I decided to do some spring cleaning on my iBook tonight. I’ve had it for a little over a year. It’s my first Mac. I’ve tried a lot of apps on it. It was time.
I recently purchased AppZapper, a great utility that removes apps and their support files (for the most part). It’s the cleanest way I could find to remove most apps. Sure, technically you can just drag an icon to the trash, but it’s not as clean and leaves some mess behind. AppZapper is so great, I got in on the macZOT freebie deal and still paid for a copy. It’s worth supporting good apps.
That brings me to my complaint. Holy crap is a default install of OS X bloated as hell. It’s really just obscene! Long ago I discovered Monolingual. It removed something like 1.8GB of worthless files. I don’t speeak Swahili or whatever other languages they have. Can’t Apple make it an option on initial boot of a new system to only install chosen languages? I mean, come on, 1.8GB?
I only have a 30GB hard drive in this little monster. Techinically that’s 27.82GB. By my math, unnecessary language files account for roughly 6% of the used space on my system. Gone!
Tonight, as I said, I started using AppZapper and going through apps I never have used or maybe installed to try but don’t use anymore. There were a number of small apps that I installed, but they accounted for minimal amounts of space. What was taking up the largest amount of space? Garageband and World Book Encyclopedia.
I don’t edit audio on this machine, or any machine for that matter, so why do I need Garageband? If I just drag the app I save around 62MB I think. What about the 2GB of samples I never wanted? AppZapper doesn’t delete those so I removed them manually. Why, your Steveness, do you think I need or want 2+GB of audio samples on my small hard drive? That’s another 7% of space.
World Book. I honestly didn’t even know this stupid thing existed on my system until tonight. Why would I want a static encyclopedia when I have “the Internets”? I have more information than an encyclopedia could possibly provide anyway. That was something like 1.6GB of space. Gone! Another wasted ~6% of space.
Tonight alone I saved 3.84GB of space, 13.8%. That’s quite substantial. Combine that with the worthless languages that saved me about 1.8GB and I have saved about 20% or a FULL ONE FIFTH of the space on my hard drive!
What a waste of space. People who think Windows has bloat haven’t seen anything. If I get rid of printer drivers I don’t need that’s another 1.3GB for a total of about 25% wasted space, around 7GB. Can I just delete all the printer drivers? This is just an out of the box install. It’s ridiculous. An average user should never have to go through what I have above just to use their hard drive.
What I really need to do is wipe this sucker out and put on a fresh install of Tiger, choosing only what I want. Again, this is not an option for an average user. Apple, you know I love you, but you are getting fat and I don’t like fat chicks.
April 12th, 2006 at 11:33 am
Not that your point doesn’t have some validity — but the bloat on today’s Windows machines isn’t so much from the operating system itself, but from all the extra junk manufacturers bundle in. Your typical Toshiba laptop takes 2x as long to boot as it should because of all the extra “convenience features” and power management B.S. they load in system tray applets. Dell throws everything from “My Way” toolbar search spyware to annoying 30-day trials of bloated Norton Anti-Virus on their systems. And most new HP printer install CDs throw a huge collection of assorted HP drivers on a Windows system during installation - not just the driver for that particular printer model.
Some of the bloat you refer to in OS X is bothersome, like the default of it installing all the additional language support - but a selective install during OS X install from CD or DVD allows you to un-check mark those options, as well as deselecting whole groups of printer drivers (like all Epson drivers, if you know you don’t have any Epson products). It’s not nearly as big a deal as the typical Windows PC installation, IMHO.
April 12th, 2006 at 7:09 pm
You don’t need to install all the additional printer and language support with OS X. If you accepted the defaults, yes, you ended up with a lot of stuff you didn’t need… but it doesn’t take too much effort to uncheck what you don’t want.
It’s also much easier to get rid of junk from OS X than it is for Windows. How many uninstallers for Windows apps have you seen saying, “well, I can remove this DLL for you, but another app might fail to work if it’s not there… go ahead and blow it away anyhow?” Then there’s the registry, and the royal mess of all the COM component registration…
OS X just works. Windows *just* works.
April 12th, 2006 at 9:31 pm
Points taken, but this is the default, out of the box OS I got on the iBook. I added nothing. Just like the Dell, it’s full of crap. In my case, 7GB of crap.
Sure, I can and will reinstall clean and only choose those things I actually want, but that’s not the point. As with the Dell de-Crapifier, the idea is to get rid of the junk that comes with a default new box. Joe User isn’t smart enough, nor should they have to be, to reinstall the OS from scratch.
Apple could allow some options on a first time boot that allow one to select language support and what applications should be installed. This wouldn’t be difficult for them to do and would certainly save people like me headaches and disk space. Just make an option for “Advanced” or something like that.
April 17th, 2006 at 3:17 pm
I think the real difference between the Mac and a Windows peecee is that the bloatware on a Mac is there if you choose to explore and find it. On a DellshibaHPaq, all that crap assaults you and tries to get you to pay for it. Yeah, I don’t need the language files and trial version of stuff, but at least it’s not in my face when I start up for the first time.
April 24th, 2006 at 2:00 pm
I have to agree with the others here. Yes, there is some stuff that would be considered bloatware, but MS is no better in this regard. How many useless applets come with Windows XP that you will never use? When was the last time you fired up the Windows Movie Maker? How about the endless wizards for retarded people who can’t figure out how to set up a wireless connection or dialup connection? Can those be removed?
At least the Mac stuff, as you discovered, can be simply dragged to the trash and flushed away with little in the way of dire warnings and Add/Remove Programs wizards. The only point I agree with you is the foreign language support. I used to use Delocalizer (no longer updated) on any new Mac for that very reason, and always do a custom install to minimize the language files and printer drivers included.
Note that Monolingual has NOT been updated to deal (properly) with Intel-based Macs. You have been warned. See VersionTracker for more detail.
April 24th, 2006 at 2:04 pm
I have to agree with the others here. Yes, there is some stuff that would be considered bloatware, but MS is no better in this regard. How many useless applets come with Windows XP that you will never use? When was the last time you fired up the Windows Movie Maker? How about the endless wizards for retarded people who can’t figure out how to set up a wireless connection or dialup connection? Can those be removed?
At least the Mac stuff, as you discovered, can be simply dragged to the trash and flushed away with little in the way of dire warnings and Add/Remove Programs wizards. And of the stuff that is there that could be termed useless, at least none of it is “in your face” AND useless, like the crapware preinstalled on most Windows boxes these days. The only point I agree with you is the foreign language support. I used to use Delocalizer (no longer updated) on any new Mac for that very reason, and always do a custom install to minimize the language files and printer drivers included.
Note that Monolingual has NOT been updated to deal (properly) with Intel-based Macs. You have been warned. See VersionTracker for more detail.
April 24th, 2006 at 2:06 pm
[sorry for the double post… browser hung]
April 24th, 2006 at 2:46 pm
CompuDude, I could not simply drag and drop to get rid of that bloat. I required Monolingual to remove the language files, some OS X knowledge to remove the printer files (knowing where they were and that it was safe to delete them), had to use AppZapper to remove the programs, had to find the sample files from Garageband.
In other words, it took two third party apps and some more-than-joe-user know how to remove those files. While I hate the junk Dell and other OEMs put on Windows machines as much as the next guy, find me a Dell that comes with 7GB of bloat and I’ll Paypal you a dollar.
May 21st, 2006 at 5:55 pm
One Word… Linux.
Another word… Ubuntu.
Apps for just about anything you can think of, none of the maddening bloat you get with Windoze or The Mack, and it’s open source, meaning your dollars aren’t filling the pockets of a multi-billionaire who has nothing but contempt for his customers.
June 3rd, 2006 at 1:34 am
well i think the real point here is that most people are not motivated and/or smart enough to be bothered with Linux. Microsoft is everywhere and although it comes with a lot of bloat, and even more depending on what brand of computer you buy, Apple consistently markets itself as being not at all like that, when in fact it is nearly as bad. and no you cannot simply drag things to the trash, they still leave many of their components behind, so for all the Apple snobs out there, the only reason your computer is even remotely better than anyone else’s is because not enough people own one for anybody to bother messing with it, but clearly your turn is coming….
November 3rd, 2006 at 12:45 pm
I like Mac and Windows, the operative system are similar or not???
April 13th, 2007 at 9:42 am
the who;e reason why all them drivers are there is for the simple reason ‘ IT JUST WORKS’ it may use up a lot of ypur hard drive, if ur running out of space buy an external hard drive.. if OSX didnt have all them files, it would be a pain in the ass to find the drivers like on windows so there there for a reason
what Apple Inc. have adveertised ‘it Just Works’ meaning there there for ur stuff just to work
May 27th, 2007 at 5:54 pm
Sean Farrell probably wants to grow up and join the army. He’ll find the intelligence there comforting. Funny thing about folks at his level: they are consistently stumped by apps other than notepad. Oh, geez im sorry. No one has ranted on this post since 06…I love finding these gems from the past. This must have been way back in time when drive space was really hard to come by and a couple of GB’s of extras that could be uninstalled was not sparable.
October 24th, 2007 at 11:20 am
Apple fanboys making excuses again. (laughs)
Point isn’t about windows bloat but Apple bloat, and the slavering devotion towards Steve Jobs ‘can do no wrong’ is humorous at times. It’s like ‘gee the bloat’s bad, but Windows is worse’ excuse again.
As usual, that’s not the point but try telling the cult from Cupertino that.
October 25th, 2007 at 2:22 pm
All I know is Leopard reviews are out and even though there are things like driver bloat, it just works. Unlike Vista, which still has driver problems with older hardware. Hook up an ancient modem to Leopard? No problem! To Vista? Good luck!