This is my 2015 MPB Retina, with a 1TB HD, still running out of space after many deletions today.
I dunno, to me 400+GB of system data seems excessive? What's in there, and how can I reduce it? I keep running out of space on this machine.
Thanks!
Geoff
geofffromdowney wrote:
I found 300GB of sample library stuff in "previously relocated items"! Not sure why Osx stuffed them there, but I've got all my samples on a network drive now anyway, so I'll happily reclaim this 300G.
Most likely you had those items stored on the root of the file system while running an older version of macOS 10.14 or earlier. When you upgraded to macOS 10.15+, the root volume became a read-on system volume so Apple moved your stuff to the "/Users/Shared/Relocated Items" folder.
Here is an Apple article with some more details:
About the read-only system volume in macOS Catalina or later - Apple Support
Here is another Apple article about some further drive layout changes made with macOS 11.x+:
Signed system volume security in iOS, iPadOS, and macOS - Apple Support
geofffromdowney wrote:
I found 300GB of sample library stuff in "previously relocated items"! Not sure why Osx stuffed them there, but I've got all my samples on a network drive now anyway, so I'll happily reclaim this 300G.
Most likely you had those items stored on the root of the file system while running an older version of macOS 10.14 or earlier. When you upgraded to macOS 10.15+, the root volume became a read-on system volume so Apple moved your stuff to the "/Users/Shared/Relocated Items" folder.
Here is an Apple article with some more details:
About the read-only system volume in macOS Catalina or later - Apple Support
Here is another Apple article about some further drive layout changes made with macOS 11.x+:
Signed system volume security in iOS, iPadOS, and macOS - Apple Support
This article mentions some free Utilities you can download to take a look around and identify the biggest Boat-Anchor sized files. Be sure to log in as An Admin so that you can see ALL files. They chug away for a quarter hour before most big files are found:
What is “Other” storage on a Mac, and how… - Apple Community
Thanks Grant. The Disk Inventory app mentioned in that thread is SUPER useful!
I found 300GB of sample library stuff in "previously relocated items"! Not sure why Osx stuffed them there, but I've got all my samples on a network drive now anyway, so I'll happily reclaim this 300G.
"System Data" at an unmanageable size
