Start up / space help

[Emma gascoigne]

Hello

I am looking for some advice and not sure if this is the best area to post in.

I have a mac book pro and I do a lot of editing with Adobe.

I have recently had very annoying issues with lack of space so i got a dropbox and moved everything to dropbox. But this hasn't helped me at all as even though things are available "online only" there is still no space available as things sync from dropbox all the time. I've tried turning sync off but nothing opens.

So I'm really confused now as to what to do. I dont have massive amounts of anything on my mac but I have no space.

Should i get an external hard drive? Would I be able to easily run programmes like Adobe premiere pro off and audition from that ? Or should I move away from a mac? It is causing me a lot of stress!

Thanks in advance.

 

[Cory Cooper]

Hello and welcome.

A few troubleshooting questions for you:

-Which exact model MacBook Pro?
-Which version of OS X/macOS?
-How much free space is actually left?
-Do you use iCloud and/or iCloud Photos as well as Dropbox?
-Do you have a Time Machine or other backup of your data on an external drive?
-Check what space is used in  > About This Mac > Storage. If you hover your mouse over the colors it will show what types of files are using space.

The issue is that portable/laptop computers aren't really designed for doing large amounts of image/audio/video processing, since they don't have as much drive space and RAM as their desktop counterparts. It is all about file/space management. An external drive would help for file storage to free up space on your internal drive, but you cannot install applications and run them from the external, as they need to reside in the startup disk's Applications file and have support files in the Library and System folders. You could use an external drive and install OS X/macOS and the applications you would use on it, but you would then have to have it connected and startup from it each time.

We'll see if we can help you through this.

C

 

[Emma gascoigne]

Thank you for coming back to me. It's really appreciated as I'm really at a loss what to do as I am not able to afford another Mac!

Could you still keep the Adobe files on an external hard drive and not have space issues?

Please see answers below:

-Which exact model MacBook Pro? I have a MacBook Pro (Retina, 13-inch, Early 2015)
-Which version of OS X/macOS? OS X EL Captain
-How much free space is actually left? I have apparently got 16.68 gb of 120.12 gb.
-Do you use iCloud and/or iCloud Photos as well as Dropbox? I use iCloud too.
-Do you have a Time Machine or other backup of your data on an external drive? No.
-Check what space is used in  > About This Mac > Storage. If you hover your mouse over the colors it will show what types of files are using space. I use Movies - 29.28 gb/audio 25.76 gb/ apps 22.32 gb/ photos 15.44 gb / other 10.63 gb/ backups 11.6 mb....


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[Lufbrarunner]

I had the same model Macbook pro with a 120gb SSD, I kept all my data files on an external drive and only the OS and application files on the mac I tried to keep the mac SSD at around 50% free space and it worked well for me, using Photoshop and adobe lightroom mainly.

 

[Emma gascoigne]

Thanks. That's really helpful.

Not sure why dropbox is actually seeming to make things worse...

 

[Cory Cooper]

OK, thanks for the additional information.

First off, we strongly suggest that your purchase an external hard drive to use as a Time Machine or other backup of your data. All storage drives fail at some point, so it it wise to invest a little now to backup your data.

As I mentioned previously, portables don't have the same amount of storage as a desktop, which is part of what you are running into. Your MBP has 128GB of storage, which can easily be used up by video and other files. You stated you have 29.28GB of movies...are these movies you purchased within iTunes, or possibly video/movie files in your Photos Library or made with iMovie? The are taking up almost 25% of your storage space.

iCloud Photos could help a bit in this scenario: Set up and use iCloud Photos. However, since you have 15.44GB of photos, assuming they are all in your Photos Library, you would need to purchase extra iCloud storage. You get 5GB free, and can increase it to 50GB for $0.99 (USD) a month.

As Lufbrarunner stated, I also store my large iTunes and Photos Libraries on an external drive. The only caveat is that you need to have the external drive attached any time you want to use iTunes or Photos.

Dropbox: How much storage is taken up by the files in Dropbox? Dropbox gives you 2GB of space for free, so unless you are paying a monthly fee, it is only a small portion of your drive space.

Basically, iCloud/Dropbox/Google Drive are very similar as far as cloud storage. Here is a good article comparing them: The best cloud storage services for Apple users. For most people, simple is better, so it is recommended to stick to one cloud service depending on your devices and usage.

Hope that helps,

C