The 13-inch MacBook Pro ($1,499+) is a teeny bit thicker and correspondingly more powerful than the Air. The PC market has an overwhelming number of options in this space, making your decision. One of the best ways to get more life out of an aging Mac is to upgrade the storage. In some cases you'll want to go faster. In other cases, you'll want to go bigger. I carried a MacBook Air for two years but gave up on it in favor of a Retina MacBook Pro with beefier SSD storage, and haven't regretted it. The MacBook Air is still with us, in the hands of my college-aged son.
huge storage, low cost, high quality, very small and portable.
BEST FOR THE COST, Toshiba 'tiny giant' 15mm thick 2TB drive (have several of them, lots of storage in tiny package) $100
best options for the price, and high quality HD:
Quality 1TB drives are $50 per TB on 3.5' or $65 per TB on 2.5'
Perfect 1TB for $68
Nice 500gig for $50. ultraslim perfect for use with a notebook
*This one is the BEST portable external HD available that money can buy:
HGST Touro Mobile 1TB USB 3.0 External Hard Drive $88
Most storage experts agree on the Hitachi 2.5'
Hitachi is the winner in hard drive reliability survey:
Hitachi manufacturers the safest and most reliable hard drives, according to the Storelab study. Of the hundreds of Hitachi hard drives received, not a single one had failed due to manufacturing or design errors. Adding the highest average lifespans and the best relationship between failures and market share, Hitachi can be regarded as the winner.
Apr 28, 2014 4:08 PM
System Information User Guide
macOS can help make more room on your Mac by optimizing its storage. When space is needed, it keeps files, photos and videos, Apple TV movies and shows, and email attachments in iCloud and makes them available on demand. Files don't take up space on your Mac, and you can download the original files when you need them. Recent files and optimized versions of your photos are always on your Mac.
Choose Apple menu > About This Mac, click Storage, then click Manage.
macOS calculates how much space is being used by different categories.
Note: Wait until all categories are finished being calculated to ensure you're seeing the accurate amount of space. Values are refined as each category is calculated.
View the recommendations and decide how to optimize storage on your Mac.
Recommendation
Description
Store in iCloud
Helps you store files from your Desktop and Documents folders in iCloud Drive, store photos and videos in iCloud Photo Library, store messages and attachments in iCloud, and optimize storage by keeping only recently opened files on your Mac when space is needed.
See Use iCloud Drive to store documents on your Mac, iOS, and iPadOS devices, Use iCloud Photos to store photos in iCloud, and Use Messages in iCloud.
You can modify these settings later in iCloud preferences, Photos preferences, and Messages preferences.
Optimize Storage
Save space by automatically removing Apple TV movies and TV shows that you already watched, and by keeping only recent email attachments on this Mac when storage space is needed.
See Change Files preferences in the TV app and Mail Account Information preferences.
Empty Trash Automatically
Automatically erase items that have been in the Trash for more than 30 days. You can modify this setting later in the Finder. See Delete files and folders.
Reduce Clutter
Quickly find files, apps, books, movies, and other items that are taking up space, then manually delete items you no longer need. See Find and delete files.
When space is needed on your Mac, macOS also clears caches and logs that are safe to delete, including temporary database files, interrupted downloads, staged macOS and app updates, Safari website data, and more.
Best Storage Options For Macbook Air Monitor
Note: If your disk is partitioned, recommendations apply to only the partition that contains your home directory.
Storage On Macbook Air
To see an overview of used and free disk space, choose Apple menu > About This Mac, then click Storage. See available storage space.
