Disk Utility says I am using 58gb of a potential 60gb.
I couldn't find the source so downloaded Disk Inventory. Disk Inventory says I am using 26.9gb.
Where is my rogue 31GB and what can I do to clear my HD? The largest thing I have on my computer is 5GB of music. The disk usage is about 80% "other".
MacBook Air, OS X Mavericks (10.9.5)
Different utilities use different methods to display storage utilization. This is especially true of portables that have Time Machine enabled.
If the discrepancy is legitimate, force Spotlight to re-index your drive.
Thanks, I have re-indexed the drive and it now says I am using 57GB, 51GB of which it says are "other" (i.e. not my music, videos etc.)
I'm just not sure what is using up all this space?
All you could ever want to know about Other
What is "Other" and What Can I Do About It?
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What I was alluding to before...
If you use Time Machine to backup your MacBook, when you are not connected to TM, the MacBook saves temporary snapshots of your drive. These will be released if you need the storage space for something else. But some methods list this as used storage, while others list it as free, because it will become free if you need it.
Ah ok....this makes sense as TM is trying to backup to my ex-boyfriend's computer and he has not been around for three years 🙂
So. My computer won't save anything anymore because of all this "other". Do I need to switch TM off somehow and can I get rid of all the snapshots?
Snapshots should be released automatically when the storage space is needed for other uses.
If this is not occurring automatically, I guess it's OK to delete the oldest ones, but I really don't know for sure. What does the link recommend?
As far as I can tell, it says to do all the things I've already tried. I've been through absolutely everything on this machine - hidden folders etc. - and downloaded both Disk Inventory and OmniSweeper to check it, but both apps can only see around 27GB on the HD, they can't see this other 31GB. There is still no way to find and delete this 'other'. I've also just managed to recover the computer after it crashed completely and wouldn't get past grey screen after login (safe booting just seemed to fix it....)
Still no idea what's going on. Oddly, there used to be another account on here called 'Guest' that I'm 99% sure had never been used (so I would expect there was nothing on there to account for all the 'other'), but since the crash the 'Guest' user has disappeared. How strange.
I'm going to get someone else to have a look at it physically and if neither of us can find anything I think I'm just going to have to try wiping it and starting over.
Thanks for your help!
HD says it's full; disk inventory disagree
