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What exactly is "Other" hard drive storage?

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Reader Kevin Loy would like some details on how storage is being consumed on a relative’s hard drive. He writes:</p>

I read your article about freeing up space on a hard drive (http://www.macworld.com/article/2599241/how-to-free-up-space-on-a-packed-hard-drive.html) and had a follow-up question. My niece was running out of space on her MacBook Air. I did some digging using About This Mac under storage and found she has 78GB of “Other” storage. What kind of files does this “Other” entry reflect?

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If you choose About This Mac, click on the More Info button, and then click the Storage tab you will indeed see a very general graphical layout of the file allocation for each volume connected to your Mac. This representation lists Audio, Movies, Photos, Apps, Backups, and the Other entry you mention.</p><p class="jumpTag"><a href="/article/2601467/what-exactly-is-other-hard-drive-storage.html#jump">To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here[/url]</p></section></article>

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