Help!...... Start-up disk is full

[Dubmatic311]

New User woes/Woe to my ignorance

As a long-time PC user and recent Mac convert, I was totally ignorant. First thing I did was move over all my iTunes music and photos onto the new iMac. Knowing I had plenty of room there, 2TB in fact. Lo and behold I didn't know about the small "startup drive" where everything got automatically installed. Now I too have run out of space. It is that simple. I am now copying those folders and pasting to the "real" big drive. iTunes is now having trouble locating the files, so I have to manually add the new directory and go back and delete the "missing" duplicates. What a pain in the Mac! At least the iPhotos picked up on the fact the pictures have been moved. Bottom line, I just freed up the problem with the startup drive being maxed out! I just wish I had known before I started a little about the divisions on the hard drive, and how to specify the location of these directories.

 

[warrior555]

Harddisk is Full

For some reason, my computer is constantly telling me that my 1TB iMac hard disk is full, even though I calculate that I'm only using ~40 GB, via 'Get Info' for hard drive files. Even Activity Monitor says that I only have 2.15 GB available. I can't even download Eudora email for the same reason. Any solutions? Thanks.

 

[GTO NEMESIS]

I had the same problem and calling Apple tech servicve didn't help. In fact, they wanted me to take the computer to the Apple stores.
Prior to getting the message "start disk full", I had, a) run disk utility and had used "erase" command to clean, b) increased my monitor resolution to the highest (i believe 2400xsomething), and c) installed neooffice and a couple of others. When I started getting the message, my computer eventually wouldn't boot up and I couldn't do a clean reinstall as there was no disk space!
I knew that I had hardly 20Gb full in a 120Gb disk although the disk info said that I had only a few MB available!

What I did:
1. started the mac in safe mode (held the shift key during booting)
2. Adjudted the resolution to lower level (1600x900)
3. Deleted the newly installe softwares.
4. Ran the disk permission/repair three times.
5. Restarted and reran the utility.
Disk info came to normal, the machine is working OK.

This is like the issue I currently have.

If I start my Mac I get the usual Apple Logo, progress wheel then a blue screen and a message saying that my Start Up disk is full, I click ok and then it closes the window and does nothing.

I also get the same issue if I start &:
Press cmd, alt, p, r
Press shift
Press c
Press s

If I press cmd, alt, escape I get the Force Quit window but there is nothing in it

I know that I have around 140 Gb of free space as I cleared a load of space just before restarting.
I did a TimeCapule back up this morning but I can't get it to boot from that either.

Any suggestions?

Thanks
Mark

 

[sunshine:-)]

start up disk full, can't trash stuff because SB_01.png is locked

Hi, I keep getting the 'start up disk full' message too. It probably IS full because the trash has 4,500 items in it. My problem is that when I try to empty the trash I get a message saying that it cannot be emptied because SB_01.png is locked, I try pressing the 'option key' while trying to 'securely empty trash' as I am advised to do but to no avail. Can anybody help me? Thanks in advance

 

[patp]

Hi, I keep getting the 'start up disk full' message too. It probably IS full because the trash has 4,500 items in it. My problem is that when I try to empty the trash I get a message saying that it cannot be emptied because SB_01.png is locked, I try pressing the 'option key' while trying to 'securely empty trash' as I am advised to do but to no avail. Can anybody help me? Thanks in advance

SB_01.png that file is in the trash and is locked?

find the file and right click > get info

see if the locked box is checked. uncheck and see if it helps. Or remove just that file from the trash and then empty the trash.

 

[MVD]

Relatively new user, but received no warning...!

People, here me out. I caved into the pressure of some long-time Mac users and, until now, have been more than thrilled by the decision. However, I received this Startup Disk Is Full warning for the first time tonight, AND NOW I only have access to the internet. My four-finger sweep (forgot the name of the feature) to get to my desktop no longer works, and minimizing the Safari browser leaves me only with the "space nebulae" background with nothing else shown. I can't even check the status of my disk because I don't have access to the drives any longer!

I have three drives:
-My startup disk is an 80G Intel X25M
-One external drive is the original 160G drive I received with the MacBook Pro via firewire
-The other external drive is a 600G Western Digital via USB

What do I do? Please! Now's the time for this legendary Mac Community to show its stuff! I've never allied with ANY company or system, seeing as they all have their faults to a more-than-human degree. However, if you rescue me here, I'll certainly raise a banner in support of this particular system's legion.

THANK YOU!

 

[iThinkergoiMac]

I imagine you've accidentally turned off the desktop or some such. What happens when you click on the Finder (smiley face) in the Dock?

 

[Writegrrl]

As a long-time PC user and recent Mac convert, I was totally ignorant. First thing I did was move over all my iTunes music and photos onto the new iMac. Knowing I had plenty of room there, 2TB in fact. Lo and behold I didn't know about the small "startup drive" where everything got automatically installed. Now I too have run out of space. It is that simple. I am now copying those folders and pasting to the "real" big drive. iTunes is now having trouble locating the files, so I have to manually add the new directory and go back and delete the "missing" duplicates. What a pain in the Mac! At least the iPhotos picked up on the fact the pictures have been moved. Bottom line, I just freed up the problem with the startup drive being maxed out! I just wish I had known before I started a little about the divisions on the hard drive, and how to specify the location of these directories.

I have a MacBook Pro (since 2007) and this is the first I've ever heard of a difference between a small startup drive and the larger internal hard drive. How do I find the smaller one so I can move things from it to the larger one?
(I've been getting messages for months saying there is no room left in my startup drive, so I have been moving files to my external hard drive, but the startup is always maxing out.)

 

[Writegrrl]

The solution is you need to delete some things from your hard drive

#1 is Empty your Trash.
#2 go to www.Versiontracker.com search for and download DeLocalizer. This will remove unneeded foreign language resources from your OSX, saving about 1 Gb of space.
#3 buy yourself an external Firewire hard drive that you can store your documents, music, movies, whatever it is you are filling the drive up with, and also backup your data to.
# Again at Versiontracker.com, look for a utility like CacheOutX that will delete caches and temporary files.

Couple of other things.
You *might* have a runaway process that is creating huge log files. At versiontracker.com look for a utility called WhatSize, which will list the largest files on your drive for you.

I've been having a similar problem with my MacBook Pro's startup disc being maxed out all the time. I just went to download Delocalizer, but Versiontracker is now CNET and they don't have a Delocalizer, only Applimizer and HomeOnKey:
http://download.cnet.com/1770-20_4-...s&filterName=platform=Mac&filter=platform=Mac

Would Applimizer be good to use?

 

[Crisco-Kid]

This is like the issue I currently have.

If I start my Mac I get the usual Apple Logo, progress wheel then a blue screen and a message saying that my Start Up disk is full, I click ok and then it closes the window and does nothing.

I also get the same issue if I start &:
Press cmd, alt, p, r
Press shift
Press c
Press s

If I press cmd, alt, escape I get the Force Quit window but there is nothing in it

I know that I have around 140 Gb of free space as I cleared a load of space just before restarting.
I did a TimeCapule back up this morning but I can't get it to boot from that either.

Any suggestions?

Thanks
Mark

I have ALL same Problems with my Imac
320GB, 3.1MB available, running mac osx 10.6.8

HELP

 

[Damo01]

I have ALL same Problems with my Imac
320GB, 3.1MB available, running mac osx 10.6.8

HELP

Have you thought of freeing up used space?

You'll need to free up used space on your startup drive by deleting things you don't need.

 

[McLagman]

Have you thought of freeing up used space?

You'll need to free up used space on your startup drive by deleting things you don't need.

I'm having the same problem. If I check the Storage under About this Mac, it shows 447 gigs of "Other" while about 50 gigs are used with Music, Photos, etc. I cannot figure out what these "Other" files are... I cant find them and I can't figure out if Time Machine or something else is corrupted and filling up the drive.

There should be 450 gigs free, but I am getting error messages that the disk is full.

Running Lion. I've run software update, disk utility and the disk is OK, repaired permissions, verified, emptied trash, turned off Time Machine, etc.

Any ideas?

 

[Damo01]

I'm having the same problem. If I check the Storage under About this Mac, it shows 447 gigs of "Other" while about 50 gigs are used with Music, Photos, etc. I cannot figure out what these "Other" files are... I cant find them and I can't figure out if Time Machine or something else is corrupted and filling up the drive.

There should be 450 gigs free, but I am getting error messages that the disk is full.

Running Lion. I've run software update, disk utility and the disk is OK, repaired permissions, verified, emptied trash, turned off Time Machine, etc.

Any ideas?

Download one of these applications Disk Inventory X, Grand Perspective and omnidisksweeper
to find where the other use up space is taking up...

 

[joethebus]

'Start-up disc is full', then a cold, dead blue screen

I'm guessing this is Apple's way of telling me I have just wasted a huge amount of money, and all the Apple Mac equipment I bought 'cos I'm a gullible **** needs to go to the recycling tip, and I have to go back to my old PC and take up where I left off!

So what is a start-up disc? I thought there was just the one hard drive, as it says on the spec sheet. Start-up disc? Is that like a starter on a car? And it can be full? Hmmmm.

How can it be full, it isn't full; whatever it is? If it is why wasn't there any warning (by which I mean some kind of intelligible warning it was about to overflow and completely disable my machine).

Why at no stage did it occur to the half-wit nerd who wrote the software for Apple that not all purchasers are long-term Apple fan boys and girls who know every nuance of how to nurture their delicate little devices and keep them working? That maybe, as in my case, having been told Mac Minis can be used for playing music, I was just playing music - not faffing about trying to get to PhD standard in Apple Mac faffing just to operate the play and stop buttons.

I'm gutted, and fed up with having a blue screen only to work with and being able to do just the one thing - move the cursor around the screen.

Oh how the sadistic git responsible must be laughing his or her little head off at my predicament.

All my music has gone, now and I'm a sad, sad fellow. Laugh on - I'll get over it eventually. Managing forgiveness is going to be a challenge though.

'Empty your trash'/ 'Free up some space'. Ha Ha Ha Ha.

Joe