What Is Disk Utility Telling Me?

[jparker402]

Opened up Disk Utility for the second time in my life, and for the first time in my life I looked at the WD external drive I use for Time Machine. In one screen it looks like my drive is full. In the other it looks like it isn't full. Could someone (1) tell me what I am seeing and (2) aim me for a tutorial on how to understand Disk Utility? Thanks!

You can clearly see that I am also terribly inexperienced at placing and sizing images in a document! Suggestions on that would also be appreciated!

 

[0128672]

Here's Apple's Disk Utility user guide: https://support.apple.com/guide/disk-utility/welcome/mac
In particular, look at Get detailed information about a disk in Disk Utility on Mac.

Hope that helps.

 

[Apple_Robert]

The first picture shows the WD drive itself. The second picture shows the partition you created on the WD drive that holds your data. The part of the drive that holds your data is not full.

 

[casperes1996]

As BasicGreatGuy said, yeah - The part that shows to be full just means that that partition is formatted across the whole drive.

 

[jparker402]

The first picture shows the WD drive itself. The second picture shows the partition you created on the WD drive that holds your data. The part of the drive that holds your data is not full.

Hmmm! I don't remember making a partition! But it was over four years ago that I hooked it up. Oddly, I was reading about partitions today which is what caused me to look at Disk Utility.

 

[Nermal]

If you don't explicitly choose to partition the disk then it'll create one big one that fills the entire disk.

 

[jparker402]

If you don't explicitly choose to partition the disk then it'll create one big one that fills the entire disk.

That must be what happened.

 

[casperes1996]

That must be what happened.

Yeah a disk with no partition is a disk that cannot be used for anything at all. A disk needs at least one partition to be useful so a disk that stores something will be guaranteed to have a partition.

 

[jparker402]

I gather, then, that by doing nothing and thereby inadvertently creating one big partition was okay. But if I were to have to do it again, should I do something different?

 

[casperes1996]

I gather, then, that by doing nothing and thereby inadvertently creating one big partition was okay. But if I were to have to do it again, should I do something different?

Unless you want to achieve something specific, no, not really

 

[jparker402]

Unless you want to achieve something specific, no, not really

Thank you!

 

[casperes1996]

Thank you!

Cheers, mate

 

[Fishrrman]

OP:

Select "the next line down" from the one highlighted in the pic you posted in #1.
That should show you used/UNused space on the drive partition.

Unless you know WHY you would want more than one partition, you probably don't need any.

 

[Black Baron]

The first picture shows the WD drive itself. The second picture shows the partition you created on the WD drive that holds your data. The part of the drive that holds your data is not full.

Strange, I saw lots of mounted disk images by opening my Disk Utility even though they are not mounted and available in the Finder. I needed to eject all the virtually mounted Disk images in Apple Disk Utility.

What is it for? Is it CleanMyMac X Disk Utility virtually mounting every disk image on my internal HD when
I use the feature of CleanMyMac X "Smart Scan > Protection"? I use version 4.4.7. Beta features is disabled
and this version has no feature yet for Treat - Malware scanning.

Nor do I have Kaspersky installed on my puter.

Could it be that the software is forgetting to unmount the disk images?

Rergards,

BLACK BARON
Design / Photo / Art / Music

 

[gnasher729]

Hmmm! I don't remember making a partition! But it was over four years ago that I hooked it up. Oddly, I was reading about partitions today which is what caused me to look at Disk Utility.

MacOS _always_ creates one partition. For example, on a 1000 GB drive, one 1000 GB partition. Without any partition you couldn't store any data. It's your choice to change this to say two partitions with 800GB and 200GB. Or two partitions with 300GB each, wasting 400GB of your hard drive.