Apple stuff - Mac, iPad, iphone

[AppleMacster]

Background Noise,

The updates vary according to your Mac. My Macbook update was 442Mb, yet on the iMac was only 280Mb.

There's another button in Disk Utility marked "Verify Disk". Try this. If it flags up anything, move onto the button beneath marked "Repair Disk". I've only had to use this once when an update went awry. It repairs the file structure of the disk itself, rather than "Repair Permissions" which deals with the applications themselves and associated files.

Applemacster.

[Senior Pilot]

For the past 2-3 weeks I've had a problem with steadily reducing disc space available on my MB Air, at one stage down to ~4GB I can restore the space available with a reboot, and it appears to me to be a caching issue, especially noticeable when using iPhoto. I upgraded to iLife 09 about the time this started, so I have my suspicions

Any advice?

Any clues on where to find the mysteriously increasing cache? Nothing found with a search on the web, nor anything in Apple Help.

[Tim00]

Could perhaps be swap files getting overly large. Does it get really slow? Try starting Activity Monitor (in Applications/Utilities, IIRC), and look at the memory tab. If the VM size is more than a 'few' dozen GB, then this might be the culprit. If any individual app is showing huge amounts of Virtual Memory, then it's a problem with that app.

see Mac OS X: Reading system memory usage in Activity Monitor for a brief intro. As Apple say, don't worry about the amout of 'free' memory.

[Senior Pilot]

Tim00,

Thanks: the VM useage is 1.4gb for both Firefox and iPhoto, but my problem is actually the amount of free space showing on the hard drive, in Finder. Normally around 9GB, it steadily decreases as the Air is left on for any length of time, and had got to ~4GB a couple of days ago. This was coupled with slow perforformance, all of which went with a reboot (after a massive Force Quit session!).

All of which leads me to think that some sort of cach/VM is eating into the free disc space, and it seems to be worst when iPhoto is syncronising with MobileMe. This didn't happen with iPhoto 07, so maybe the 09 upgrade is the culprit?

[tropaco]

Re: installing Running Parallels 4.0

Hi There,


I am not sure if I am posting this in the right place. Apologies if I am, but I need some help from a Mac guru. I am flying somewhat off course into uncharted territory and was planning on on my Mac using Windows XP Home Edition with Service Pack 3, English, 1 pack DSP OEI.

Do I need a different version of XP or will this version suffice?

[Background Noise]

That should work - either under bootcamp or VM software (eg VM Fusion or Parallels). Using bootcamp, the mac is booted selectively into OSX or WIndows. The others allow you to run Windows from within a 'virtual machine' which itself is program running within OSX.

[Saab Dastard]

You might run into problems with registering the DSP OEI with MS - it's only supposed to be used by system builders on a new build PC.

SD

[tropaco]

Thanks for the feedback guys. I presumed that they would compliment each other well as I was actually planning on buying them both on Amazon as they were being sold together.

Parallels Desktop 4.0 (Mac CD): Amazon.co.uk: Software

Do you still think that I am likely to have problems registering the XP with MS considering this point? And in regards to not being a system builder how would MS know that I have not put together my own Mac/PC from scratch? Also would you be able to suggest an alternative Windows XP OS that would not give me these probs?

Thanks again for the help.

[Saab Dastard]

It's not the OS (XP) or edition (home) per se, it's the version (DSP OEI) that could be a problem.

DSP OEI I believe means “Delivery Service Partner Original Equipment Installer.” It is a version of OEM software used by smaller computer manufacturers and system builders. It is only supposed to be pre-installed on a new PC.

You probably won't have a problem installing it and registering for updates, but bear in mind that all OEM versions are tied to one system ( a one-shot deal), unlike the full retail versions, which can legitimately be moved off one system and installed onto another.

Anyone selling OEM software without an accompanying PC is technically in breach of MS licensing, although I think that they turn a blind eye on the basis that a sale is a sale and better than a totally pirated installation.

However, I'm sure that MS would be particularly sympathetic (should you ever need to contact them) when you explain that it's to install on a Mac!

SD

[Tim00]

Senior Pilot:

This may be what you're seeing, perhaps?
Help Please

Quote: "I agree with the recommendations to have quite a bit of free space on the boot drive. 10 times the memory seems about right for a working minimum. Recently I've had several clients with only 1 or 2 GB free on the boot disk; they came to me because their Macs had drastically slowed down and they were concerned about a couple of files that could no longer be opened at all. In all cases, their iTunes & iPhoto libraries were enormous, and after we moved them to an external drive and deleted them from the boot drive every thing returned to normal (so far). The one client who had only 725 MB free had to be booted from an external disk so that the trimmimg actions could be accomplished in "real time.""

[Argonautical]

Two very useful utilities that show the disk space taken by applications and system files like caches, are WhatSize and GrandPerspective. WhatSize simply gives the sizes see below :-



However, GrandPerspective give a graphical representation of the same, see below:-



The big brown "blob" in the middle is the Google Earth cache of 547 MB.

[Saab Dastard]

GrandPerspective give a graphical representation of the same

Priceless! In a Zaphod Beebblebrox way, like, cool. Only on a Mac!

Do they do a defragmentation utility? I would just love to watch that for a couple of hours!

SD

[SpringHeeledJack]

Fellow macsters!

One's reliable powerbook is in need of a few small repairs and after telephoning a few advertised repairers, I have been none too impressed with the service. This could well lie in the in the fact that the person answering the phone has little or no technical knowledge, but to entrust my faithful steed based on this (these) first impressions is not encouraging.

Do any of you have any personal experiences/recommendations within an hour of central London ? The repairs are nothing major, but necessary, so I need the repairs to be done quickly and for a reasonable price.

Any help appreciated.


Thanks


SHJ

[Tim00]

Drifting slightly off-topic, but OS X doesn't really need much defragging. The OS itself will defrag an individual fragmented file whenever it's actually opened (subject to certain rules about its size, disk free space & file fragmentation). So a fragmented file that's never opened won't get defragged, but that's not important.

OS X doesn't however squash files up in order to optimise the free space into big chunks, so a 3rd party utility could be of benefit there, but it's only likely to be important if you do lots of video editing etc.

Unless things have changed with Windows7, Windows doesn't even do this much.

[timmyneedham]

Going back to Background Noise's problem. You're not using iAnti-Virus are you BN? Sometimes something similar happens to my machine and I find that if I go into Activity Monitor and stop the IAVD process, my macbook returns to normal and the anti-virus resets itself.
If you're not using Ianti-virus - God knows!

Cheers
TN

[AppleMacster]

Safari 4 Beta disk hog

I had been wondering for a while where 2Gb of disk space had disappeared, despite deleting lot of redundant files. The answer lies with Safari 4 Beta. I'm a big fan of Safari, especially now it works properly with AIMS. However, I've just deleted 2Gb of files stored by Safari, which are hidden. They are mainly jpeg page previews and ancient history files. The problem is that they are hidden in the Finder.

This article explains it: Safari 4’s Messy Trail - The Thrica Network

You'll need this to find the files: Reveal Hidden Files 1.2 software download - Mac OS X - VersionTracker

There were 36,000 files in there!

[Senior Pilot]

AM,

I can't locate the directory quoted in the article (private/etc). Which folder did you find it in?

TIA

[AppleMacster]

Macintosh HD>var>folders>jw>jwHG3BlB2RWHxU+BYmsoq++++TI>-Caches->com.apple.Safari>

The "jw" & "jwHG3BlB2RWHxU+BYmsoq++++TI" bit are specific to my Mac - it will be a different set of letters on yours. However, just go into var>folders and locate the one which has an unlocked -Caches- folder, then the com.apple.Safari folder. It's a bit of a rummage, but worth it if you're limited in disk space.

Applemacster

[Senior Pilot]

Thanks: that's accounted for 1.2GB

[Senior Pilot]

I finally gave up and reinstalled OS: now a usable 13gb free, instead of a fluctuating 2 -6gb

I think I'll stick to Safari V3 for now, all my issues seem to have started with V4 Beta Although I still can't get iWeb to start, even after reinstall, so that'll tie up a long call to Apple support later today