support the upgrade but I cant figure out why it wont let me. Help anyone!

So heres the deal, I updated my iphone and in order to put any music on it or even ringtones I have to have the most updated version of iTunes, unfortunately my macbook wont allow the update, I do have a lot of pictures and song stored on here but I have no documents I have deleted everything the only thing left on here is what the macbook came with. I checked and it says that I have enough memory so is there another reason I cant update. When I try and check for the update option in iTunes it says its up to date but I have version 10 something so I know its old, I haven't been able to update anything on here. Do I have to take it to the store or is there something that I can fix on my own because my warranty is up and I have nothing but problems when I go into an actual apple store.

If you want to try to clear even more disk space see https://discussions.apple.com/thread/5872318?tstart=0

Low disk space in recovery disk (d) drive in window 8.1

I continue to receive the subject warning. I have never added any files to D, but I have 32.3 MB free of 25.5 GB. I have Administrator privilrges but am unable to view the files on D. When I click on recovery, I get an HP warning.

Hi @pjd10
I grasp that you are a low disk space error on recovery D. I regret that you are having that difficulty.
Here is a link to HP PCs - Error: Low Disk Space. You are running out of disk space on Recovery (Windows 8) that should guide you to resolving this issue.
Best of Luck!
Sparkles1
I work on behalf of HP
Please click “Accept as Solution ” if you feel my post solved your issue, it will help others find the solution.
Click the “Kudos, Thumbs Up" on the bottom right to say “Thanks” for helping!

Disk space mystery

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