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Missing 6GB of disk space

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Hello, I’m new to working with a Mac, so hopefully this question makes sense. I have a Mac that shows the drive being out of disk space. It shows 9.4GB total space, and 40MB free. However, when I checked the sizes on all of the directories on the drive, they only added up to about 3GB. Being a PC guy (don’t say it!), I feel that the drive must be partitioned, but I can’t find anything to back that idea up.

I tried the Drive Setup on the boot disk, but it wants me to boot from the cd. When Itried that by holding down “c” at startup it ejects the cd and continues booting from the hard drive. Of course, drive setup then tells me to boot from the cd again. Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks

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Missing 6GB of disk space

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Point value changed by question poster.

Missing 6GB of disk space

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Point value changed by question poster.

Missing 6GB of disk space

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jfruits:

If the harddrive is partioned, it will show
the drives mounted on the desktop. If you
don’t see more than the standard
“Macintosh HD” – then it either isn’t
partioned or a subsequent partition has
been initialized.

Adding upthe directories might be
misleading – as there are hidden files on
the harddrive.

As far as starting up from CD – it will
depend on what model mac it is. There is
a control panel named “StartUp” disk –
you can set it to the CD and see if that
works.

What type of Mac? What OS version?

Missing 6GB of disk space

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Thanks, I appreciate the info, but it didn’t help me solve the problem.

Missing 6GB of disk space

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It’s a G3 Blue/White minitower with MacOS 9.?

Sorry I don’t know more details, but I should have a chance to check tomorrow and find out more details.

Missing 6GB of disk space

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Here’s a possibility.

You may be looking at a fragmented RAID.

Many a G3 BW has had an internal raid.

I wish that it were as easy as logical drive management in Win2K, but it’s not. You’d need to acquire a robust disk utility with Raid support, can’t mention any names. That would give youa clearer picture as to what’s happening logically with the drive.

You could then reformat any corrupt partition, that’s what the problem sounds like to me, and have your 9.4 gig drive back. Albeit in two partitions.

Missing 6GB of disk space

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Thanks, I appreciate the info, but it didn’t help me solve the problem.

Missing 6GB of disk space

In reply to Missing 6GB of disk space

Check two things.

In Sherlock Delete the index files to save some space, Also do an advanced find for invisable files, You will find a temp folder full of files. Review the list for application temp files and delete as needed.

RM

Missing 6GB of disk space

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Thank you, this did solve my problem.

Missing 6GB of disk space

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Dear jfruits;

There is a bug in the System 9.0.x, and sometimes the contents of an invisible temporary folder are not deleted.
To fix it, either upgrade to System 9.1, or create an applescript to empty this folder.

below is the long answer, as posted at the Apple’s support page, Article ID 25134

===========================================
Solution:
Install Mac OS 9.1.
An update to Mac OS 9.1 is available from Apple Software Updates (http://www.apple.com/swupdates/).

In Mac OS 9, there is an invisible folder named Temporary Items that applications can use to store temporary files. Normally, these temporary files are deleted when the user quits the application.
…
With Mac OS 9.0.x, the Finder does not move files from the Temporary Items folder to the Trash. This can result in a noticeable loss of available space depending on how large the files are. This situation has been corrected in Mac OS 9.1.
If you don’t update to Mac OS 9.1 you can use the AppleScript below as a startup item. Follow these steps to make the AppleScript applet:
1. Open the Script Editor, located in the AppleScript folder of the Apple Extras folder on the hard disk.
2. Copy and paste the AppleScript statements below into the Script Editor window.
3. Choose Save from the File menu and type a filename, such as Temporary Items Cleaner.
4. In the Save As dialog box, choose classic applet from the Format pop-up menu; two additional options appear in the dialog.
5. Click Never Show Startup Screen.
6. Navigate to the Startup Items folder of the System Folder, and click Save.
This creates … a folder called Rescued Items in the Trash that will contain any items found in the Temporary Items invisible folder.

Note: thisAppleScript is available at:
ftp://ftp.info.apple.com//Apple_Support_Area/Apple_Software_Updates/US/Macintosh/Misc/AppleScript/Remove_Temp_Items.bin

Missing 6GB of disk space

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Thank you. While the previous post answered the same question to solve the problem, the added info about the scripts will help me keep the problem from happening again.

Missing 6GB of disk space

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Hi,
Ive had the same problem with my mac. I
found that when working on large
Photoshop files my hard disk would fill up
and the temporary files would not be
deleted. The solution that I found most
helpful was installing OS 9.1 which
solved the problem. Running Nortons
Disk Doctor or TechTool will delete the
files or else you can search for “temp” in
Sherlock and delete files from there.

Missing 6GB of disk space

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Thank you, while the two previous responses helped me hunt down the problem, Photoshop was the key to the whole thing. 8.4GB of temporary Photoshop files!?! Unreal!!!

Missing 6GB of disk space

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