I can't figure out what is using so much disk space, please help

[astromoose]

I've got a 1TB SSD on a retina 13" running 10.11.1.
I've used DaisyDisk, and GrandPerspective, and can't figure out what is taking up so much space; the numbers in DaisyDisk don't add up.

My boot drive (the 1TB SSD) says it has 651.1GB worth of data on it.
A bootable clone of the drive (created using carboncopycloner) only takes 362.9GB worth of data.
DaisyDisk shows both have roughly the same size Users, Applications etc. folders.

Am I missing some GIGANTIC cache somewhere?
I've run disk utility first aid and everything says its fine.

Any ideas?

 

[astromoose]

SOLUTION: Someone on another forum suggested I use DaisyDisk to 'Scan as Administrator'. (FYI the mac app store version does not give you this option, you've got to get it directly from the developer)

Doing that I was able to see that .MobileBackups.trash was using ~300GB!

I wasn't sure how to get rid of it and ended up using the terminal command on this page: http://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/168180/how-to-empty-mobilebackups-trash-content

Not sure why this happened but someone on that page speculates it was from using Time Machine concurrently with CrashPlan, which I do.

 

[chscag]

Someone on another forum suggested I use DaisyDisk to 'Scan as Administrator'. (FYI the mac app store version does not give you this option, you've got to get it directly from the developer)

Doing that I was able to see that .MobileBackups.trash was using ~300GB!

I wasn't sure how to get rid of it and ended up using the terminal command on this page: http://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/168180/how-to-empty-mobilebackups-trash-content

Not sure why this happened but someone on that page speculates it was from using Time Machine concurrently with CrashPlan, which I do.

Nope. Mobile Backups are created when you detach your Time Machine external drive from your MacBook Pro. The backups will continue and instead of creating the images on your external drive, they now are placed on your internal hard drive or SSD. They add up real quick. Do some googling and find out how to turn that off permanently. Note... that only affects mobile Mac computers and does not affect an iMac, Mac Mini, or Mac Pro.

 

[astromoose]

Nope. Mobile Backups are created when you detach your Time Machine external drive from your MacBook Pro. The backups will continue and instead of creating the images on your external drive, they now are placed on your internal hard drive or SSD. They add up real quick. Do some googling and find out how to turn that off permanently. Note... that only affects mobile Mac computers and does not affect an iMac, Mac Mini, or Mac Pro.

Yes but perhaps CrashPlan is/was somehow preventing them from being properly purged.

 

[tmagman]

Try using omni disk sweeper. Free app that you can run and it shows exactly what folders are making up all of your data.

 

[astromoose]

Try using omni disk sweeper. Free app that you can run and it shows exactly what folders are making up all of your data.

Thanks for the suggestion.
For anyone reading this, I've learned that for ODS to have caught the .MobileBackups.trash files that were taking up so much space on my disk, you need to run ODS (or most other disk data visualization utilities) as root.

For OmniDiskSweeper in particular, make sure it's in your applications folder and use the following terminal command:
security execute-with-privileges /A*/OmniDiskSweeper.app/*/M*/* 2>&-

 

[Fishrrman]

Those "graphical" disk apps confuse me.

Here's something that may make the task easier:
Download DiskWave:
http://diskwave.barthe.ph

Then, launch it.
In the preferences, set it so that it makes normally-invisible files VISIBLE.

Then, look around.
You'll see what to do next....

 

[iphonedude2008]

He already found the files taking up all the space