HT4889 Migration assistant is showing user folder sizes much larger than in finder

I am migrating my system from a HD to a 256 GB SSD on a mac Pro.
The move is all internal from Bay 1 to Bay 4.
I did a fresh install of Mountain Lion on the SSD.
I now have about 199 Gb free on the SSD.
When I went to use the Migration assistant to move users it shows the user folders to be >300 GB, even though they read as being less than 30 GB when I look at then in the finder.
I already store my iTunes, videos etc in separate folders outside the user folders.
What is going on?
How to I address this?

Probably Time Machine local snapshots. Even if your TM disk isn't connected, local snapshots are created.

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Migration Assistant created admin user w/ Macintosh HD volume on desktop

Hi,
Summary:
MBP 17" (running Leopard) logic board died
Retrieved hard drive from MBP and put in USB 2.0 caddy
Bought Mac Mini 2.5 intel core i5 w/ latest Mountain Lion
Used for a couple of days as main Administrator user, set up a VPN etc, every working fine.
Made a back up using Time Machine on a USB connected My Passport Edge for Mac
Used Migration Assistant to transfer user account from MBP HD (with Leopard) - this was the main adminstrator (not root superuser) of the MBP
When prompted, renamed the Leopard user account to MacBook so no conflict with new Mountain Lion administrator user
Transferred everything but applications and download folder of the main (administrator) user on the MBP.
All appeared successful.
Restarted Mac Mini and logged into the User account created by Migration Assistant---all files there etc so far so good.
Then I noticed that this migrated user still had Admintrator rights and appears to have reset some of the global settings effecting the original ML admin user (the one I eventually want to carry on using)
First inkly of this was that the VPN server I set up was no longer recognised by Safari in any accounts on the machine.
Logged into original ML administrator user and changed the migrated MBP user to a 'standard' user with no rights to do change settings on the computer.
[still can't get Safari to recognise the VPN proxy server]
Decided I'd better make a back-up to the Time Machine on the My Passport, but had to follow these instructions http://pondini.org/TM/A4.html for a 'Full Reset of Time Machine'. Which did the job.
Then I logged back into the migrated MBP user account to look around. There on the desktop is a volume called 'Macintosh HD' (the same as the main computer default name that is used my Mountain Lion.
When I do a get info on this volume it tells me the following:
Kind: Volume
Created: Friday, 19 October 2012 (which is an odd date)
Modified: Today ...
Version 10.8.2
Formal: Mac OS Extended (Journaled)
Capacity: 499.25GB
Available: 361.32GB
Used .....(127.93 GB on disk)
          Sharing and Permissions
               You can only read
               system Read & Write
               wheel Read only
               everyone Read only
Can I delete this volume off the desktop or will that mean I lose all the files and folders for this user? Why is there a 137GB volume on the desktop?
Also, as it's called Macintosh HD (the same as Mountain Lion's Computer name) isn't this likely to be causing some clashes?
I will eventually be deleting this migrated user, once I have all the emails, notes, etc off Entourage's Main Identity imported into Outlook 10. In the meantime this volume on the desktop is worrying me.
My question is: what should I do about this double Macintosh HD volume on the migrated MBP user account?
Thanks for your help.
Cheers,
Tracy

There are settings in Finder's Preferences to show Hard Disks on the desktop. So, that is likely normal. Deleting it would be bad.

Email account folder in /user/library/mail is much larger than full mailbox archive for the same account

Hi,
I recently changed jobs and want to archive all email (with attachments in place) for the associated work email account. I also plan to remove the old work email account (IMAP) from the list of active mailboxes in Apple Mail. I don't want Spotlight searches for personal or current work email cluttered with results from my old job.
I have created an archive of the old work account by doing Mailbox Archive for all of the IMAP folders for that account. The entire archive is 1.7GB in size.
Before I delete the old account from my Mail preferences, I want to make sure that I have really exported everything. So I've compared the size of the new archive folder with that of the mailbox folder in users/.../Library/Mail for that same account. That latter is 8.7GB in size. Why the enormous difference?
Can the difference be attributed to lack of compression and indices (which would be rebuilt if I import the archive) for spotlight searches? Am I missing something in the archive that I created?
I've created a zip of the system folder. Can I easily restore this at a latter time if I delete the email account from my Mail preferences?
Is there a better way to achieve my objective?
Mitoids

I did find a "Recovered Messages" by looking in the the Mail client under "On My Mac" (I don't normally use that feature). One message with an accicental 99MB attachment that I never sent, was recovered ~60times, consuming 5.7GB.
I deleted all of those, but the size ~/Library/Mail/xxxaccount folder did not change much. It is still much larger than the Archive I created. BTW, this is an IMAP account that was syncing with corporate GMail.

Why is menu size so much larger than the files?

I am somewhat perplexed - I'm making a single-layer dvd and have a simple single screen theme (no animation) - it has one drop zone. The movie has 28 chapters so there are five of them, but so far I've added only one montage of photos to each menu page - it's a "mobile" quality in media browser and ave only 10 - 20 MB, then one song. On average these movie clips are 1:00 to 2:00 min long and the music is cut to that length. So, all told, it's probably less than 110 MB in files - but when I look at the project properties, the menus are 3301 MB!!!
The movie itself is only 1.1 GB so what is going on?
It's preventing me from doing the project and I've got no idea why it's making the menu size so much larger than the file sizes?
Can you please help me figure out what to do?
Alexa

The 2 min clips were natively 2 min - I had each one separate and actually converted to media browser in "mobile" size (b/c the drop zone was 4 x 6 in size in the theme). They were tiny - in most cases I was shortening the audio (e.g. the song was 4 minutes and I was setting the loop to only 1:30 b/c that's how long the video clip was on the menu).
BUT, to resolve the question (I always like to post the answer) - I ended up duplicating the project to try to reimport the video. It was a fresh iDVD project and I happened to click on the project tree of screens - and, lo and behold, the ENTIRE menu was duplicated for some reason (and the movie, actually). I went back to the original and it was the same! I have no idea how that would happen do you? It only had one main menu screen - and then an entire duplicate menu - which I wouldn't even know how to access if I didn't see it in the project menu tree?
The only think of is that at one point I added a title menu link to the scene selection - it gave me a warning that my menu was more than 12 minutes, did I want to fix or ignore and fix later - which confused me b/c it was under 12 min, then but I clicked ignore. Does that create an alternate title menu and send people back to something else?
Anyway, I deleted the entire extra scene selection menus (5 of them) and it was back to under 4 GB.
So, I was able to burn, but still wondering about creating the "title menu" link on scene selections? It drives me crazy that it doesn't automatically do that so I like to add "main menu" links.
Thanks for your help!
Alexa

My hard drive is clogging up automatically. The personal folder is now 921 GB which is much larger than the sum of the subfolders. I cannot see what's causing this or prevent this from happening. Anyone?

My hard drive on my Imac keeps clogging up automatically. The personal folder is now 925 GB which is much larger than the sum of the underlying subfolders. I cannot see what"s causing this. Anyone?

You may try one of these utilities to spotlight exactly where the hard drive usage has gone crazy.
      DaisyDisk- http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/daisydisk/id411643860?mt=12
     DiskFalcon   - http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/disk-falcon/id421781596?mt=12
Items to check manually:
     Duplicate iTune libraries, or music files that are in itune folder AND loose on the harddrive
     Download folder that hasn't been emptied
     Backup software location

The estimated project size is larger than the target media chosen

I am at a loss for trying to author a project using Adobe Encore. I first tried to author the project using version CS2. When attempting to export I received the following message:
"The estimated project size is larger than the target media chosen. While this is an estimate, the project may fail to build."
I have authored hundereds of projects in the past, but have never received that message before. I first thought that the problem was with the version of Encore I was using, but I received the exact same error when trying to author the project with Encore CS5.
The project itself has one menu, a motion menu, and one video file. The video file last 152 minutes, and I was attempting to export that to a dual layer DVD. I have since tried exporting the file using Adobe Premier CS5.5 using a variety of settings. I am trying to export it to a DVD-2 file, with the match soure attributes being set to the highest setting. The setting on the main concept MPEG encoder is set to 5. I have tried exporting the file using both constant and varaible bit rates.
When I recently exported the file using a contant bit rate of 6.5, I still had 650.4 MB remaining on my Encore project. I still received the same error about the project size, and so I am thinking that something else is wrong.
I have even exported the video file as an uncompressed AVI file, and then tried encoding it again using both Adobe Premier CS5.5 and the Adobe Encoder. I still get the same error message about file size.
Any help and/or suggestions about how to solve this problem would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

Using the Imgburn product worked! It also helped me figure out what the real problem was...
As it turns out, some single-layer DVDs had been mixed in with my dual-layer DVDs. I feel very foolish about this. All of my discs are printable, and so there is no indication written as far as what their capacity is on them.
Encore can be a bit vague in identifying a problem such as this. For example, I can set the settings to plan for a dual-layer disc, and it will display a graphical status indicator with that capacity in mind. When I saw the original file message error I honestly believed that there was a problem with the encoded file instead of the type of disc itself.
Imgburn instantly displayed the discrepancy in the type of disc I had loaded and the needed capacity for the type of project that I was trying to create.
Thanks again for your help!

Migration Assistant fails - calculates user size as a large negative number

I have a recurring problem that has prevented me from successfully using Migration Assistant to move my user account from my old computer to my new computer (since 3 computers ago, but definitely still a problem with my freshly updated Tiger machine).
The problem that I have seems to be that something about my user account makes the size in "Step 1 of 4: Pick Users To Transfer To This Machine" say that my user's size is "-53673944.7 GB"
At the bottom of the same screen it says "Space Remaining: 53673968.3 GB" and "Selected Items: -53673925.1" -- so it clearly is making some kind of horrible math error and then propagating it through all it's calculations.
Everything on "Step 2 of 4..." seems to be normal, and in fact the MA worked fine to move everything but my user account over.
When I arrive at "Step 4 of 4..." the "Migrate" button is always greyed out if I have my user account selected in step 1, which doesn't actually make sense, since right on the page it says I have over 51 petabytes free and will benefit by gaining some additional space after migrating. (Perhaps there is some last minute sanity check that does not simply involve subtraction and a test for greater-than-zero).
I'd really like to be able to migrate... what could I possible have in my home directory that would cause this? I certainly have some symbolic links scattered around, but those should really not be followed... has anyone seen any behaviour like this before? Does anyone at Apple care that there is obviously a serious bug with the Migration Assistant (although clearly only in some special situation)?
Aluminum Powerbook 15" Mac OS X (10.4.6)

Surprisingly, it let me run Disk Utility from the original factory MBP install DVD!
I was able to click "Repair Disk" and it displayed lines of info in the window. One of the lines it outputted was in red and said,
"Exceeded recommended limit of 100 nested folders".
I found this site -- http://hintsforums.macworld.com/showthread.php?t=28421 -- then ran this in Terminal -- *sudo find / -mindepth 100* -- and it outputted page after page of lines for my flight simulator, FlightGear.app.
Here's one example line that Terminal found...
/Applications/FlightGear.app/Contents/Resources/data/Aircraft/FlightGear.app/Con tents/Resources/data/Aircraft/
FlightGear.app/Contents/Resources/data/Aircraft/FlightGear.app/Contents/Resource s/data/Aircraft/FlightGear.app/Contents/Resources/data/Aircraft/
FlightGear.app/Contents/Resources/data/Aircraft/FlightGear.app/Contents/Resource s/data/Aircraft/FlightGear.app/Contents/Resources/data/Aircraft/
FlightGear.app/Contents/Resources/data/Aircraft/FlightGear.app/Contents/Resource s/data/Aircraft/FlightGear.app/Contents/Resources/data/Aircraft/
FlightGear.app/Contents/Resources/data/Aircraft/FlightGear.app/Contents/Resource s/data/Aircraft/FlightGear.app/Contents/Resources/data/Aircraft/
FlightGear.app/Contents/Resources/data/Aircraft/FlightGear.app/Contents/Resource s/data/Aircraft/FlightGear.app/Contents/Resources/data/Aircraft/
FlightGear.app/Contents/Resources/data/Aircraft/FlightGear.app/Contents/Resource s/data/Aircraft/FlightGear.app/Contents/Frameworks/osgIntrospection.framework/
Versions/A/Headers/CustomAttribute
I will trash FlightGear.app, then attempt the migration again, then post back here whether I was successful or not.
Hopefully, you won't be hearing from me for an hour or so!
<Edited by Host>

HT4889 Migration assistant It created a whole new user.

I was going through the steps of setting up my new imac and went ahead with migration from my other computer. It created a new user. Now I have 2 users.
What is the best way to get all my files, music, photos applications ect to the new user?
Or can I ditch the new user and go about it differently to have it import all my old computer to the main user?
thanks!

The easiest option may be to erase the disk, reinstall OS X, and start over.
This time elect to transfer information from the other computer, before creating a user account.
Read Apple Support Communities contributor Pondini's Setting-up a new Mac from an old one, its Backups, or a PC
As he says:
Usually, the best way to do that is with Setup Assistant, when your new Mac first starts up. The alternative, Migration Assistant, can be used later, but there are some downsides to waiting.
One downside is creation of the second User account, as you now know.

HT4889 Migration Assistant unable to transfer from OS 10.4.11 to Mountain Lion

I am following the instructions here
How to use Migration Assistant to transfer files from another Mac
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4889?viewlocale=en_US&locale=en_USto migrate from OS 10.4.11 to Mountain Lion, but Migration Assistant gets stuck looking for my old computer. This occurs after I select "From a Time Machine backup or other disk".
My old computer is in Target Disk mode and visible in the new Macbook's Finder, so the Firewire cable is OK.
I also tried migrating from a 120 GB hard-drive backup through the USB port. Still no luck.
I am running Tiger on my old Powerbook G4, and Mountain Lion on a MacBook Pro.
Any ideas?
Any good guides to transferring the files manually?
Thanks
Seth

It is not a good idea to wholesale restore your entire home directory from Tiger to Mountain Lion. If Migration Assistant had worked, you would have a nightmare on your hands with incompatibilities in the home library folder.
Here is what I would do:
Use Target Disk Mode to mount the old Tiger Mac on the new Mountain Lion Machine installation.
Ensure that the original files have the same user id and group ownership between both machines.
Get the Tiger home directory files to the ML home directory
Do not drag and drop folders from Tiger, that already exist on ML. Drag the contents between folders. The reason is that folders created by ML, may have different permissions and lower level access control list settings than their Tiger counterparts.
Do not move the contents of the home Library folder on Tiger at all. You are asking for mayhem if you splatter this over its counterpart on ML.
You can drag and drop any folders that you created on the Tiger home directory to your new home directory on ML.
Do not drag any Tiger applications to the new Mountain Lion installation. They are incompatible, and you need current revisions with confirmed ML support.
Unmount Firewire Target disk mode.
Start using ML.

Migration assistant stalls on "applications folder"

hi all
i'm having an odd problem upgrading a g4 dual gig desktop system to tiger using the erase and install option, after cloning my drive to an external fw hd. when i finish the install and get to step 3 (transfer your information) the migration assistant stalls on my old "applications" folder - it just sits there with the word "calculating" next to it. i tried leaving it alone for a while to no avail. with the "applications folder" checked (and calculating) the "transfer" button is greyed out. there is also an option for taking files and folders from the drive with the cloned system, and when i uncheck the "applications folder" and check the drive where this folder resides, "transfer" becomes active. i tried doing it this way, but it just copied the files to a folder on the upgraded system, without copying all my library support files, prefs and such. anyone have any idea what's going on? this has always worked flawlessly for me in many other installs. i'm stumped!
thanks
bruce
g4 dual gig "mirror face" Mac OS X (10.4.5)

well, none of that resolved anything. here are a few more details: after installing 10.4 and getting to the "import from another partition/computer" section of the migration assistant the file list shows the applications folder i need to access, but instead of a size it reads "calculating." even if i let it sit for several minutes this doesn't change. i ran the usual disk utility repair permissions and verify disk procedures, and everything comes back fine. if i try to boot from the clone everything seems very slow: boot up takes quite a while, it hangs on "waiting for apple file service" for several minutes and "login window starting" also takes forever. once it gets done i get a blue screen hang. if i boot into the new install of 10.4 and run the migration assistant, it doesn't see the partition with my cloned system at all. the first time i tried migrating the files, when it wouldn't see the applications folder, it did allow me to copy the files into a folder on the new system drive. this didn't help much of course, since it didn't bring the support files over. i'm resigning myself to having to reinstall all my apps manually, a big PITA.
<sigh>
g4 dual gig "mirror face" Mac OS X (10.4.7)
g4 dual gig "mirror face" Mac OS X (10.4.7)

Migration assistant added second user did not merge data: iTunes

I set up my new mac at the store then came home and connected my OLD iMac to the new via Firewire. I used Migration Assistant, and the migration took about 90 minutes. When it was done I had two parallel usernames; my old username with the old desktop look and stuff and the new computer's username I set up with the clerk at the Mac Store. Now I have two separate users on my computer, complete with two separate iTunes. When I look in the finder under Macintosh HD/Users, I see an icon for the new user (the little house) and a folder labeled with the old username but it has a red "negative" circle over it (like a push icon on an iPhone, but with a minus sign in the middle), plus a Shared folder.
The weird thing is that all the documents and stuff merged, but I have to go to the old user to use iTunes. My old computer did also have 2 users (why? I have no idea) and it brought the iTunes library I did not use in, but not the massive library I do use in. I teach a fitness class and have about 100 unique playlists and ALOT of music on that thing - but the wrong library was brought in. Now I have to switch back to the old user to use iTunes and that just seems silly. I have tried 'add to library" to try to bring the stuff over but it can't see into the other user I guess.
Any suggestions? It is so frustrating that my whole library is there but I can't access it on the new user after spending all that money.
Thanks!

Read here on why a second user was added and how to remedy.
http://web.me.com/pondini/AppleTips/SetupAsst.html
Regards,
Captfred

Migration Assistant, now two user accounts

Hi, I've just purchased a Macbook Pro. I've just completed the migration assistant and its transferred all my files, photos and itunes to my macbook but under a different user account to the one my computer was set up with. Any ideas how I can merge the two (transfer the info over) and delete the second one?
Many thanks, Louise

A = First user account created on the new machine (Admin)
B = User account migrated over (account status unknown)
1: Log into A and make sure B is a Admin user in System Preferences > Accounts
2: While in A, transfer files via the Users/Shared folder
Programs usually are installed into the Applications folder for all accounts to use, but some have particular settings saved into each user account.
Best thing is to just use the program again and make new settings which get saved in User B.
Once you have everything up on A, then delete B from the System Preferences > Accounts.
Optional: for more security,
it's best to create a new Admim user while logged into A, lets call it C, and then logging into C and changing A to Standard user from Admin, then using A all the time like normal.
It's a little more work involved using the computer when your accessing the Applicaitons folder (rarely), and having to manually check for updates, but your computer is much more secure as A is now a Standard User with little "powers" so in case something bad happens it can't do much to your computer (unless you give it your Admin password of course.)
https://discussions.apple.com/message/16276201#16276201

When migrating from a pc to macbook pro migration assistant caused multiple user accounts how do I get the data all in to one account now that it is migrated ?

I am switching over to apple from a PC platform and I have tried to use migration assistant to transfer the stuff on my PC to my macbook pro. When i tried the first time the two went to sleep due the long time required to transfer 13 GB of data and the transfer failed. I tried to transfer again only opting for some of the data but when I did it created a second user account . I tried again and now I have transferred most of the data but I have it in three user accounts. Not what I wanted to do. Is there an easy fix for this or do Ineed to start from scratch ?

Open the Users folder on the internal drive, drag all of the other home folders to the desktop, and then move the files inside to the desired locations.
(91949)

Transferring Itunes Files from user created by migration assistant to another user

Hello,
I was wondering how to transfer the entire itunes library from the user file created by migration assistant to my current user file on my mac. I have noticed on the file folder created by migration assistant that the itunes play counts and ratings are all the same as my old pc, but now I want to bring all of that to my new user account on this mac. I really need to learn how to do this ASAP! Help would be greatly appreciated!
also - the old user files cant be accessed by my current account (there is a red icon on the lower right of all the files)

You have three choices:
1. Keep both accounts. Enable fast user switching. Use the original account only for administrative tasks, and demote the new account to "Standard User" status in the Users & Groups preference pane. This is the best choice from the standpoint of security.
2. Delete the new account. Create a temporary one with a different name and allow it to administer the computer. Log into the temporary account and run Migration Assistant again, this time selecting only the user you want to transfer. If it has the same name as an existing user, you'll have the option to overwrite that user. Confirm. Log out of the temporary account and delete it.
3. Erase the startup volume in Recovery mode and start over. Do the transfer the right way, in Setup Assistant, not Migration Assistant. You will have to download about 5 GB of data and it may take several hours.

Migration assistant and 2nd user account

Yesterday I set up my new Mac Mini and used Migration Assistant to transfer files from my PC to my new Mac.
I can't now access the files as a 2nd user, as I am being prompted for a password. I can't remember setting a password for a 2nd user account. If I did it would be the same as my Administrators account.
Any suggestions on how I can access the 2nd user account?
I presume I will later on be able to transfer files from 2nd user account to my Mac account and then delete the 2nd user account.
I am a new Mac user.

From the main account on your Mac, the one you are now signed into, open a Finder window and go to the Users folder and right click on that second user account. Select Get Info from the list that comes up. When that opens scroll down to the bottom and click the small Lock icon and type in your Admin password. Once the lock icon is open click on the Plus ( + ) sign and add your current username, the one you are now logged into to the list for Sharing & Permissions and then give it both Read & Write access. Then on the icon with the little gear and downward facing triangle click that and select Apply to Enclosed items. That will propagate those permission down to all folders and files in that second user account.
you should then be able to access all the folders in that second user account and copy those files over to your main account. Once you have done that you can go into User & Groups in System Preferences and delete, remove, that second account.

HT4889 Migration assistant is showing user folder sizes much larger than in finder

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