Hard Drive Space Decreases Rapidly over the day

I am constantly experiencing a rapid decrease by 5-10 GB over the day in my hard drive space. I have no idea what could be taking up this space as I am usually only working on a word doc, listening to music, surfing the internet. I can only imagine that something is caching on my system in large amounts. The only reason I've come to this conclusion is that after a reboot of my computer, my hard drive space returns back to the levels it was originally at.
Is there any way to determine what is actually caching on my computer and causing this rapid depletion in my hard drive space? I have one of the first macbook pros, so saving hard drive space is a necessity!
Has anyone experienced this before?
Thanks!

Use Disk Inventory X to see what's taking space:
http://www.derlien.com
Also, check Utilities > Console to see what's writing logs.

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I want to create for the first time ever an iPhoto library on my Mac Mini from all of my seperate external hard drives over the years. Instead of filling my Mac Mini hard drive space with all of the pics can I import it to a seperate Apple hard drive.

I want to creat for the first time on my Mac Mini an iPhoto library. I have many seperate hard drives with pics I want to import but are concerned I will fill the hard drive with pics alone. Can I install the pics on one larg (1TB) external apple hard drive and use iPhoto functions still with the pics being installed on a seperate drive from the iPhoto OS?

This is our resident iPhoto guru, Terence Devlin's, advice:
You can move your iPhoto Library to an external disk:
1. Quit iPhoto
2. Copy the iPhoto Library Folder as an entity from your Pictures Folder to the External Disk.
3. Hold down the option (or alt) key while launching iPhoto. From the resulting menu select 'Choose Library' and navigate to the new location. From that point on this will be the default location of your library.
4. Test the library and when you're sure all is well, trash the one on your internal HD to free up space.
Once that is done you can import directly into the iPhoto library on the external HD.

I am installing Final Cut Pro, but need about 30gb of hard drive space. What is the easiest way to find files on my computer to move them to an external hard drive?

I need more space on my hardrive to install final cut pro. What is the easiest way to identify large files that I can move to an external hard drive?

See my FAQ*:
http://www.macmaps.com/diskfull.html

How much hard drive space do photos in the organizer take up on hard drive?

Do the pictures in the organizer in PSE 12 take up room on the hard drive or are they just copies of what's in iPhoto?

Thanks for the quick reply! And the help. My computer shows many Preview app documents. Lots of pictures. Just wanted to know if I was duplicating storage. Thanks again.
Sent from my iPad

Photoshop CS5 decreases my hard drive space?

Hi, today im working on some pictures, and when i open them i suddenly noticed that when i open images my hard drive space decreases... Example (30.8GB then when i opened images it became 30.5) im worried that everytime i have an image to edit it might always decrease my memory until it reaches 0.. so is there anyway to fix this?

Photoshop opens temporary files as part of its normal operation. Some of them can get quite large.
Normally it cleans up after itself, though you may have files left over if you have an application error or system crash.
Look for files of this form. If Photoshop is not running, generally speaking you can delete these files to clean up.
Photoshop TempXXXXXXXXXX (where Xs are numbers) in the root folders of hard drives identified as scratch drives.
XXXX_XXXXXXXXX_MVM_XX.tmp (where Xs are numbers) usually in your TEMP folder but also sometimes in the root folders of hard drives.
Photoshop also stores some files you don't want to delete, such as images you save, Camera Raw settings, preferences, etc. Generally these are not very large by comparison to a hard drive's total space, but (as with any application) you should understand that your using Photoshop will have a small ongoing impact on your disk space.
-Noel

Loss of Hard Drive Space

I'm running a macbook pro (mid 2009) 10.8.2 OSX. Ever since I upgraded the OSX my hard drive space is rapidly diminishing. I have 160 gig of space, but as of this morning it shows only 24.6 gigs are available. I've tried to locate where the 140 gigs of files are but cannot locate. I have approx 9 gigs in the library, 11 gigs in pictures no music (kept on an external) and 9G in applications. Any suggestions where the remaining 110 gigs could've disappeared to? And how I can get it back? The computer has really started running slow over the last few days as well.
Cheers,
Doc

First, empty the Trash if you haven't already done so. Then reboot. That will temporarily free up some space. According to Apple documentation, you need at least 9 GB free for normal operation. You also need enough space left over to allow for growth of your data. 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.

I don't see my hard drive in finder , i wanna know how much hard drive space i have.

i don't see my hard drive in finder , i wanna know how much hard drive space i have.

Check the settings in the General and Sidebar tabs of the Finder's preferences.
(67071)

Hard Drive Space goes down when I turn on AirPort and go online.

So, when I turn the AirPort on on my MacBook Pro you can see the hard drive space go down on the bottom of a finder window. When I turn AirPort off the the GB available on the hard drive stays the same. I'm not downloading anything. that I know of. Is some virus downloading in the background that I can't control? I did a full scan with VirusBarrier Express and it says that there are no infected files on the computer. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

Robert Thomas123 wrote:
when I turn the AirPort on on my MacBook Pro you can see the hard drive space go down on the bottom of a finder window.
Welcome to Apple's discussion groups.
Launch the Console utility and look in the "All Messages" category for repeated messages. If you see such messages but you don't understand what they mean, copy a few of them and paste them into a reply to this thread.
Is some virus downloading in the background that I can't control?
That's extremely doubtful.

Hard Drive Space Discrepancy

Why is there a difference in hard drive space when I use the folder preview (spacebar) and "Get Info"? When I select MacHD in the sidebar and hit the spacebar, it says 352 GB available. When I secondary click and select "Get Info" it says 408 GB available. Which one is right? And, if I only have 352 GB... where has it gone!?!?! I have been doing a bit of iMovie and iDVD stuff here recently. Thanks!

Nevermind! Found it.....
If you have TimeMachine set up and do not back it up frequently, it saves everything you have deleted. In my case, I had deleted about 50 GB worth of duplicated videos, ppts, etc. So even though the info said I had 408 available (and I would if I needed it), I had 50 GB worth of stuff I had deemed trashed to be backed up. When I backed up my computer on TimeMachine, the discrepancy fixed itself :-)

Ran out of hard drive space while importing AVCHD footage... cant delete?

I was importing about 6 hours of AVCHD footage I shot, however my macbook pro ran out of hard drive space about halfway through the import. It looks like iMovie got confused, and just hung. I forced quit the application, the video footage that was imported is now NOT showing up in iMovie, or in the Movies folder. However the file must be somewhere because I have zero space free.
Does anyone know where this file could be, and how I could nix it?
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I also tried setting up a smart folder showing all files created today- it does not show it.

Regular kernel panics, most noticeable with Flash usage. I suspect it has to do with RAM, hard drive space, or overheating.

Hi, would massively appreciate it if anyone would be able to point me in the direction of what's causing fairly regular kernel panics and general poor performance of my 2007 Macbook. Running 2gb Ram, hard drive space is running low (90% full), but seems to operate fine until I hit flash videos, when it stutters, stalls, and, if I push it too far, crashes. Is it directly related to hard drive space? Here's the log:
Interval Since Last Panic Report: 2259605 sec
Panics Since Last Report:          8
Anonymous UUID:                    8E803563-23BA-4850-B3FB-F4FFCAE6622A
Thu Feb 2 12:10:45 2012
panic(cpu 0 caller 0x28fc2e): "TLB invalidation IPI timeout: " "CPU(s) failed to respond to interrupts, unresponsive CPU bitmap: 0x0, NMIPI acks: orig: 0x0, now: 0x0"@/SourceCache/xnu/xnu-1504.15.3/osfmk/i386/pmap.c:3572
Backtrace (CPU 0), Frame : Return Address (4 potential args on stack)
0x34fb3b28 : 0x21b837 (0x5dd7fc 0x34fb3b5c 0x223ce1 0x0)
0x34fb3b78 : 0x28fc2e (0x59a47c 0x0 0x0 0x0)
0x34fb3be8 : 0x2944ee (0x5090d24 0x1d10c000 0x0 0x5)
0x34fb3d78 : 0x255994 (0x5090d24 0x1d10c000 0x0 0x640e4)
0x34fb3de8 : 0x2589af (0x2e5cf7c 0x5090d24 0x1d10c000 0x0)
0x34fb3f38 : 0x2ab83c (0x509d0a4 0x1d10c000 0x0 0x3)
0x34fb3fc8 : 0x2a18da (0x5b446c0 0x0 0x10 0x5b446c0)
BSD process name corresponding to current thread: Google Chrome He
Mac OS version:
10K549
Kernel version:
Darwin Kernel Version 10.8.0: Tue Jun 7 16:33:36 PDT 2011; root:xnu-1504.15.3~1/RELEASE_I386
System model name: MacBook2,1 (Mac-F4208CA9)
System uptime in nanoseconds: 20169509378374
unloaded kexts:
(none)
loaded kexts:
com.google.driver.Gild          1.0.0 - last loaded 41377940038
at.obdev.nke.LittleSnitch          2.0.25
com.apple.filesystems.autofs          2.1.0
com.apple.driver.AppleTyMCEDriver          1.0.2d2
com.apple.driver.InternalModemSupport          2.6.2
com.apple.driver.AudioAUUC          1.57
com.apple.driver.AppleIntelYonahProfile          14
com.apple.driver.AppleUpstreamUserClient          3.5.7
com.apple.driver.AppleIntelPenrynProfile          17
com.apple.Dont_Steal_Mac_OS_X          7.0.0
com.apple.driver.AppleMCCSControl          1.0.20
com.apple.driver.AppleIntelGMA950          6.3.6
com.apple.driver.AppleIntelNehalemProfile          11
com.apple.driver.AudioIPCDriver          1.1.6
com.apple.driver.AppleHDA          2.0.5f14
com.apple.driver.AirPort.Atheros          422.19.10
com.apple.driver.AppleGraphicsControl          2.10.6
com.apple.driver.SMCMotionSensor          3.0.1d2
com.apple.iokit.AppleYukon2          3.2.1b1
com.apple.driver.AppleIntelMeromProfile          19
com.apple.driver.AirPort.Atheros21          425.14.7
com.apple.driver.ACPI_SMC_PlatformPlugin          4.7.0a1
com.apple.driver.AppleLPC          1.5.1
com.apple.driver.AppleBacklight          170.0.46
com.apple.driver.AppleIntelIntegratedFramebuffer          6.3.6
com.apple.driver.CSRHIDTransitionDriver          2.4.5f3
com.apple.driver.AppleIRController          303.8
com.apple.driver.AppleUSBTrackpad          201.6
com.apple.driver.AppleUSBTCKeyEventDriver          201.6
com.apple.driver.AppleUSBTCKeyboard          201.6
com.apple.iokit.IOAHCIBlockStorage          1.6.4
com.apple.driver.USBCameraFirmwareLoader          1.1.0
com.apple.iokit.SCSITaskUserClient          2.6.8
com.apple.driver.AppleFWOHCI          4.7.3
com.apple.BootCache          31.1
com.apple.AppleFSCompression.AppleFSCompressionTypeZlib          1.0.0d1
com.apple.driver.AppleEFINVRAM          1.4.0
com.apple.driver.AppleAHCIPort          2.1.7
com.apple.driver.AppleUSBHub          4.2.4
com.apple.driver.AppleRTC          1.3.1
com.apple.driver.AppleHPET          1.5
com.apple.driver.AppleUSBEHCI          4.2.4
com.apple.driver.AppleUSBUHCI          4.2.0
com.apple.driver.AppleIntelPIIXATA          2.5.1
com.apple.driver.AppleSmartBatteryManager          160.0.0
com.apple.driver.AppleACPIButtons          1.3.6
com.apple.driver.AppleSMBIOS          1.7
com.apple.driver.AppleACPIEC          1.3.6
com.apple.driver.AppleAPIC          1.4
com.apple.driver.AppleIntelCPUPowerManagementClient          142.6.0
com.apple.security.sandbox          1
com.apple.security.quarantine          0
com.apple.nke.applicationfirewall          2.1.14
com.apple.driver.AppleIntelCPUPowerManagement          142.6.0
com.apple.driver.AppleProfileReadCounterAction          17
com.apple.driver.AppleProfileTimestampAction          10
com.apple.driver.AppleProfileThreadInfoAction          14
com.apple.driver.AppleProfileRegisterStateAction          10
com.apple.driver.AppleProfileKEventAction          10
com.apple.driver.AppleProfileCallstackAction          20
com.apple.iokit.IOSurface          74.2
com.apple.iokit.IOBluetoothSerialManager          2.4.5f3
com.apple.iokit.IOSerialFamily          10.0.3
com.apple.driver.AppleHDAHardwareConfigDriver          2.0.5f14
com.apple.driver.DspFuncLib          2.0.5f14
com.apple.iokit.IOAudioFamily          1.8.3fc2
com.apple.kext.OSvKernDSPLib          1.3
com.apple.iokit.IOFireWireIP          2.0.3
com.apple.iokit.AppleProfileFamily          41
com.apple.driver.AppleHDAController          2.0.5f14
com.apple.iokit.IOHDAFamily          2.0.5f14
com.apple.iokit.IO80211Family          320.1
com.apple.iokit.IONetworkingFamily          1.10
com.apple.driver.AppleSMC          3.1.0d5
com.apple.driver.IOPlatformPluginFamily          4.7.0a1
com.apple.driver.AppleSMBusPCI          1.0.10d0
com.apple.driver.AppleBacklightExpert          1.0.1
com.apple.iokit.IONDRVSupport          2.2.1
com.apple.iokit.IOGraphicsFamily          2.2.1
com.apple.driver.CSRUSBBluetoothHCIController          2.4.5f3
com.apple.driver.AppleUSBBluetoothHCIController          2.4.5f3
com.apple.iokit.IOBluetoothFamily          2.4.5f3
com.apple.driver.AppleUSBMergeNub          4.2.4
com.apple.iokit.IOUSBHIDDriver          4.2.0
com.apple.driver.AppleUSBComposite          3.9.0
com.apple.driver.XsanFilter          402.1
com.apple.iokit.IOSCSIMultimediaCommandsDevice          2.6.8
com.apple.iokit.IOBDStorageFamily          1.6
com.apple.iokit.IODVDStorageFamily          1.6
com.apple.iokit.IOCDStorageFamily          1.6.1
com.apple.iokit.IOATAPIProtocolTransport          2.5.1
com.apple.iokit.IOSCSIArchitectureModelFamily          2.6.8
com.apple.iokit.IOFireWireFamily          4.2.6
com.apple.driver.AppleFileSystemDriver          2.0
com.apple.iokit.IOAHCIFamily          2.0.6
com.apple.iokit.IOUSBUserClient          4.2.4
com.apple.iokit.IOUSBFamily          4.2.4
com.apple.iokit.IOATAFamily          2.5.1
com.apple.driver.AppleEFIRuntime          1.4.0
com.apple.iokit.IOHIDFamily          1.6.6
com.apple.iokit.IOSMBusFamily          1.1
com.apple.security.TMSafetyNet          6
com.apple.kext.AppleMatch          1.0.0d1
com.apple.driver.DiskImages          289
com.apple.iokit.IOStorageFamily          1.6.3
com.apple.driver.AppleACPIPlatform          1.3.6
com.apple.iokit.IOPCIFamily          2.6.5
com.apple.iokit.IOACPIFamily          1.3.0
Model: MacBook2,1, BootROM MB21.00A5.B07, 2 processors, Intel Core 2 Duo, 2 GHz, 2 GB, SMC 1.13f3
Graphics: Intel GMA 950, GMA 950, Built-In, spdisplays_integrated_vram
Memory Module: global_name
AirPort: AirPort Extreme, Atheros 5416: 2.1.14.6
Bluetooth: Version 2.4.5f3, 2 service, 12 devices, 1 incoming serial ports
Network Service: AirPort, AirPort, en1
Serial ATA Device: TOSHIBA MK8034GSX, 74,53 GB
Parallel ATA Device: MATSHITADVD-R   UJ-857D
USB Device: Built-in iSight, 0x05ac (Apple Inc.), 0x8501, 0xfd400000 / 2
USB Device: IR Receiver, 0x05ac (Apple Inc.), 0x8240, 0x5d200000 / 2
USB Device: Bluetooth USB Host Controller, 0x05ac (Apple Inc.), 0x8205, 0x7d100000 / 2
USB Device: Apple Internal Keyboard / Trackpad, 0x05ac (Apple Inc.), 0x021a, 0x1d200000 / 2
Thanks!

This may help: http://thexlab.com/faqs/kernelpanics.html

Rapidly decreasing hard-drive space after upgrading to snow leopard

So... recently upgraded to SL on my just over 1 year old MBP. No problems at first, but now acting really... odd...
When I first upgraded I had moved a bunch of files over to an external drive to have enough hard drive space. Had 11GB open when I upgraded, up to 23GB after the upgrade. Then, the other night, I suddenly get a "your startup disk is full" message. I was shocked. Checked and sure enough, had something like 270KB open. I had not saved any new files on the hard drive since I upgraded. Right after I got this message my computer spazzed out and I got a "you must restart your computer" message. Did, and afterwords had 7GB of free space on my hard drive. Don't know what happened to my 23 from a few days prior...
Since then, I have gotten the "your startup disk is full" message several times. When I check, I have everything from 3GB to 0KB of free space. Usually a restart solves the problem for a few hours, but then it pops up again. (In fact, as I wrote that, the message popped up on my screen once again... when I started this post I had 500-something KB free. Currently have 257KB free... again... no files saved/downloaded in the past few days...)
I've never had a problem like this before, and this is BEYOND annoying at this point... considering I've lost all the free space I freed up BEFORE I even upgraded, not to mention the extra space I was supposed to get by upgrading in the first place... plus I've had to restart my computer 5-6 times over the past 2 days, which is more than I've had to do it in the year that I've owned it...
anyone else having similar problems? Any ideas as to what might be going on??

So I'm having the same problem. I was converting songs in iTunes and browsing the web in Safari with a few torrents running in the background with Transmission. All the sudden the computer started hanging and I decided to restarted. After the restart, the Apple logo showed on the grey startup screen with a white progress bar (looked like a firmware update). When it completed and booted to the login screen I got a prompt that my startup disk was full and to delete some files. I know this can't be right because I had about 50GB free on my startup disk. Then after restart I noticed that the drive was fluctuating a lot! It first said I had ~250MB free, then jumped to 698 - 769MB!
I'm attempting a Snow Leopard install DVD startup and Disk Utility fix for repair and permissions. I really hope my HDD hasn't decided to randomly crap out. :-/

I just had to reformat the external hard drive that houses my iPhoto library, then restore it from a backup. Now Time Machine is telling me my backup hard drive suddenly does not have the space to complete a backup. I also noticed when I go in to Time Mac

I just had to reformat the external hard drive that houses my iPhoto library, then restore it from a backup. Now Time Machine is telling me my backup hard drive suddenly does not have the space to complete a backup. I also noticed when I go in to Time Machine, there are only about 5 backups recorded on the ext. hard drive. There were many more before. Any idea what happened and if I have to buy a new back up hard drive?

Hallo Kieth ,
I am not quite ready to restore the full iphoto library , as I have days of work re - imputting titles,descriptions and enhancement . I hope that your suggestion works , as I use my Macbook basically to work with digital photography. Through time , I will need to delete my library to recover more disc space and I would hate to have to spend more time re - imputting titles and descriptions all over again .
Thanks for your interest and advice.
regards - Alan

Do you have any ideas why Motion 5 would run slow on a computer? I have an Imac with 8Gigs of ram, and plenty of hard drive space, but it still gives me the beach ball when I add a few lights and effects. I'm at the end of my rope.

Do you have any ideas why Motion 5 would run slow on a computer? I have an Imac with 8Gigs of ram, and plenty of hard drive space, but it still gives me the beach ball when I add a few lights and effects. I'm at the end of my rope.

You probably don't really need 1080 at 60 for your finished projects but since you're just starting out with Motion, you need to lower your expectations. A long way. 1080 is about 2 million pixels per frame, DV is only about 400,000. That's not just five times as many pixels for the Mac to track; everything in video is exponential.
Explore the training tutorials available by Mark Spencer. You will get an idea of how his super powerful machine reacts with the software.
Adding a light roughly doubles the processing time over flat scenes. Two lights increases processing again. Reflections require processing the lights and then calculating the reflections so add another quarter of the time required for flat scenes. Add camera movement, motion blur, and depth of field and you need exponentially more processing time for every frame. The preload of renders into RAM is one of the cooler features of Motion, as comapred to After Effects, but that takes tons of time, to.
Try working in ye olde DV resolution for a few days. Get to know the software's limitations and what gets imposed by your Macintosh. Step up to 720p/30 and see how things slow down.

Before Mac OS X lion install I had over 50% free hard drive space on new MBP, but now my hard drive is full without me doing anything! How do I fix this??? Or should I just revert to Snow Leopard???

Before Mac OS X lion install I had over 50% free hard drive space on new MBP, but now my hard drive is full without me doing anything! How do I fix this??? Or should I just revert to Snow Leopard???

Sounds like the Time Machine Local Backup. Try turning Time Machine Off in System Preferences to verify.
See: OS X Lion: About Time Machine's "local snapshots" on portable Macs
But, your real problem is
I forgot to mention that I tried to use Disk Utility to Verify Disk, but it cannot. I get red errors that say the MacHD is corrupt and needs to be repaired. It says that in order to do this I need to use the Disk Utility on the install disk, but Lion doesn't have one!
Boot into Lion's Recovery (Hold ⌘R on Boot), select Disk Utility and then select Macintosh HD and click [Repair Disk]
Tony

Hard Drive Space Decreases Rapidly over the day

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