No space remaining on hard drive
My wife's MacBook Unibody (late 2008) is having a recurring hard drive problem where some program or utility is consuming nearly all available space on the internal drive.
The computer's original configuration is as follows:
2.0GHz Intel Core 2 Duo (2 cores)
4GB DDR-3 1066MHz RAM (2 X 2GB SODIMMs)
160GB SATA Hard Drive
OS X 10.5 (Leopard) + any updates to that version
Following the advice of Apple Care and a knowledgable friend who's also a MacBook user we updated the operating system to the newest version of OS-X, Mountain Lion.
I also updated the hardware to best compliment the newer version of OS X. I recently upgraded the memory to 8GB and installed an 80GB Corsair SSD with the latest firmware. Both seemed to alleviate the issue of performance and my wife stated that she perceived a big increase in performance from the original hardware.
She's also using an external USB Hard Drive, 1.5TB Seagate with a dedicated AC power adaptor, for her time machine backups. She also uses this as her storage drive for any files larger than 1GB. So all that remains on her internal drive, the 80GB SSD, are the OS and installed programs. After the initial setup of Mountain Lion she had over 30GB of space remaining on that drive with no apparent problems.
The problem has occurred again, consuming all user-available space on the internal SSD. There aren't any other programs, applications or utilities that we can see to account for the loss of usable sapce.
Could this be a bug within the NVIDIA MCP79MXT-B2 Chipset?
We did use a program to determine what was taking up the space, but it appeared to be some glitch that was writing multiple gigabytes of log file entries. Without an alternative solution we've just been identifying and deleting these every couple of months. We're uncertain whether its a hardware, firmware or software problem that's writing these log files that are invisible to OS-X's build in file management system. If it weren't for a free 3rd party app, cannot recall the name at the moment, then we wouldn't be able to see and delete these log files - rendering the computer unusable.
Similar Messages
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I need to free up space on my hard drive. How do you move photo's to my external?
I need to free up space on my hard drive in order to complete a new update. How do I move photo's from my macbook air to my external hard drive?
You need to backup your Iphoto library to Time Machine first (if you havent already done so)
THEN you need to copy your Iphoto library to another HD before deleting from your Macbook ,....because 1 copy only is = NO COPY in case of HD failure!
To move an iPhoto liobrary -
quit iPhoto and drag the iPhoto library intact as a single entity to the external drive - depress the option key and launch iPhoto using the "select library" option to point to the new location on the external drive - fully test it and then trash the old library on the internal drive (test one more time prior to emptying the trash)
And be sure that the External drive is formatted Mac OS extended (journaled) (iPhoto does not work with drives with other formats) and that it is always available prior to launching iPhoto from LarryHN
As to your AIr and its SSD =
You need to change the premise of your SSD use.
see here:
Your Solid State Drive and having enough space inside your Macbook Air & Pro
Solid State Drive usage premise, or the “more space / upgrade SSD” question
There have been questions posed and positions taken by many people who are trying to use their Macbook Air or Pro’s solid state drive (SSD) as a mass media storage device, for either pictures, videos, massive music collections or all three combined; but this should not be the working premise of a ‘limited’ SSD and its use.
In which, it’s the case of those users with either 128GB, 256GB, or even 512GB of internal SSD space, that have or are running “out of space”, that questions are raised. The immediate premise of some users can sometimes be “(how to / if) upgrading my SSD” when in fact in nearly all instances another approach is the logical and sensible one that needs to be looked into and exercised.
Any Macbook containing a SSD should be idealized as a ‘working platform’ notebook containing all your applications, documents, and weekly or bi-weekly necessary files. All collections of media files such as pictures, music, and videos, unless directly needed should be kept off the notebook and on an external hard drive or likewise. While the ‘working platform’ premise is also the case with larger internal conventional hard drives of 1TB+, its implementation isn't as critical except in terms of data protection.
Realistically, you should at most coordinate roughly 20 to 25% of your total SSD space to all audio-video personal use media (picture / music / video collections), leaving the remaining amount on an external HD.
Nobody should consider any notebook a data storage device at any time under any circumstance, rather a data creation, sending, and manipulation device; and in the case of a SSD, this is more important for purposes of having sufficient working space on the SSD and reducing SSD ‘bloat’ in which cases someone is wrongly attempting to use the SSD space as a large media storage nexus.
The rare exception to the collective usage and premise of SSD use in which a much larger SSD is truly needed are for those in video and photography professions that require both the extremely fast speeds of the SSD and the onboard storage for large and or many video and photography files. However this also falls under the premise of a ‘working platform’ for such peoples rather than the intent of many who are using the SSD as passive and static data storage for media files very infrequently needed or accessed.
All on-notebook data collections should be logically approached as to necessity, and evaluated as to whether it is active or passive data that likely doesn’t need to be on the notebook, allocations of space-percentages to as-needed work and use, apportioning space for your entertainment media, and questioning whether it should it be on the notebook for more than short-term consumption.
Considerations should be made in the mind of any user in differentiating the necessary system data (System hub) comprising the Mac OSX, applications, necessary documents that both must and should be on your internal SSD, and that of the users personal data (Data hub) comprising created files, pictures, music, videos, PDF files, data created or being created and otherwise, that likely unless being used soon or often should be parked on an external hard drive for consumption, or temporarily loading onto the internal SSD.
You both can and should purchase whichever SSD size you need or see fit, but even in the case of the largest of SSD, unless use-considerations are made, and SSD spaces are allocated as should be the case indicated above, one can easily and immediately run into this quandary of “needing more internal SSD space”, in which instance a different approach in usage must then be implemented.
However it is almost always the case, that such large media files are wanted to be stored internally rather than actually needed, in which case the external HD is both prudent as well as necessary. Additionally costs per MB are infinitely less on an external HD than an internal SSD in any consideration of data expansion needs.
A Professional Example
In the case of a Macbook Air or Macbook Pro Retina with ‘limited’ storage on the SSD, this distinction becomes more important in that in an ever rapidly increasing file-size world, you keep vital large media files, pics, video, PDF collections, music off your SSD and archived on external storage, for sake of the necessary room for your system to have free space to operate, store future applications and general workspace.
You should also never be put in the position of considering “deleting things” on your Macbook SSD in order to ‘make space’. This is especially what your external HD is for.
Professionals who create and import very large amounts of data have almost no change in the available space on their notebooks internal SSD because they are constantly archiving data to arrays of external or networked HD.
Or in the case of the consumer this means you keep folders for large imported or created data and you ritually offload and archive this data for safekeeping, not only to safeguard the data in case your Macbook has a SSD crash, or gets stolen, but importantly in keeping the ‘breathing room’ open for your notebook to operate, expand, create files, add applications, for your APPS to create temp files, and for general operation.
Slim USB3 1TB external hard drive
External Hard Drives
External hard drives are both extremely cheap and regardless of the size of your internal SSD (or even internal hard drive if the case), you need an external hard drive with your SSD equipped Macbook for several reasons:
1. Data backup and protection.
2. Redundancy for important data.
3. Necessitated ideal space for large media files for collections of pictures, videos, and music etc.
While ever changing in price, typical portable 2.5” external hard drives in USB3 run roughly $65 for 1TB or $120 for 2TB small portable USB3 hard drives. Such drives range in thickness between 5mm and 15mm, with recent improvements in storage of 500GB drives in 5mm profiles.
There is almost no premise in which a small 12mm thick 1 Terabyte USB hard drive cannot be taken along with any Macbook as an external large storage extension inside any Macbook carry case or pouch. Typically such external HD profiles are not much bigger than a deck of cards.
External hard drives are a foregone necessity for purchase with any Macbook for at the very least Time Machine backups, data redundancies, and ideally for large media storage. -
Hello, I wish to install Linux Ubuntu on my macbook pro by using boot camp to set aside space. Whenever I load the Boot Camp Assistant application out of the utilities folder in applications, it only gives me the options to download windows support software and install windows 7. I do not want this, I just want to be able to slide that little bar to set aside the space on my hard drive that i can use for Linux. I tried just downloading the windows support software but my internet is immensely slow and it has been an hour or so since it started and it's not even half way done. When this download is finished will i get the option to partition or will i just be faced with those same options?
I am on a 13" macbook pro, with apple OS X snow leopard version 10.7.2
A lot of the data on this macbook was transferred over from my old macbook i had.
Any ideas on how to fix this problem?
Thank you for reading.Well thank you for your honesty. Apple requires you have to have a Mac to develop iPhone apps, ergo my foray into OS-Xland. No way around it that one except for running OSX in a VM, which would have probably saved me some quid, true enough.
BUT for those interested parties: VirtualBox has a startup script in /Library/StartupItems/VirtualBox that will prevent OSX from fully booting on the initial (and required) rEFIt boot cycle. Once I temporarily moved that out of the StartupItems rEFIt went in as expected.
FYI, the openSUSE desktop running native is a little peppier than OSX native which was a nice surprise. Now if the Mac just had more open source software we would have a deal. (: -
I just downloaded Yosemite and all my iPhotos have disappeared! I tried importing them from the photo library but it said there wasn't enough space on my hard drive which is rubbish, because they were there before. How do I get them back to iPhoto?
There are 9 different versions of iPhoto and they run on 9 different versions of the Operating System. The tricks and tips for dealing with issues vary depending on the version of iPhoto and the version of the OS. So to get help you need to give as much information as you can. Include things like:
- What version of iPhoto.
- What version of the Operating System.
- Details. As full a description of the problem as you can. For example, if you have a problem with exporting, then explain by describing how you are trying to export, and so on.
- History: Is this going on long? Has anything been installed or deleted? - Are there error messages?
- What steps have you tried already to solve the issue.
- Anything unusual about your set up? Or how you use iPhoto?
Anything else you can think of that might help someone understand the problem you have. -
I use an external hard drive for my Lightroom library and I notice that all the images shown on there are DNG. On my MAC hard drive I have images shown as NEF. I desperately need to free up space on my hard drive, can I safely delete these NEFs?
dj_paige wrote:
however, I do point out that obtaining an additional hard drive and not throwing anything away seems a preferable solution to me.
heidie22, dj_paige has a very good point there. I would not through away the NEF files; I would archive them to a external drive.
By the way, I am assuming that converting RAW files to DNG is a decision you have made and not an accident. -
Please can you help - I have recently added an external hard drive to my Macbook so it can be used as a back up and storage to save space on my hard drive. I have deleted videos and photos from my hard drive but they are being replaced with 'backup'
how do i get rid of this ?
thanksWelcome to Apple Support Communities
Time Machine makes local snapshots in all portable Macs with Lion or Mountain Lion. They are made in the internal drive and they are removed when your hard disk gets full, so you don't have to worry about it.
If you want to delete them, turn off Time Machine and turn it on every time you want to make a backup. You can also turn them off manually without having to turn off Time Machine, or you can delete those local snapshots > http://pondini.org/TM/30.html -
How do I find out what program / file is using 100 GB of space on my Hard drive? Once I find the problem how do I delete the specific files to increase GB of space?
Use OmniDiskSweeper
Once you find file, it can be deleted from within OmniDiskSweeper
Allan -
Why is there so much available space on my hard drive after installing Lion?
I just made the decision to go ahead and install the new operating system "Lion"
I backed everything up to my Time Capsule and I have an older back up of everything on an external hard drive.
Now I have two questions and one task.
Why is there so much available space on my hard drive and where did my iPhoto library go after installing the new operating system?
My task is to restore my most up to date iPhoto library which I assume is on my time capsule.
How should I approach this task?Hi entresoft,
I am not sure how to do this. I am not a very literate computer person but have a vague idea of what you are suggesting.
If I do manage to figure out how to do what you have suggested will this restore my iPhoto Library and I assume maybe other files?
Thanks! -
Erratic amount of free space on my hard drive...
Can someone please tell me if they think this is strange, or should I not worry about it.
About a week ago I had 520 gigs of free space on my hard drive (its a 1 TB drive). I decided to defrag it simply because it had been a long time since I had done so. That went off without a hitch. I did not even think to check if the amount of free space had changed afterwards. I then decided to use Disk Utility to 'Erase Free Space'. That ran fine, but afterwards I was shocked to see that I now had 605 gigs (!!!) of free space, meaning either the defrag or the erasing of 'Free Space' freed up some 85 gigs (). Okay, strange I thought, but no complaints here. A couple days went by and I happened to glance at the free space and WOAH, its dropped back down to 570, even though I've added, AT MOST, 5 gigs of photos, music etc. Is it me or does this seem really strange...? Just wondering if anyone has any thoughts on this, reasoning etc...
Much appreciated
AdamHi A,
The used and free space amount are subject to some considerations as use and approach to data storage, here is a link to a previous question about it with reference to two other related posts http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=12743931#12743931
It is also curious that when you create and save a data file it will report a different size once you open and save it again even without changing contents.
Good luck, K. -
After I download my music into library and put it on the cloud, can I delete my library so it doesn't take up space on my hard drive.
I thought maybe it would be a little easier to understand where I am getting all these numbers from if I gave you guys some screenshots.
Here is the information for the original files (pulled straight from the card onto the external):
Here is the information for the FCP Library:
Here is the information for the folder within the FCP Library called "Original Media":
And finally, here is the information for the folder within the FCP Library Called "High Quality Media": -
i just saved my iphoto original library to my external hard drive, now how do i create new space on my hard drive and create a new iphoto library
Trash the copy of the library you just moved. Then Hold down the option (or alt) key key and launch iPhoto. From the resulting menu select 'Create Library'
But do you want to have two iPhoto Libraries? Why not just use the one on the External? -
Ever since I updated what looked like iTunes 10.6.1 my computer has been corrupted with Malware, which has filled up all available space on my hard drive. What do I do to get rid of the Malware?
First, 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.
First, back up all data 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.
☞ If you’re running Mac OS X 10.7 or later, 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. -
How to free up space on internal hard drive
How do I free up space on my internal hard disc?
I have only about 40 gig of information on my macbook however it says I don't have space while I'm working on photoshop. I have deleted a lot of files on my mac that are already saved in my external hard disc but when I check my memory it says I have only 1.3gig space available out of a 120gig memory. This data is distributed between audio, apps, movies, pictures and other. I don't understand what 'other' is and it says I have about 76gig worth of data in the other part. Please I would need help on how to delete files from this 'other'. Cheers!All Mac operating systems use any free space on your hard drive as virtual memory, and this virtual memory plays a part in how well your computer performs. Because of this, the more data you have on your hard drive, the less virtual memory becomes available. Therefore, in order to help increase your Mac boot time, and keep your computer running smoothly, periodically cleaning your hard drive is necessary. To clean it up you want to get rid of any old or unnecessary files. You can do this manually by removing unused applications, emptying your trash etc.,
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I recently installed OS X Server on my mac mini and found that it took up almost 170 GB of space on the hard drive , is that possible ?
In the Server cache what is an OK setting ..... I mean how many GB 25, 45, 60, ? Any suggestions ?
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I have plenty of space on my hard drive (500GB), but when I plug in my iPhone there is a window stating the pone cannot be backed up because of lack of disk space. The same occurs with attempting to import CD's into iTunes. The hard disk was replaced recently in order to gain extra memory. Is there some sort of limit set up from the original hard drive causing this problem?
Boot up from your Snow Leopard Install DVD while holding down the "c" key.
Select the language you wish to use, and then choose "Disk Utility" from the menu bar.
Your HD should appear in a panel on the left hand side of the window which opens. Select it and then click on the "repair disk" button in the right hand section of the window.
If Disk First aid is unable to complete the repair you will need to use a stronger 3rd party utility like DiskWarrior or TechTool Pro.
Once this process has been completed restart your computer.
Utilities & info regarding checking your HD space:
Where did my Disk Space go?
Slimming your hard drive
Seven ways to free up drive space
OmniDiskSweeper is a free utility that checks HD space.
FreeSpace cost $1 or is a free utility that checks HD space.
SpaceControl is a free utility that checks HD space.
Disk Inventory X
WhatSize
SpaceControl
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