Hard Drive filled with "Other"

Of the 250 Gb on my hard drive, 132 Gb is filled with something that "About this Mac" calls "other"?
Any idea what it is and how to get rid of it?

Other is everything that is not movies, photos, backup, apps.....Some of the other may not be required by you or the system but most of it is.

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Hard drive filled with unknown files

I Have A vexing problem: I have a 2009 iMac with a 320 gob hard drive, and runniNg Mavericks. I have multiple external hard drives on which I keep all of my photos, movies, music and backups. I have ONE user and checking all of the folders I that user account only 34gb are taken up. Yet when I Get Info for that entire user folder it says it is taking up 254 gb. what could possibly be taking up more than 200 gb of invisible files And how can I possibly find and remove them?

Empty the Trash if you haven't already done so. If you use iPhoto, empty its internal Trash first:
iPhoto ▹ Empty Trash
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 the 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.
See this support article for some simple ways to free up storage space.
You can more effectively use a tool such as OmniDiskSweeper (ODS) or GrandPerspective (GP) to explore the 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. Note that ODS only works with OS X 10.8 or later. If you're running an older OS version, use GP.
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 or GP 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 the app you downloaded in the Applications folder as usual. Quit it if it's running.
Triple-click anywhere in the corresponding 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
sudo /Applications/GrandPerspective.app/Contents/MacOS/GrandPerspective
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 by pressing command-V. You'll be prompted for your login password, which won't be displayed when you type it. Type carefully and then press return. 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. Ignore any other messages that appear in the Terminal window.
The application window will open, eventually showing all files in all folders, sorted by size. It may take a few minutes for the app to finish scanning.
I don't recommend that you make a habit of doing this. Don't delete anything 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 the app, quit it and also quit Terminal.

HT201250 I have two external hard drives. One is my Time Machine backup drive. The other I use for external storage of files (documents, photos, movies, etc). Can I set Time Machine to backup BOTH my Mac hard drive and my other external hard drive?

I have two external hard drives. One is my Time Machine backup drive. The other I use for external storage of files (documents, photos, movies, etc). Can I set Time Machine to backup BOTH my Mac hard drive and my other external hard drive?

Yes you can make multiple backups on one hard drive, for example if you’ve 1TB hard drive installed in your PC and you’ve two Mac Machines with 500GB drive each then you just make two backup images with size of 500GB each.
http://www.halfspot.com/use-your-pc-hard-drive-for-time-machine-backup/

External hard drive compatible with macbook pro 10.5.8

external hard drive compatible with macbook pro 10.5.8, i need a hard drive that will work with 10.5.8 to back everything up before upgrading to 10.6. a hard drive that is compatable with 10.5.8 has been impossible to find, a hard drive that works with both opperating systems is what i am looking for, any information that can help is appreciated

You can buy just about any USB2.0 hard drive and use it with your MacBook Pro. Many older external drives come pre-partitioned and formatted FAT32 for use on Windows. Your Mac can use that file system as well, but it has limitations on file sizes. You can always re-partition your external drive and re-format it as HFS+ (MacOS Extended Journaled) then your old Mac OS version and your new one should both be able to access it just fine. One thing to keep in mind is that many older OSes don't really handle drives larger than 2TB well, so you would probably want to try to keep your external drive to something smaller than 2TB...

Hard drive problem with HP Pavillion dv7-4180us

Hard drive problem with my HP Pavillion dv7-4180us. Using Windows 7.
Boots up sometimes and very slow.
Appreciate any help.

Have you booted into the BIOS or Diagnostics Tool to run the Hard Drive Test?

How to install windows 8 onto an external hard drive connected with usb 2.0?

How to install windows 8 onto an external hard drive connected with usb 2.0?

Transfer win 8 from inside hd to external hd.
Cloning Win 8 is also OK.
Aomei Backupper can do the above.
In additional, Do you know Windows to Go?
http://www.disk-partition.com/features/windows-to-go-creator.html

When using Time Machine, if I delete items from my computer, will they still be backed up to access later on my external hard drive? In other words, when time machine backs up again, will it delete the files from the back up?

When using Time Machine, if I delete items from my computer, will they still be backed up to access later on my external hard drive?
In other words, when time machine backs up again, will it delete the files from the back up that I have deleted from my computer?

No, I do not believe so. Time Machine would keep all those now-deleted files in previous backups, and as time goes by those backups might be deleted if you needed room, but it would still keep one backup from each day in last month, as well as one from each week forever, as long as you don't start running out of room, then just the oldest would be deleted to make room if needed.
I use a backup drive about double the size of my drive to be backed up, so I would guess it will never get to the point where deleted files being replaced by new ones being backed fill up that drive to the point where backups actually have to get deleted.

With Time Machine I have an external hard drive formatted with Mac

With Time Machine I have an external hard drive formatted with Mac. The record contained files windows. How to recover?
Serious mistake: to connect a Mac to an external drive with data (important!) Windows, the warning appears: "You want to use the disk for Time Machine?" Wrong button, so in 2-3 seconds, the disk is formatted. Now Mac "sees" the disc but empty, Windows does not see it under "My Computer" but in "Disk Management" is reported as "hard core", "healthy", "GPT protective partition" Is there a way to retrieve the files? Sorry for my English Thanks

I'm having a difficult time following, I understand English isn't your native language. You may have good luck with Google Translate.
Also please read Pondini's Time Machine FAQs & Time Machine Troubleshooting.

Is a WD My Book Studio Desktop 3TB Hard Drive - FW 400/800, USB 2.0, Apple Time Machine Ready external hard drive bootable with my Powerbook G4 12" PPC 10.5.8?

Sirs or madams,
Is my Powerbook G4 12” PPC 10.5.8 'bootable' with a Western Digital My Book Studio Desktop 3TB Hard Drive - FW 400/800, USB 2.0, Apple Time Machine Ready external hard drive? Western Digital says officially no, but that it MIGHT be. I primarily live in China and bought a datastorage.com.cn Clearlight s400+ external hard drive enclosure with a 320GB disk drive a few years ago in China. My computer 'boots' fine from it, but since I got it in China all the paperwork, etc. is in Chinese; my Chinese isn't quite sufficient enough yet to read it. But there are references to something called "SATA", whatever that is.
My level of computer 'under the hood' knowledge is extremely low. I've been told that SATA has some relationship as to whether or not an external hard drive will boot a computer via the Firewire connection, something relating to 'interface', which I assume is how separate electronic gadgets work, or don't work, with each other.
I frankly don't care much for computers, the internet, or their related gadgets such as all these fancy phones. I longingly reminisce about the days when there were no such things. I use a computer & the internet because I have to, and unfortunately unlike a car where one doesn't have to have 'under the hood' knowledge to operate it, just knowledge of the steering wheel, brake, gas, etc., one seemingly must know a ridiculously great amount of 'under the hood' knowledge, including jargon, to operate computers.
So, please try to respond accordingly; thank you.
If this particular external hard drive won't, for certain, be bootable with my computer, can you advise as to what readily available brand/model would be in the 3TB range for a similar price, roughly $150ish??
Thank you very much.

Mr. BGreg,
Thank you very much. "...under the covers...". I think you meant "under the hood", as in a car. I suppose "under the covers" would be man/woman interfacing, which I am familiar with!
Actually, I'm back in the US now for a few months. I looked at the OWC web site, but only cusorily so far. I'll contact them; they appear knowledgeable about Apple computers.
As to what you wrote about Western Digital's cases, I certainly wouldn't want a poor case. In China I had over time gotten 3 different external drive cases, 3 different Chinese brands, and separately bought Hitachi brand disk drives that 'simply' plugged into the cases. The drives are roughly 80GB 120GB and 320GB. The two larger ones are in cases that have Firewire plugs/jacks, which are bootable with my computer.
So my understanding, as you wrote, has been that my Powerbook will boot from an external hard drive, provided it connects via Firewire, and the disk drive itself is 'normally' formatted with however my computer's own disk drive is formatted, (HFS OS extended (journaled) or some such??). So I was left wondering why Western Digital would indicate that even though their such-and-so external hard drive case/drive was Firewire capable, that they would then say it would not be bootable with my Apple PPC computer......
Well, anyway, since you indicated Western Digital's case quality is suspect, then I'll try OWC and disregard Western Digital.
Naturally, OWC should be able to address this, but your thoughts are also welcome. You mentioned the OWC cases are good with Apples. Would the disk drives OWC supplied with the cases also be of relatively dependable quality?? From my so far only cursory look at their web site they appear to have various options, including case only options where I could insert my own or their own drives. These sorts of options seem preferable, also along with quality components.
My Powerbook has been in use since 2004. In China I put in a 1.25 memory 'chip' in the bottom and installed the 10.5.8 operating system, which I understand are the maximum workable with my Powerbook. When I inquired with Chinese friends if my 1.33 GHz processor could be taken out and a more powerful one put in, they said it wasn't feasible because in my particular computer my processor was, as I recall them saying, soldered/'permanently' connected with the 'motherboard', that it would just be easier to get a new computer.
I would be with them and they would nonchalantly open it completely up showing me all its tightly arranged 'innards' while at least giving it a good internal dust/dirt clean job for cheap lunch and a beer (& so much dirt/dust/lint there was!)...these are the same folks who build the things of course...fast moving hands with tiny screws flying everywhere, but everything 100% all back in place when finished.
My Chinese friends also said that nowadays Apples are not as well built as when my Powerbook was built, that nowadays an Apple's life expectancy was considerably lower, so I fear that when I get a new computer that, though it will be more up-to-date and powerful, etc., it most probably won't last near as long as my Powerbook has. They also said that in an older computer the fan was often the first component to go bad, and if a new one couldn't be easily found, as they said was my case, then you're just left with having to get an entirely new computer. Part of why I dislike electronic computer gadgets generally is that they are obsolete so quickly.
So, anyway, thanks very much for your information.

Having hard drive problems with 2011 macbook pro

Hey all,
I am having some hard drive issues with a 2011 Macbook Pro running OS X Mavericks.
How it happened: I was browsing the web when suddenly I got the spinny-wheel-of-death. The spinny wheel of death stuck around for much longer than usual, and eventually my computer wouldn't even respond to mouse input (the mouse wouldn't move). Nothing worked, so I did a hard reset of my computer. When I rebooted the machine, it took me into "Recovery Disk Mode".
Here are the diagnostics that I've done: In "Recovery Disk Mode", I have the option to use the Disk Utility, which I have done. My main volume, called "Macintosh HD" is grayed out - and not mountable. When I run "first aid" on it, it is not able to verify the disk because of an "Invalid B-tree node size". It then tells me to repair the disk. I have tried repairing the disk, but it fails - and that is not entirely unexpected because all of the forum posts that I have read up until now say that Disk Utility cannot repair this specific type of error.
3rd party software I have tried: Based on the forum posts that I have read, Disk Warrior is especially capable at fixing this kind of error, so I went to my local computer shop, purchased the software, and booted into it. Disk Warrior did not recognize my drive, and did not even show it in the list of available options.
Other things I have tried: I purchased a Seagate external drive, and I tried to use Disk Utility to copy the contents from my MBP's hard drive over to the external drive, but when I do so, "Disk Utility" tells me that "Recovery partition restores can only be done on GPT partition maps." I have also had it give me another error message where it says it "cannot verify source - error 254".
Additionally, I have seen around the internet that many people try using "fsck" to fix this issue, but I haven't been able to find a good explanation of the proper steps when using "fsck", nor how to specify to the "fsck" program that I want it to fix my "Macintosh HD" volume. I've opened up the terminal, and gone into the "/dev/" folder, but I don't know which item in that folder, or any other folder, would properly lead down the path to my "Macintosh HD" volume. Also, the man pages seem to be of little help here.
One option I would like to try, but I have not been able to, is to try putting my MBP into Target Disk Mode, and see if my desktop machine (a Dell) can see it. The problem here is that my Dell only has USB ports - no Firewire, and obviously no Thunderbolt ports. I would need to find a way to plug my MBP into my Dell while it is in Target Disk Mode, but from what I can tell, that's impossible if I don't have a Firewire or Thunderbolt port on my Dell.
So, now having explained everything I have tried, can y'all give me any advice on how I can recover my drive without completely repartitioning it? Although most of my important data and files are located on cloud services, there are definitely some files on the drive that I don't have backed up, and I would like to recover the drive without losing those files. What suggestions can you give me? Thanks!

Yes, BUT...
... there are many problems that are really easy to eliminate by replacing the Hard drive, including ones that have nothing to do with actual Drive Hardware failure. These include corrupted install of Mac OS X, its EFI partition, clobbered partition tables, or the appearance of Bad Blocks in a critical area.
Any of these problems can sometimes be eliminated by re-initializing the entire drive and writing Zeroes, and re-installing from scratch. The trouble is, this process takes hours to complete, and is not guaranteed to be successful -- you may still need a new drive after all that effort.
I learned from my Plumber that consumers have no appetite for solutions that might work, and detest return visits for any related problems whatsoever. You or your friend may have had your drive replaced, not because it actually failed, but because the situation was troublesome, and the provider thought you would not tolerate anything less than a crisp, complete fix on the first attempt. And based on the cost of technician time, it may have even been cheaper that way.

How do I get my Mac to recognize external drive filled with 5 projects, created at Apple Store?

How do I get my Mac to recognize external drive filled with 5 projects, created at Apple Store? I created 6 hrs worth of projects on computer in apple store with my external. came home my computer did not recognize it at all. went back to apple, they said oh click the news reel bottom left that will do it, came back home and nope....not recognizing it, in fact it says no events exist on this disc. I want to get the 5 projects and put up on vimeo tonight. ugh.

Hi Tom,
I'm so impressed with how you help everyone solve their problems. I will do my best here, but my husband will be home soon and knows how this large external is formatted.
How late do you all work there? I'm on east coast. Is the screen shot you wanted? I opened up external and
this is what I see.
Drive is connected to usb in back of computer. N

What External Hard Drives Work With Lion?

Have installed Lion in my iMac. Need a new external backup hard drive. Understand some hard drives aren't compatible with Lion. If this is so, can someone recommend an external that is? The G Drives Mobile works with my Macbook Pro with Lion as OS, but I'm concerned about the iMac.
Thank you for any response

I've been using a LaCie d2 Hard Drive Extreme with Triple Interface 250GB since July 2005 (= 6 years) and it still hasn't let me down....yet...
I only use it a couple of times a week, sometimes once or twice a day, to make complete bootable clones of my HD. For the rest of the time it's disconnected.
I use Carbon Copy Cloner to make the clones. Mike Bombich, who owns CCC and has an excellent website, advises not to use Western Digital drives.
As I understand it, this is because WD drives have something in the software that isn't compatible with the Mac OS.
I've never heard of there being any particular problems with any other make of external drive.

Which types of external hard drives works with T400?

Hi Thank you for reading my post.
Can someone please let me know which types of external hard drives works with a T400?
eSata, USB or firewire?
Which model and brand you suggest for a 1TB drive?
Thanks

USB 2.0 is the connection that is natively supported on the T400, no eSATA or Firewire port i think, you can get these ports by buying an expansion card for the card slot (i think it is the expresscard one) on the T400.
Regarding a 1TB drive, most of the large drive manufacturers have one out, but i suggest you unless you need the large capacity, i would stick with a smaller drives like 750 gig or 500 gig since the cost gigabyte is lower. Also i would stay away for storing all your important files solely in these drive, because if these things start to fail it would be on a moment's notice, you probably won't even have time to backup the files, before the harddrive gives up on you.

Has anyone else been having hard drive issues with 13" MacBook Pro barely a year old?

Has anyone else been having hard drive issues with 13" MacBook Pro barely a year old?

Yes, BUT...
... there are many problems that are really easy to eliminate by replacing the Hard drive, including ones that have nothing to do with actual Drive Hardware failure. These include corrupted install of Mac OS X, its EFI partition, clobbered partition tables, or the appearance of Bad Blocks in a critical area.
Any of these problems can sometimes be eliminated by re-initializing the entire drive and writing Zeroes, and re-installing from scratch. The trouble is, this process takes hours to complete, and is not guaranteed to be successful -- you may still need a new drive after all that effort.
I learned from my Plumber that consumers have no appetite for solutions that might work, and detest return visits for any related problems whatsoever. You or your friend may have had your drive replaced, not because it actually failed, but because the situation was troublesome, and the provider thought you would not tolerate anything less than a crisp, complete fix on the first attempt. And based on the cost of technician time, it may have even been cheaper that way.

Will a WD hard drive work with AirPort Extreme to connect with an iPad Air

Will a WD hard drive work with Airport Extreme to connect by a iPad Air

If you already have an AE and a WD drive .. the best idea is plug it in and see on a mac in airport utility is the drive recognised.
If not you have problems.. if it is formatted correctly (Not NTFS mainly) then it can be a drive that is not compatible.
assuming it works get your ipad and pay for filebrowser or at least download a test copy and see how it goes.
Always the best way to find out.. try it.

Hard Drive filled with "Other"

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