Reesch wrote:
According to Tim Standing video "Dive into APFS . . . " at -24:18, the red bar means metadata was wrong or something happened to crash that volume or disk. This might explain the problems I've been having with the computer not working correctly.
I watched much of the video but I have neither the time or the interest to learn APFS and moving volumes around to free up space, plus I see a long thread of people attempting to do so without success. This is really annoying. It's really annoying that in order to maximize space and understand why my Mac isn't working right, I have to learn APFS.
And if I hadn't inadvertently discovered this, I wouldn't understand why it seems that far more of my storage has disappeared than it ought to.
And I've taken it to repair twice, spending money needlessly because apparently they aren't up on it either.
Any advice you could give about volumes, freeing up space, etc. would be appreciated.
?
You are well off the beaten track here. There is no learning apfs necessary and no moving Volumes around to free up space.
All Volumes share space with the Container at no penalty.
Add, delete, or erase APFS volumes in Disk Utility on Mac ...
If the real issue is trying to free up storage—
Empty your Trash — Delete files and folders on Mac - Apple Support
https://support.apple.com/guide/mac-help/delete-files-and-folders-on-mac-mchlp1093/mac
How to free up storage space on your Mac - Apple Support
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT206996
See used and available storage space on your Mac
https://support.apple.com/guide/system-information/see-available-storage-space-syspf9b375b9/10.14/mac/10.15
User tip: "Other and What Can I Do About It ?"
https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-5142
Try something like OmniDiskSweeper for a GUI to get a good look at itemized file size and location:
OmniDiskSweeper http://www.omnigroup.com/more
If you want to get a comprehensive look at the structure of your drive...
The standard layout can be seen from the Terminal.app command, copy & paste:
diskutil list internal
The example for comparison only in macOS Catalina —
MacBook-Pro ~ % diskutil list internal
/dev/disk0 (internal, physical):
#: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER
0: GUID_partition_scheme *1.0 TB disk0
1: EFI EFI 314.6 MB disk0s1
2: Apple_APFS Container disk1 1.0 TB disk0s2
/dev/disk1 (synthesized):
#: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER
0: APFS Container Scheme - +1.0 TB disk1
Physical Store disk0s2
1: APFS Volume Macintosh HD 11.2 GB disk1s1
2: APFS Volume Macintosh HD - Data 273.7 GB disk1s2
3: APFS Volume Preboot 80.8 MB disk1s3
4: APFS Volume Recovery 529.0 MB disk1s4
5: APFS Volume VM 3.2 GB disk1s5