How do I remove extra files from my hard drive?

Take your time and be careful to only delete what you intend to. Do not move or rename files that you didn’t create. Mac OS X needs a lot of special files in special places, and it put them there already. Leave them be.

If you have files that you don’t use frequently, you can transfer them to an external hard drive or USB flash drive. For important files, you should back them up using two separate devices. After you’ve confirmed that the files are working from an external drive, you can delete them from your hard drive. Remember that moving files to the trash doesn’t make more room – you also have to choose Empty Trash from the Finder menu.

If you use iPhoto, you should check the trash of your iPhoto library. Deleting a photo in iPhoto moves it to the iPhoto trash, which is only emptied into the main computer’s trash when you select Empty Trash from the iPhoto menu.

If you have a very large iTunes library you may want to get an external drive to store it all and free up space on your internal hard drive, check out "Can I move my iTunes library to an external hard drive?".

An easy way to figure out what is taking up the most space on your drive is with the shareware applications What Size or GrandPerspective. They examine all the files on your computer and let you see which are the largest. These applications will show you many system files that your Mac hides from you (for good reasons). Don’t move or delete any files that you didn’t create.

Read “How do I remove extra applications from my hard drive?“ for more.

Published March 24, 2009 12:00 PM
Last modified on November 25, 2011 1:27 PM