start up disk full

macuser987 · Jan 9, 2014

hi all,
my macbookpro keeps on saying the start up disk is almost full.
i've deleted the trash, deleted all my files and still this problem occurs. disk utility first aid is all fine.

Looking at my disk it says i have lots of music and lots of 'others':
-The music i don't understand, as i don't have any music on my computer...
- the 'other' must be my programs i have some adobe programs, and some other bigger programs (dropbox, google drive, albelli, Skype), but i doubt this could take so much space.

i feel like a major nube that can't work out the problem
anyone any suggestions??

jav6454 · Jan 9, 2014

Do you have any large downloads? You do realize Photoshop is a 'heavy' app in terms of disk space.

macuser987 · Jan 9, 2014

i've deleted all my downloads.
jup, understand photoshop is a heavy app, but i've always had the entire adobe suite on my computer and never had any problems. because of the 'start up disk full' i've already deleted many programs of the adobe suite.

Bruno09 · Jan 9, 2014

Are you sure you don't have any music on the Mac ?

Could you select your Music Folder and do Cmd + i to see its size, please ?

maflynn · Jan 9, 2014

Download and use OmniDiskSweeper. It will provide a sorted list of what's consuming your space.

macuser987 · Jan 9, 2014

89 KB, 16 items

at 'all my files' i found a huge list of images, documents and music. i have no idea where this is hiding, but i'm deleting them now, safes me already 28 Gb, but still a lot of music and others.

Kelmon · Jan 9, 2014

maflynn said:
Download and use OmniDiskSweeper. It will provide a sorted list of what's consuming your space.

What he said. I have very fond memories of OmniDiskSweeper from the last time I owned a notebook with limited disk space and it was invaluable for finding out where my disk space had gone.

Your statement that "i don't have any music on my computer" doesn't seem to square with what is reported, plus I note from the screenshot that you have iTunes open, which seems odd if you don't have music. I wonder if it is possible that you do have an iTunes Library that you think is stored in the cloud (iTunes Match/iCloud) but in reality it is still stored on your MacBook Pro.

The "Other" category should cover documents and other such files that don't fall into the Music/Photos/Apps categories. 145GB of documents sounds quite a lot so you must be very productive...

Wuiffi · Jan 9, 2014

if you use itunes, your settings are probably, that it copies your music to itunes own folders. if you right click on a title and go to: "view in finder" or something like this (sorry my mac is not in english) it will show you where itunes saves your music files.

if you have any pictures in iphoto it will have those in it't own iphoto (or aperture) library. so even if you delete the originals, the pictures are still saved on the computer and need space

but as others, I highly recommend the use of OmniDiskSweeper!

macuser987 · Jan 9, 2014

thanks a lot! installed the new iOS and omnidisksweeper. omnidisksweeper is the bom, tells you a lot.
turns out i have a lot of user data. still can't work out where this is located, but will delete this via omnidisk.
and many apps... guess i can loose some of those as well.

thanks a lot for all your help!

maflynn · Jan 9, 2014

Your attached image isn't showing the whole picture.
First did a screen print while it was sizing so its not that helpful.
Secondly you're showing the application folder which isn't really a problem. The majority of data is in your home folder. I'd look to cleaning that up before touching any applications.

Also be sure to have a backup because if you delete something you need, you have a fall back plan.

Dekard · Jan 9, 2014

Are you using time machine? Any backup software? Sleep images? etc?

priitv8 · Jan 9, 2014

Still, adding up the numbers in leftmost column is a far cry from 420GB that System Information declares as used.

simon48 · Jan 9, 2014

Not to shoot down OmniDiskSweeper, but I highly recommend DaisyDisk and you can't beat its UI. It's by far the best and fastest way I've found to find your big files.

jav6454 · Jan 10, 2014

That picture is not the complete deal. There is more to it.

maflynn · Jan 10, 2014

jav6454 said:
That picture is not the complete deal. There is more to it.

Nope, it was still in scanning mode, and only highlighting the applications folder. We'll have to wait and see what the OP responds.

macuser987 · Jan 10, 2014

ok, this is what i got from omnidisk...
i guess i have to delete some pictures

TRAV9614 · Jan 10, 2014

Deleted

niteflyr · Jan 10, 2014

Time machine local snapshots automatically delete as room is needed. Fuggetaboutit.

http://support.apple.com/kb/PH14329

maflynn · Jan 11, 2014

macuser987 said:
ok, this is what i got from omnidisk...
i guess i have to delete some pictures

Depending on the pictures, consider using an external disk to archive them. I use external drives to for this purpose and so I retain the pictures of my kids but as each year clicks off, I move the Aperture library to an external drive.

Weaselboy · Jan 11, 2014

macuser987 said:
ok, this is what i got from omnidisk...
i guess i have to delete some pictures

Something is off here.

Omni is showing zero in the hidden /.Mobilebackups folder, yet that system about graphic is showing over 200GB there. That about graphic gets its data from the Spotlight index and I believe yours is corrupt and providing incorrect information. In your first screenshot in post #1 that graphic shows the entire disk used up by Other and obviously that cannot be correct either.

Run the below command in Terminal to reindex Spotlight then take another look at the system about graphic to see if it matches up with what Omni is showing.

Code:

sudo mdutil -E /

macuser987 · Jan 14, 2014

Thanks for all your help. My compu is working a lot better already!

I did the sudo mdutil -E / but the graph is still off... see screenshot.

I think I should empty my caches. Is there a way to empty all caches at once?

Weaselboy · Jan 14, 2014

macuser987 said:
Thanks for all your help. My compu is working a lot better already!

I did the sudo mdutil -E / but the graph is still off... see screenshot.

I think I should empty my caches. Is there a way to empty all caches at once?

Caches would be in /Library/Caches and ~/Library/Caches, but neither looks huge on your system.

Did you wait while the Spotlight reindex completed? It can take hours if you have a lots of data. I ask because the system info graphic is still off.

You mentioned "disk first aid" earlier. Try a command-r boot to recovery and from there run Disk Utility and do a repair disk and tell me what you get.

I just did some testing on my system (Mavs 10.9.1), and have come to the conclusion OmniDiskSweeper is borked and not showing hidden folders content.

Look at this screenshot from my system. Time Machine's local backups is using 233MB and Omni shows 0 bytes in /.Mobilebackups where that data is stored. The Terminal command below shows "308M /.MobileBackups" (a few minutes later so the size went up), so the Backups purple graphic is correct and Omni is not showing this space on my system. If you notice at the top of Omni it only shows your total space used at 99.3GB and we know that is wrong. Also Omni show 0 bytes in /.Spotlight and that can't be right either.

Code:

sudo du -hs /.MobileBackups

So let's ditch Omni and move to Terminal.

Enter the command below in Terminal and wait for the output (it takes a couple minutes). You will need to enter your password.

Code:

sudo du -d 1 -x -c -g /

You will get something like this:

Code:

1	/.DocumentRevisions-V100
1	/.fseventsd
1	/.MobileBackups
0	/.PKInstallSandboxManager
1	/.Spotlight-V100
0	/.Trashes
0	/.vol
8	/Applications
1	/bin
0	/cores
1	/dev
1	/home
8	/Library
1	/net
0	/Network
5	/private
1	/sbin
5	/System
30	/Users
1	/usr
1	/Volumes
56	/
56	total

The numbers to the left are GB of space used in that folder. Post up the output of the command so we can have a look.

macuser987 · Jan 20, 2014

1 /.DocumentRevisions-V100
1 /.fseventsd
3 /.MobileBackups
1 /.Spotlight-V100
0 /.Trashes
0 /.vol
8 /Applications
1 /bin
0 /cores
1 /dev
1 /home
8 /Library
1 /net
0 /Network
8 /private
1 /sbin
4 /System
73 /Users
1 /usr
1 /Volumes
103 /
103 total

Weaselboy · Jan 21, 2014

macuser987 said:
1 /.DocumentRevisions-V100
1 /.fseventsd
3 /.MobileBackups
1 /.Spotlight-V100
0 /.Trashes
0 /.vol
8 /Applications
1 /bin
0 /cores
1 /dev
1 /home
8 /Library
1 /net
0 /Network
8 /private
1 /sbin
4 /System
73 /Users
1 /usr
1 /Volumes
103 /
103 total

Okay... nothing there jumps out at me as odd. I do see 3GB in /.Mobilebackups that was not shown in Omni as I suspected. If you turn Time Machine off briefly then back on, it will zero that out saving some space.

What are you seeing now in the system about graphic? How about Disk Utility?

disasterdrone · Jan 21, 2014

I really like DiskInventoryX for this too - it does the same thing, with a different UI.

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