Mac OS X forum: What's taking up space on my hard drive?

20 Gb is a miniscule HD in this day and time. Although your machine probably came with such a small drive, replacing it with one of an identical size, unless the replacement was under a warranty agreement, was a little short sighted.

If you do not have too much data stored on that machine, back it up and do a Format and install. Do not partition your drive.

All should be reasonably well for a while

P

is the page-swap file that allows data and applications to use hard drive space in addition to real RAM. Over time, with so little space allowed, the operating system can't even turn around and bump into itself. When you restart the machine, all the page-swap / virtual memory goes away/is reset, so all is well until you do more work and more time passes...

If you want to see what "virtual memory" is being used, check out "Activity Monitor" (the utility that comes with the complete install of the operating system).

Like mrmacfixit said, you do not need to partition the drive. It is unecessary... and - in my opinion - symptomatic of a windows tech working on a machine s/he should likely not be working on.

What is wrong with you?
Meaningless ramble of incoherent thoughts?
I explained on how my hard drive was partitioned before.
And an IT example from Adelphia that is US based.
Simple for anyone to understand.

Peter, SE is a forum that is visited by many more than all the Mac Forums.
As a matter of fact, the Mac Forums represents 2% of all CNET Forums.
Look up the information and check it out again.
Cheers!

-Kevin

Cheers!

"Peter, SE is a forum that is visited by many more than all the Mac Forums.
As a matter of fact, the Mac Forums represents 2% of all CNET Forums."

REALLY?! You want to make Peter & this Forum look small?

First of all, this Forum serves an extremely specific purpose - it does what it does and it does it extremely well, thanks to Peter and all the contributors - of course Speakeasy will be larger, it's a huge, swaggering all-encompassing forum.

I think you should seriously consider the tone and content of your posts before you ever write again because this sort of bravado and posturing is damn offensive.

Udayan.

I have contributed, around 930 times so far. But then again, I don't care to prove myself to you. I think you'll see from what I write below, but I feel I should clarify here, I resent all the insinuations you feel your prejudiced nature allows you to make.

1) You are anti-Mac from the disparaging way you write. The tone is purely derogitory, it is effectively ''Macs are miniscule, they don't account for much CNET forum traffic'' So... what? People use them, and people need help with them. I wonder if actually you are writing out of a desire to question these forum's existence.

2) Peter is a great Moderator, but you don't give him the respect you give to other Mods. So he likes Macs and feels he should voice that, good for him. Others voice their undying love for Vaios, for AMD, for WoW. Peter deserves the respect you give to the other Mods.

3) There is little Mac posting on SE because that isn't where it's meant to be. People who use Macs and frequent CNET are fairly level-headed, not fanboyish in behaviour and post to solve problems or ask for help.

4) ''What is it in England?''

Really? You have something against England? That's fine, but personifying that in me is plain stupid.

5) ''There are some Forums on the internet that limit persons under eighteen years of age from entering for a reason.''

That is a despicable thing to say. So I'm 16. Does it really make a difference? Essentially you are prejudiced. You are judging me (which, first of all, who gave you the right to do so based on just ''My Profile'') purely out of the age I am. Now perhaps the 16 year olds you know are not pleasant, open-minded or respectful of you but to brandish all teenagers as such is what you seem to be doing. If that is the case, you're an ignorant bigot.

Udayan.

http://reviews.cnet.com/5224-6142-0.html?forumID=10&threadID=201216&messageID=2168223

The offensive post reply was posted to you and your reply to me. Not a kid that is sixteen years old. Peter, you have a way of twisting threads and posts the way you want to as a Mod. Deleting post from kiddpete, as you seem to do and belittle anyone that does not agree with the Mac platform, or prefers the PC and Windows other than the Mac platform.

I invited kiddpeat to this Mac Forum to post an honest evaluation of a student going to collage and selecting what kind of laptop to use. Mac or PC.
Bob Proffitt had also responded in a post way up front on the particular post also.

Kiddpeat went to the Mac forum and gave an honest evaluation. Kiddpeat is a man that I respect. He has chosen to go to collage repeatedly through his life and to learn more. Kiddpeat is in his forties. Not sixteen years old. His kids are about that age ready to go to collage
You, on the other hand, did not like his evaluation and deleted one of his posts. Not nice to do and not an accident on your part.
Oops on your part? No. Deliberate.
Nice to be a Mod and delete posts that you do not agree with.
Lucky for you. How wonderful.

Do not like what I post back to you? Do not tell me I am treading on thin ice and you will have me barred from CNET! This is the Mac Forum of CNET. Not Peter Sayward's Forum.

The percentiles of mac usage change every day. One day the total Mac users in the world is 2.3%. The next week it is close to 2.4. US percentages also up and down from 3.4 to 3.9.
Goes up and down weekly. Just like the stock market.

You do not like the SE forum because the Forum does not deal with computer issues. Good for you. I happen to like it and the vast majority of Mods are on it daily.
Not many are Mac users. Who cares!? Mac is only 2.5 max worldwide as of a few weeks ago. Could go up or could go down.

I like to see kiddpeats posts there where he will not be insulted for not using a Mac every day.
Peter, you are in a Mac closet. Completely shut off from the rest of the world and are unaware of PC, UNIX or other developments happening and the vast majority of members here on the CNET Forums that are not biased.
One of my friends told me some advise. Leave the bad. Accept the good. Good advise.
Total Mac Forums are still 2%. on the CNET.

-Kevin

The original question was addressed. The rest of the thread is now off topic.

Is this the appropriate way to close something that has been answered?

Partitioning in General:

You loose drive space with the partition itself.
With the newer drives it has become unnecessary and wasteful. This practice is considered "old school" by computer pundants and is no longer platform specific.

From a housekeeping standpoint it may be o.k. if you have a "very large" HD and a tremendous amount of personal data on the HD. To minize making an omelette out of you HD I would also look at your RAM, can u add more RAM. This will minimize the write to disk action and make your computer a "Happy Mac". This is the cheapest and best upgrade available to your computer.

The full blown Panther install is about 5G with all of the updates. This can easily be reduced to 3G and still have it all, less the languages and printer drivers.