I bought this Macbook last night, but before I did anything to it there was only 57 GB left from 80 GB. Although I do have iPhoto and a DVD program and a few other things, I don't understand where the space was eaten up?
I had the same question when I first received my MacBook. I have a 100gb hard drive but i only had about 75gb to use out of the box. The first issue is how you calculate the storage. Everybody just kind of rounds up. The actually formatted capacity for my hard drive is 91gb. Second, Apple gives you a ton of stuff. Just random programs and other such things like drivers. I'm not sure but I think that I read somewhere that OS X itself is about 5gb, but again, I'm not sure. I know this explanation isn't the greatest but that's the basic answer. I'm sure someone else like Chucker could answer your question in a more detailed way.
The bundled software takes up the most. Garageband is the worst at over 3GB - not the app itself but the loops. Even the example projects are huge. Some apps have a lot of themes too such as idvd. I get rid of most of them.
This measures the disk usage all over your drive and reports where the most is being used.
I'd say that taking into account your drive would only be about 75GB as mentioned, the default 20GB or so installation can probably be brought down to under 10GB. It just depends which apps you want to still use.
Thank you both for your replies. I'll wait until I have some idea of how to use this thing before trashing stuff, but that's a great idea. So long as it's normal, I'm happy.
The templates, themes, and loops for GarageBand and iDVD take up several gigabtyes. They're stored in in /Library/Application Support/[name of app]. If you're not planning on using those apps, move those files to an external drive and you'll free up some room.
Also, if you reinstall OS X you can skip installing the boatloads of printer drivers. Also you can scale back the languages installed since every language available in OS X is installed by default. These steps will shed some GB weight.
Thanks for the link to that program Marvin. Believe me, bec, after a few years and all kinds of movies and games and music building up all over the place you start wondering, "what the heck happened to all my space?"
I was pretty shocked personally at how much space Garageband and iDVD take up when I explored the issue (painstakingly, by selecting folders and Cmd-i). Also, as mentioned already, the different languages that you can choose to not install (it's not as scary as it seems) take up a little over a GB. And the, literally, tons of printer drivers are several GB's I believe.
I believe that the best course for now is what you've already come up with-keep it since you have space to spare. The printer drivers might prove very convenient, not ever having to worry about it.
Side note: the disparity, Maimezvous, has to do with the fact that 1GB actually equals 1024 MB, and so on. For some wacko reason the harddrive manufacturers write it as 1GB=1000MB, and so on and put in fine print what it really is. Actually, it might be even wackier than that (I read on Wikipedia that it was for floppies) but that's the basic problem.
By the way: Welcome and best of luck with your shiny new computer. **meelash is green with envy** 8)
Apple's Tech Note says "not to touch" this folder, but damn that's a lot of data in there, and I don't even have any syncing services enabled, not even iDisk. Apple implies that deleting items from this folder could cause deletions from Address Book and others.
Quote:
Originally posted by Marvin
The bundled software takes up the most. Garageband is the worst at over 3GB - not the app itself but the loops. Even the example projects are huge. Some apps have a lot of themes too such as idvd. I get rid of most of them.
This measures the disk usage all over your drive and reports where the most is being used.
I'd say that taking into account your drive would only be about 75GB as mentioned, the default 20GB or so installation can probably be brought down to under 10GB. It just depends which apps you want to still use.
Comments
What to do is get Whatsize:
http://www.id-design.com/software/whatsize/
This measures the disk usage all over your drive and reports where the most is being used.
I'd say that taking into account your drive would only be about 75GB as mentioned, the default 20GB or so installation can probably be brought down to under 10GB. It just depends which apps you want to still use.
To move to an external drive...would burning to a DVD be alright instead?
Originally posted by bec
To move to an external drive...would burning to a DVD be alright instead?
The idea is to have them stored in another place in case you need them in the future. So, external drive or DVD it makes no difference.
I was pretty shocked personally at how much space Garageband and iDVD take up when I explored the issue (painstakingly, by selecting folders and Cmd-i). Also, as mentioned already, the different languages that you can choose to not install (it's not as scary as it seems) take up a little over a GB. And the, literally, tons of printer drivers are several GB's I believe.
I believe that the best course for now is what you've already come up with-keep it since you have space to spare. The printer drivers might prove very convenient, not ever having to worry about it.
Side note: the disparity, Maimezvous, has to do with the fact that 1GB actually equals 1024 MB, and so on. For some wacko reason the harddrive manufacturers write it as 1GB=1000MB, and so on and put in fine print what it really is. Actually, it might be even wackier than that (I read on Wikipedia that it was for floppies) but that's the basic problem.
By the way: Welcome and best of luck with your shiny new computer. **meelash is green with envy**
~/Library/Application Support/SyncServices/Local ?
Apple's Tech Note says "not to touch" this folder, but damn that's a lot of data in there, and I don't even have any syncing services enabled, not even iDisk. Apple implies that deleting items from this folder could cause deletions from Address Book and others.
Originally posted by Marvin
The bundled software takes up the most. Garageband is the worst at over 3GB - not the app itself but the loops. Even the example projects are huge. Some apps have a lot of themes too such as idvd. I get rid of most of them.
What to do is get Whatsize:
http://www.id-design.com/software/whatsize/
This measures the disk usage all over your drive and reports where the most is being used.
I'd say that taking into account your drive would only be about 75GB as mentioned, the default 20GB or so installation can probably be brought down to under 10GB. It just depends which apps you want to still use.
I've yet to discover what most of these applications are even there for, like Garageband, so I'll stumble my way through.