BRAND NEW macbook hd has only 16gb of space????

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Level 1

8 points

BRAND NEW macbook hd has only 16gb of space????

I just bought this macbook white today, the box claims it has 120 GB of hard disk space, and the hard disk says it has only 16GB, most of which is full already because of the OS and installed applications. How did this happen and how do I fix it?
Does this mean I got a defective laptop that needs to be returned?

Macbook White, Mac OS X (10.5.6)

Posted on May 8, 2009 9:03 PM

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Answer 1

Enne Author

Level 1

8 points

May 8, 2009 9:18 PM in response to Enne

Results of the Disk Utility:

Capacity : 111.5 GB (119,690,149,888 Bytes)
Available : 531.3 MB (557,084,672 Bytes)
Used : 15.7 GB (16,881,410,048 Bytes)

Now call me crazy, but that just doesn't add up quite right.
I'm going to try all the things the disk utility suggests and see what happens.

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Answer 2

y_p_w

Level 6

17,762 points

May 8, 2009 9:28 PM in response to Enne

If you can get into System Profiler and check Serial-ATA, you should get a report on the hard drive and the capacity.

A 120 GB hard drive should be reported by the operating system with a capacity of maybe 112-113 GB minus a little formatting overhead. This is because of a difference in how drives are marketed.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gigabyte

There's shouldn't be only 16 GB of free space left. I thought it would be closer to maybe 60 GB. I don't recall exactly what it was when I got my MacBook.

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Answer 3

May 9, 2009 9:36 AM in response to Enne

i would take it to the Apple Store where you bought it (or if you bought it online, the nearest Apple Store. if you do that, bring all the receipts and shipping info).
It is normal for the hard drive to have less space than written because of formatting, but nothing like that. Have Apple replace the Hard Drive and explain the situation. Since the MacBook is new, you should be able to get the new HD without having to pay.
hope that helps!
-MacDarling55

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Answer 4

Enne Author

Level 1

8 points

May 8, 2009 9:11 PM in response to Enne

Message edited.

Message was edited by: Enne

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Answer 5

Lyssa

Level 8

41,405 points

May 8, 2009 10:49 PM in response to Enne

What does Finder report about the drive? Click the *Macintosh HD* icon, the hit the Command+i keys. Or, you can click on the icon, go to the File menu, and choose *Get info*.

~Lyssa

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