Determining the Size of a Time Machine Backup File

When I highlight a Time Machine backup file and then click on Get Info under File to determine the size of the backup file, the disk drive works its heart out, but the Get Info window never arrives at a determination of the file size being seemingly stuck in the "calculating size" state.
Anybody have an idea of what's going on?
JohnnyS

JohnnyS wrote:
Regarding your statement: "If you Enter Time Machine (the "Star Wars" interface), from a Finder window with a "size" column, then browse your backups, you should be able to see the sizes easily." - what do you mean by the "Star Wars" interface?
Ah, you are new to Time Machine. Sorry, that's how you view and restore from your backups. Hold your mouse down on the TM icon in your Menubar and select +*Enter Time Machine,+* or click the TM icon in your Dock, or the +*Time Machine+* app in your Applications folder.
If I look at the pull-down menu under Finder, I do not see Enter Time Machine. Am I looking in the wrong place? Obviously, since I couldn't get by the first step, I never got to a "size" column, and to be honest, I don't know that I have ever seen a Finder window with a "size" column.
You can add one, by selecting View > as List, then View > Show View Options in a Finder window's menubar, and select or de-select whatever columns you want.
I'm a little embarrassed by my lack of knowledge, but if I don't acknowledge my shortcomings, I'll never get the question answered. Thanks for taking your time to try to help me.
Don't be. We all started at zero at one time or another.
I'm not sure just what you were looking for in your first post. The size of all your TM backups is just the amount used on your external disk, unless you have other data in the same partition (which isn't a good idea). Because of the way TM works, you can't really determine the size of an individual backup, and it really wouldn't mean much.
Perhaps if you clarified just what you want to know, we can help answer it.
For more info on Time Machine, you might want to review these:
Time Machine Tutorial
Time Machine 101
How to back up and restore your files
Time Machine Features
Apple - Support - Mac OSX v10.5 Leopard Time Machine
and perhaps browse the Time Machine - Frequently Asked Questions *User Tip* at the top of this forum.
If you have a problem setting-up or using Time Machine, start with the Time Machine - Troubleshooting *User Tip* at the top of this forum. It will show you how to locate the message(s) that describe the problem, then help you fix it.

Similar Messages

Why would upgrading from Lion to Mountain Lion more than double the size of my Time Machine backup?

I have a 500GB Time Capsule that has 248 GB used. After upgrading from Lion to Mountain Lion, Time Machine reported that there was no longer enough room on the TC to complete the backup. Surely the new system files aren't taking up over 200GB? Does it somehow want to copy all of my user files again, even though the vast majority of those haven't changed since the previous backup?
I'd like not to have to upgrade to a larger TC just because of a system upgrade.
Thanks in advance.

If it is working as expected, what do you need with the old backup?
If you want to be able to go back to where you were prior to an upgrade, isolate that backup and don't use it again. As far as Time Machine can tell, the whole drive changed.
The link I posted contains probably everything that anybody knows about Time Machine and how to manipulate it to work as you would like as opposed to how it was designed to work. There are FAQs to continue a backup as opposed to starting fresh, but I wouldn't recommend it for the reasons above. Pondini probably doesn't, either.
If you are going to do a wholesale upgrade of the OS, I would create a bootable clone using something like Carbon Copy Cloner or Super Duper. A bootable clone on an external drive can have you back up and running instantly if the upgrade fails in any way. If the upgrade goes fine, store it away in case you find the current system isn't to your liking.

Fix file size of local time machine backup

Hi all,
I'm having an issue where after copying over Backups.backupdb from my 1.5 GB external drive to another iMac, it shows that folder as now being 6.27 TB. The local disk on the iMac is 1 TB.
The resson I copied over Backups.backupdb to the iMac is that suddenly one day when connecting the external drive to my MacBook, (This external drive was used with the MacBook as a Time Machine backup) I was promted with a warning that there was a problem with the external drive and that I should copy the files over to another location and reformat the external drive. After copying over the files on the external drive to the iMac I then reformatted it.
So, the issue is that Finder reads that the Backups.backupdb is 6.27 TB and I can't copy it back over to the newly reformatted external drive.
If anyone has any insight, I would really apreciate it if someone could tell me if it's possible to:
modify Backups.backupdb and it's contents sitting on the iMac to show it's actual file size, correct the permissions and extended attributes?
copy over Backups.backupdb to the external dirve in some other way (I tried via Terminal but with no luck)?
Thanks in advanced!
Paul

I had the same problem!
Time machine folder was using around 230GB on a 1Tb disk space.
Had to format the disk because Time Machine was stucked at "preparing backup" or something similar after 6 months without using it.
But after transferring it's main folder to my desktop, it is now showing 1.6Tb size!
I can't move it back to the 1TB disk after format and I as need to do a clean reinstall to my Macbook Pro HDit seems I will have to trash my Time Machine saved folder an loose all it's contents if I can not find a solution.
Is there any fix?
Or I just have to let go this folder?
Even folders inside it, like documents or desktops from previous backups are huge in size!

I have a time machine backup file on a USB hard drive. I bought a time capsule / airport extreme, flat 3TB. I wish to transfer the backup file from the usb hard drive to the time capsule hard drive. 10.6.8

I have a time machine backup file on a USB hard drive. I bought a time capsule / airport extreme, flat 3TB. I wish to transfer the backup file from the usb hard drive to the time capsule hard drive. 10.6.8

Unfortunately, Time Machine backups that are stored on a drive that has been connected directly to a Mac are completely different than Time Machine backups that are stored on a Time Capsule.
Frankly, it is not worth the effort and trouble to try to transfer the old backups to the new Time Capsule.....my opinion....having done this in the past.
It is possible though, but I would not recommend it due to the complexity and downsides involved with this. To give you an idea of how to do this, check out this support article.
http://pondini.org/TM/18.html
Even if you transfer the "old" backups over to the Time Capsule successfully, Time Machine will not simply "add on" to the old backups.
Time Machine will make a new complete backup of your Mac and then add incremental backups from that point.
My advice.....start a new backup on the Time Capsule and move forward. Keep the USB hard drive around for a month, maybe 2 or 3 in case you need to go back to an old backup for some reason. At that time, you will not likely need the old backups at all since you will have a current 2-3 month history of new backups. At that point, you can erase the USB drive and use it for another purpose.

Hi, Question about secure empty trash. I moved some Time Machine backup files to the trash from an external hard drive. Now I can't secure empty trash. It starts, finds 74,003 files, and does nothing. The external hard drive shows it's empty, but it isn't

I moved some time machine backup files from an external USB hard drive to the trash. Tried secure empty trash. It counts 74,003 items, then just sits there. The external hard drive window shows it's empty, but the info pane says it only has 50G of memory left. I left the secure empty trash on over night. It did nothing. Ideas?
Thanks,
Ron

Relaunch the Finder, then from the Finder menu bar, select
Finder ▹ Preferences ▹ Advanced
and uncheck the box marked Empty Trash securely. Try again to empty the Trash.

"The storge location for time machine backups can't be found"

I posted this on the TIme capsule forum and got no reply. PLEASE somebody, I need help with this.
Time machine on my new MBP (Leopard 10.5.2) is now failing on my new Time Capsule and I am unable to connect to my backups. Whenever I open Time Machine I get the error message: "The storge location for time machine backups can't be found"
I've tried rebooting, going into "Set up time machine" and changing the disk to none and then back to both the Time capsule Volume and the Time capsule backup volume (should there be 2?).
I AM able to open the Time Machine Drive through Finder.
Has there been a recent update which renders Time Machine useless?

I don't have an answer, but I get this error when I try to mount the sparcebundle to my hd to try to get Time Machine to mount as stated in this article http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1329.
I've had this problem before I upgraded to 10.5.3

HT201250 (1) Where is the "Time Machine menu" and the choice to "Enter Time Machine" (mentioned in the "Restoring data from Time Machine backups" section)?

1) Where do I find the "Time Machine menu" and the choice to "Enter Time Machine" (as mentioned in the "Restoring data from Time Machine backups" section in the Mac Support article "Mac Basics: Time Machine")?
2) How would I restore e.g. a particular photo from a backup I made with Time Machine? I can see how this is done with Word documents, but can't see how to do it with photos?

Welcome to Apple Support Communities
1. The Time Machine icon is on the menu bar.
2. If you want to do that with individual photos, it's the same way as for documents. If you want to do it with iPhoto, you have to restore the whole iPhoto library, not only one photo

Is it possible to downgrade to mountain lion with the help of a time machine backup after having updated to Mavericks?

Is it possible to downgrade to mountain lion with the help of a time machine backup after having updated to Mavericks?

Just to be clear, if by downgrade you mean uninstall, then the answer is technically, no.
You can't uninstall an OS. You can erase and re-install the old OS, but if you don't have a prior backup of your data, you'll lose it during the erase procedure.

HT1578 I have found that I can't access the contents of the encrypted disk in time machine backups. The Finder window displays a grayed-out icon representing the disk. Can this be remedied?

I have found that I can't access the contents of the encrypted disk in time machine backups. The Finder window displays a grayed-out icon representing the disk. Can this be remedied?

Time Machine error: Apple Support Communities
OSStatus 5 when trying to use Lion...: Apple Support Communities

The storage location for Time Machine backups can't be found

I recently purchased a Time Capsule and have successfully backed-up both a PC (via ethernet) and my MacBookPro via wireless. However, after a few hours of inactivity on my MacBook Pro, the Time Capsule icon on my desktop is gone. When I launch Time Machine, I get the following message:
"The storage location for Time Machine backups can't be found". I have browsed the forums and noticed some answers to similar queries to check the "Remember password" option when establishing the connection. I do not have this option when I reconnect. What am I missing?

Glasses,
It does work! I have successfully use DW on my TC both wirelessly and via ethernet. Ethernet is of course much quicker. And I have run into more DW errors trying wirelessly, so I avoid that method whenever possible. As for other NAS device - I wouldn't know.
Glenn
BTW RetroBot - That post was over 6 months ago!

Time Machine backup file corrupted and locked

This morning when I switch on my Mac there was a dialogue box telling me that my Time Machine backup file was corrupted and that Time Machine would have to create a new backup file.
I am backing up my Macs to a disk connected to my Airport Extreme. It's been working for months without any problems. Other than this morning. Time Machine buddy had the following message:
+Starting standard backup+
+Attempting to mount network destination using URL: afp://[email protected]/MyBookHome+
+Mounted network destination using URL: afp://[email protected]/MyBookHome+
+QUICKCHECK ONLY; FILESYSTEM DIRTY+
+Runtime corruption detected on /Volumes/MyBookHome/iMac27.sparsebundle (fsck_hfs -q termination status: 3)+
+Attempting to mount network destination using URL: afp://[email protected]/MyBookHome+
+Mounted network destination using URL: afp://[email protected]/MyBookHome+
+Backup verification failed for image /Volumes/MyBookHome-2/iMac27.sparsebundle!+
+Moved previous backup image to /Volumes/MyBookHome-2/iMac27_2010-11-01-032949.sparsebundle+
+Recovery backup declined by user.+
+Backup canceled.+
+Ejected Time Machine network volume.+
Has anybody seen something like this before?
I now have a locked and renamed sparsebundle on my disk and backups are not working anymore.

aschmid wrote:
Yes you are right, I know it isn't supported - as so many other things but they work!
This one is notorious for working for a while, then . . . not.
In addition to the problems above I got a pop-up from Time Machine saying the backup file is broken and it needs to create a new one. I told it to go ahead and what happened is that it actually proceeded to DELETE the old backup file before creating a new one - there goes my several months of backup history!
Yes, just as it says in the message. See #C13 in [Time Machine - Troubleshooting|http://web.me.com/pondini/Time_Machine/Troubleshooting.html] (or use the link in *User Tips* at the top of this forum).
All I can say do now is connect my drive directly to my iMac and figure out a way how I can backup my other iMac and the MacBook I have. On the AE this just worked remotely.
Yeah. Until it didn't.
Really not much options here to backup a home with 3 Macs!?!
Sure there is. Back the others up to the same drive, over your network, via sharing. See #22 in [Time Machine - Frequently Asked Questions|http://web.me.com/pondini/Time_Machine/FAQ.html] (or use the link in *User Tips* at the top of this forum), for details and setup instructions.

Can anyone access time machine backup files by connecting to time capsule by ethernet cable?

I operate an imac connected to a time capsule. It works great. My internet is connected to the time capsule with an ethernet cable and I access the internet on my imac using an ethernet cable connected to the time capsule. I can also connect to the time capsule using wireless.
A colleague of mine wants to connect to the internet and because of location issues the only convenient way is to let him connect to my time capsule using an ethernet cable. He can access the internet fine and he uses a windows PC. Now my question is, will he be able to access my time machine backup files if he connects to my time capsule using an ethernet cable? I have not given him my password.
Any help will be appreciated. I want to help him get online but I want to make sure he cannot access my time machine backup files.
Thanks

There are actually 3 passwords on the Time Capsule - assuming it has the same setup as my Airport Extreme Base Station.
One password for the WiFi connection.
One password to access setup of the device
One password for access to the storage drive - most people leave the check-box to just use the base-station setup password again.
And, as I said before, you also have the option to encrypt your TM backups. So even if somebody runs off with the device and breaks in to the disk, it will all be garbage without the TM password.
This is the screen as it is on my computer:
As you can see, to access my drive I have it set to use the device setup password.
Here is a screen shot of the other options:

When is Apple going to fix the problem with slow Time Machine backups with Mavericks?

I have been with Apple tech support and they got my Time Machine working by doing a spotlight re-indexing and a safe boot. This worked for about three days and I am back to very slow backups. It is impossible for Time Machine to back up every hour when it takes six hours to do the back up. I don't want to take hours to re-index with spotlight all the time. I think taking six hours to do an incremental backup is a bit much. I see that there are many people that have this trouble and it all started with an upgrade to Mavericks. The question is when is Apple going to fix this problem of slow backups with Time Machine for Mavericks. I have wasted more time than I care to. I am think of going back to Windows. I need good solid backups of my machine and Apple has taken it away with the new Mavericks. Oh, I am using the UBS 3.0 connection so the drive should not be the problem. Also this has occurred in about the last five months, so I am not sure this problem was in the original Marvericks.

Allen Thanks for your reply. All I can say is several months ago Time Machine quit working in a reasonable manner. Right now I have a Time Machine backup that has been running all night and still has three hours to go to backup 6 GB of data. I am using a OWC 1.5 TB drive connected directly to my MacBook with a USB 3.0 connection. In the resent past I have added Dropbox, GoogleDrive and a MAMP server on which I am using a program called Learning With Text from Sourceforge. There have been a lot of questions on the forum about people having very slow Time Machine back ups, so it appears to be a general problem. I should also state I am getting this very slow backup after doing the Spotlight re-indexing and the Safe Restart procedure that was told to me by apple support. I have a 750 GB drive in my MacBook Pro which I am constantly trying to keep at a 5% level of free space. This might be a problem also. However, I am working on a lot of things and like to have a lot of things on my drive. Also the heavily loaded drive has not be a problem in the past. This slow backup business started about three months ago, so something has happen in a very short time period. Now it seems even the procedure that Apple support gave me is not working. Currently I am in China and it is difficult to interact with Apple support to solve this problem, but because I am in China having my computer backed up is critical. I have run the EtreCheck and am attaching the results below. I would appreciate any suggestions. If necessary I will clear out more of my hard drive if that appears to be a solution. The Time Machine drive was recently reformed so I only have a few backups on it. I also don't run the Time Machine all the time as I don't want multi-hour backups running all the time. I run it every few days.
Here is the info from EtreCheck:
Hardware Information:
          MacBook Pro (15-inch, Mid 2012)
          MacBook Pro - model: MacBookPro9,1
          1 2.6 GHz Intel Core i7 CPU: 4 cores
          8 GB RAM
Video Information:
          Intel HD Graphics 4000 - VRAM: 1024 MB
          NVIDIA GeForce GT 650M - VRAM: 1024 MB
System Software:
          OS X 10.9.2 (13C1021) - Uptime: 0 days 10:18:59
Disk Information:
          APPLE HDD HTS727575A9E362 disk0 : (750.16 GB)
                    EFI (disk0s1) <not mounted>: 209.7 MB
                    Macintosh HD (disk0s2) / [Startup]: 749.3 GB (54.06 GB free)
                    Recovery HD (disk0s3) <not mounted>: 650 MB
          HL-DT-ST DVDRW GS31N
USB Information:
          VIA Labs, Inc.    USB3.0 Hub
                    OWC Elite Pro mini C 1.5 TB
                              EFI (disk1s1) <not mounted>: 209.7 MB
                              NewMBP-TimeMachine-1.1 (disk1s2) /Volumes/NewMBP-TimeMachine-1.1: 1.5 TB (691.6 GB free)
          Apple Inc. FaceTime HD Camera (Built-in)
          Apple Inc. BRCM20702 Hub
                    Apple Inc. Bluetooth USB Host Controller
          Apple Computer, Inc. IR Receiver
          Apple Inc. Apple Internal Keyboard / Trackpad
          Logitech USB Receiver
Thunderbolt Information:
          Apple Inc. thunderbolt_bus
Gatekeeper:
          Mac App Store and identified developers
Kernel Extensions:
          [not loaded] com.LaCie.ScsiType00 (1.2.2) Support
          [not loaded] com.lacie.driver.LaCie_RemoteComms (1.0.1) Support
          [not loaded] com.oxsemi.driver.OxsemiDeviceType00 (1.28.0) Support
          [not loaded] com.roxio.BluRaySupport (1.1.6) Support
          [not loaded] com.roxio.TDIXController (2.0) Support
          [not loaded] com.seagate.driver.PowSecDriverCore (5.0.1) Support
          [not loaded] com.seagate.driver.PowSecLeafDriver_10_4 (5.0.1) Support
          [not loaded] com.seagate.driver.PowSecLeafDriver_10_5 (5.0.1) Support
          [not loaded] com.seagate.driver.SeagateDriveIcons (5.0.1) Support
          [kext loaded] com.symantec.kext.SymAPComm (11.2.2f3) Support
          [not loaded] com.symantec.kext.confidentialData (1.4f5) Support
          [not loaded] com.symantec.kext.filesecurity (1.4.3f19) Support
          [kext loaded] com.symantec.kext.fw (1.0.3f5) Support
          [kext loaded] com.symantec.kext.internetSecurity (1.3.2f5) Support
          [kext loaded] com.symantec.kext.ips (1.3.1f7) Support
          [kext loaded] com.symantec.kext.pf (4.2.1f7) Support
          [not loaded] com.wacom.driver.HIDTablet (5.0.1) Support
Startup Items:
          cma: Path: /Library/StartupItems/cma
          MySQLCOM: Path: /Library/StartupItems/MySQLCOM
          ParallelsDesktopTransporter: Path: /Library/StartupItems/ParallelsDesktopTransporter
          ParallelsTransporter: Path: /Library/StartupItems/ParallelsTransporter
          Tablet: Path: /Library/StartupItems/Tablet
Launch Daemons:
          [loaded] com.adobe.fpsaud.plist Support
          [loaded] com.adobe.versioncueCS4.plist Support
          [loaded] com.barebones.authd.plist Support
          [not loaded] com.barebones.textwrangler.plist Support
          [loaded] com.bombich.ccc.plist Support
          [loaded] com.mcafee.virusscan.eupdate.plist Support
          [running] com.micromat.TechToolProDaemon.plist Support
          [loaded] com.oracle.java.Helper-Tool.plist Support
          [loaded] com.oracle.java.JavaUpdateHelper.plist Support
          [loaded] com.prosofteng.DriveGenius.locum.plist Support
          [running] com.symantec.avscandaemon.plist Support
          [running] com.symantec.deepsight-extractor.plist Support
          [running] com.symantec.diskMountNotify.plist Support
          [loaded] com.symantec.MissedTasks.plist Support
          [loaded] com.symantec.navapd.plist Support
          [running] com.symantec.navapdaemonsl.plist Support
          [loaded] com.symantec.Sched501-1.plist Support
          [loaded] com.symantec.Sched501-2.plist Support
          [loaded] com.symantec.Sched503-3.plist Support
          [loaded] com.symantec.Sched503-4.plist Support
          [running] com.symantec.sharedsettings.plist Support
          [running] com.symantec.symdaemon.plist Support
          [running] com.symantec.symSchedDaemon.plist Support
          [loaded] org.macosforge.xquartz.privileged_startx.plist Support
Launch Agents:
          [loaded] com.adobe.CS4ServiceManager.plist Support
          [running] com.lacie.safemanager.daemon.plist Support
          [running] com.micromat.TechToolProAgent.plist Support
          [loaded] com.oracle.java.Java-Updater.plist Support
          [running] com.seagate.SeagateStorageGauge.plist Support
          [failed] com.sogou.SogouServices.plist Support
          [running] com.symantec.uiagent.application.plist Support
          [running] net.culater.SIMBL.Agent.plist Support
          [loaded] org.macosforge.xquartz.startx.plist Support
User Launch Agents:
          [loaded] com.adobe.ARM.[...].plist Support
          [loaded] com.adobe.ARM.[...].plist Support
          [loaded] com.google.keystone.agent.plist Support
          [running] com.wondershare.mobilegodaemon.plist Support
User Login Items:
          GeekTool
          SIMBL Agent
          QQ
          Safari
          Calendar
          Google Drive
          Dropbox
          Day One
          Dictionary
          SymSecondaryLaunch
Internet Plug-ins:
          Flip4Mac WMV Plugin: Version: 2.2.1.11 Support
          FlashPlayer-10.6: Version: 13.0.0.182 - SDK 10.6 Support
          iPhotoPhotocast: Version: 7.0
          Flash Player: Version: 13.0.0.182 - SDK 10.6 Outdated! Update
          AdobePDFViewer: Version: 9.5.5 Support
          Default Browser: Version: 537 - SDK 10.9
          QuickTime Plugin: Version: 7.7.3
          OfficeLiveBrowserPlugin: Version: 12.3.6 Support
          RealPlayer Plugin: Version: (null) Support
          Silverlight: Version: 4.0.51204.0 Support
          JavaAppletPlugin: Version: Java 7 Update 55 Check version
Safari Extensions:
          Video Converter: Version: 4.0.0
          AllMyTube: Version: 4.1.0.0
          Open in Internet Explorer: Version: 1.0
Audio Plug-ins:
          BluetoothAudioPlugIn: Version: 1.0 - SDK 10.9
          AirPlay: Version: 2.0 - SDK 10.9
          AppleAVBAudio: Version: 203.2 - SDK 10.9
          iSightAudio: Version: 7.7.3 - SDK 10.9
iTunes Plug-ins:
          Quartz Composer Visualizer: Version: 1.4 - SDK 10.9
User Internet Plug-ins:
          QQMail: Version: 1.0.2.0 - SDK 10.7 Support
          txftn: Version: 1.0.0.6 Support
3rd Party Preference Panes:
          Adobe Version Cue CS4 Support
          Flash Player Support
          GeekTool Support
          Growl Support
          Java Support
          MacFUSE Support
          MenuMeters Support
          MySQL Support
          Norton\nQuickMenu Support
          Paragon NTFS for Mac ® OS X Support
          Pen Tablet Support
          Perian Support
          TechTool Protection Support
Time Machine:
          Skip System Files: NO
          Mobile backups: OFF
          Auto backup: YES
          Volumes being backed up:
                    Macintosh HD: Disk size: 697.84 GB Disk used: 647.49 GB
          Destinations:
                    NewMBP-TimeMachine-1.1 [Local] (Last used)
                    Total size: 1
                    Total number of backups: 11
                    Oldest backup: 2014-03-18 15:09:46 +0000
                    Last backup: 2014-04-29 23:24:28 +0000
                    Size of backup disk: Too small
                              Backup size 1 < (Disk used 647.49 GB X 3)
          Time Machine details may not be accurate.
          All volumes being backed up may not be listed.
Top Processes by CPU:
              47%          SymAVScanDaemon
               7%          Finder
               7%          WindowServer
               2%          mds
               1%          NortonAutoProtect
Top Processes by Memory:
          385 MB          NortonAutoProtect
          262 MB          mds_stores
          180 MB          Safari
          139 MB          WindowServer
          115 MB          Finder
Virtual Memory Information:
          1.15 GB          Free RAM
          2.87 GB          Active RAM
          1.83 GB          Inactive RAM
          1.05 GB          Wired RAM
          1.02 GB          Page-ins
          380 MB          Page-outs
I hope you can see something that can be fixed.

Time Machine backup file differs in size from HD

I just backed up my MacBook for the first time using time machine to a time capsule. I checked out the file size of the sparse bundle file and its approx. 70gb, however my HD has 86.5gb on it. Is this correct? I thought the backup file would be the exact same size as the HD.
Also, there is a disk image mounted under the HD in the finder called "Backup of "name's" computer". Does that have to stay or can I eject it?
Thanks in advance for the help.

cgapper wrote:
Thanks for the info on the disk image, it has since disapeared.
16gb of size difference seems like a lot. Could it be that there are 16gb out of 86gb that isn't being used efficently on my HD? While it was doing its initial backup, I noticed toward the end when I checked on it in the morning, there was still approx 16gb left to transfer.
I agree, 16gb is "a lot" just for fragmented files. When I performed my first full backup, the disk image virtually matched the size of my data on the Mac. So I don't have an explanation not knowing more about your setup.
BTW - How did you check "the file size of the sparse bundle file". Are you connected via ethernet or wirelessly? When ever I call up Get Info wirelessly it never reports a size, just "Calculating size...".
When I checked back a few mins later, the figures in the progress box had changed to 'xx' mb out of 6mb. Seems kinda wierd to me. Any more thoughts on that? b
Yes, what you say at the end was the 2nd pass of Time Machine. This explains it...
*Time Machine Appears to Make 2 Backups*
It is normal for Time Machine to perform two passes with each backup. This is because some files/folders have likely changed while Time Machine was performing the first pass of the backup backup, particularly if the current backup took some time to complete or your computer was in use during the Time Machine backup. So it picks up those changes with a second pass. George Schreyer refers to this behavior in his article on Time Machine: “The copy process is pretty straight forward and can happen in two passes if changes happen DURING a backup.” [http://www.girr.org/mac_stuff/backups.html]
Cheers!

Time Machine Backup File Size : Very Small compared to MAC HD

I did my first backup and my MAC HD where everything is at is about 319.73 in capacity and Im only using 167.78 storage space. When the backup is complete the file size is only 40Gb , I find that so odd , is that normal will everything restore to its original state If I had to reinstall the OS ?

OK, here it is
Starting standard backup
Attempting to mount network destination using URL: >afp://[email protected]/Data
Mounted network destination using URL: afp://[email protected]/Data
Running backup verification
QUICKCHECK ONLY; FILESYSTEM CLEAN
CopyHFSMeta: cannot replay journal: Invalid argument
Backup verification passed!
QUICKCHECK ONLY; FILESYSTEM CLEAN
Disk image /Volumes/Data/myname’s Computer (2).sparsebundle mounted at: /Volumes/Time >Machine Backups
Backing up to: /Volumes/Time Machine Backups/Backups.backupdb
Detected system migration from: /Volumes/Dom's HD
No pre-backup thinning needed: 21.02 GB requested (including padding), 889.63 GB available
Waiting for index to be ready (101)
Copied 26534 files (22.3 GB) from volume Macintosh HD.
Event store UUIDs don't match for volume: Macintosh HD
Starting post-backup thinning
No post-back up thinning needed: no expired backups exist
Backup completed successfully.
Ejected Time Machine disk image.
Ejected Time Machine network volume.
So, is the problem that I used Time Machine on my previous machine to backup to a different volume? Then perhaps it has just tried to backup things that may have changed in the couple of months since I last backed up on that machine?
If so, how do I get time machine to start afresh with my new Time Capsule?

Determining the Size of a Time Machine Backup File

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