HT203177 Finder stuck at "Preparing to copy.."

Every time I try to copy large files (more than 100GB) the small window which shows the copy progress continues showing "Preparing to copy..". It is not really stuck, and I can cancel it if I choose to, but it doesn't copy the file either. I tried copying my iPhoto Library when I discovered this issue. It also happens if I enter Time Machine and try to restore and older (local) copy of the library.
Does anyone know how to solve this problem?
I would really appreciate any kind of help.
(I'm using OS X 10.8.2.)

Hi!
Recently, I have encountered the same problem.
It turns out that many users have the "preparing backup" issue, but I gave it some thought and remembered that the problem started to occure after moving my iPhoto folder to an external drive.
I have formatted my external Time Machine drive etc. etc. Tonight, it worked for 3 backups. Now, it is locked "preparing backup" again.
radu92, could you please explained how it worked out for you.
Cheers,
Norchris

Similar Messages

Finder stuck at "Preparing to copy.."

Every time I try to copy large files (more than 100GB) the small window which shows the copy progress continues showing "Preparing to copy..". It is not really stuck, and I can cancel it if I choose to, but it doesn't copy the file either. I tried copying my iPhoto Library when I discovered this issue. It also happens if I enter Time Machine and try to restore and older (local) copy of the library.
Does anyone know how to solve this problem?
I would really appreciate any kind of help.
(I'm using OS X 10.8.2.)

I waited for around 30 minutes before cancelling it. I am aware that it can take very long, but the problem is the finder doesn't even show the progress. It doesn't change beyond the "Preparing to copy.." state. Is it normal to take that long just to prepare the process?

Am attempting to copy 13000 photos to external hd from imac;computer stuck on preparing to copy; how long should this take?? bob

i am attemting to copy 13000 photos from imac to external hd; computer is stuck on preparing to copy;how long should i wait
eyedrbob

The speed of transfer also depends on how the external HD is connected, and how it was formatted.
The easiest way to move that kind of volume of photos (and it will take some hours) is to create a folder for them on the external HD, and then use SyncTwoFolders to make an exact copy of the folder now containing all your photos, in the new folder on the external.
http://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/22644/synctwofolders/

ITunes/iPhone stuck contacting update server preparing to copy items

Why is Preparing to copy items stuck?
Why is Contacting the iPhone software update server stuck?
I have an iPhone 6 Plus running 8.1. I have not updated to 8.2 yet. My phone was syncing normally until 7pm lastnight but now it is stuck at Preparing to copy items Step 5 of 5. For background information; I am a DJ and use my phone to screen songs so I regularly sync songs on/off and use iTunes Grouping and Comments to organize tracks. I may listen to songs and sync the phone multiple times a day and this was done without problems on 3/24/15 at least 4 times until after 7pm.
I have done a hard reset on the phone. I have restarted my Macbook Pro, done a Force Quit. I have tried to uncheck Sync Music to remove all music and start over. I let this sit for over an hour with no success. Today (3/25/15) I attempted to update the phone to iOS 8.2 but the computer sits at Contacting update software server and no progress is made. There are multiple posts online with this issue as well.
I did allow some Apps to update yesterday but I do not recall which ones. So, whats the deal?

Watashi mo wakaranai! Each time I reset my iPhone 5 and then I get one go after that to re-sync new data to the unit before having to reset again. This morning I reset and began to start loading everything from scratch again, only to realise this afternoon that the sync had deselected a number of PDF's that I need to access from my iPhone regularly throughout my working week. When I re-ticked those files and asked the sync to resume, iTunes stopped everything and left my iPhone without all its data synced. I have had to asked it to sync a third time now.
Oddly, the amount of space indicated at the bottom of iTunes doesn't seem to relate to the amount of data being loaded in a coherent or reliable fashion, as more space is showing now that when the PDF's were (unbeknownst to me) deselected. Also, even when there is as much as 9GB showing as free on my 64GB unit, iTunes tells me that there is insufficient space available on my unit to sync: This forces me to reset again! It takes more than 24 hours for the iPhone 5 to load 50GB odd of data... I remember when we were told how computers saved us time.

Copy folder items hangs on preparing to copy

I am trying to copy the contents of a folder from one place to another and it gets stuck on "preparing to copy 2 items" forever. I can't even stop the process, have to force Finder to quit and then restart. Then I have the same problem! Help!

I'm copying my website domain file, which is very large, to another empty folder on my desktop. But even when I try to copy the individual files one at a time, "preparing to copy" gets stuck even on the much smaller files. I haven't had this problem before with copying and pasting files to folders. I just did an update to the OS tonight, could that be the problem?

How do i stop the preparing to copy music bar

I was trying to copy music from my external hard drive to my new macbook pro 13 inch. I ended up copying the music through select and move manually to itunes. But the operation that was copying the music to the music folder in the finder still says preparing to copy music (with the word stopping... at the bottom). But it has been a while, and it won't shut off. There is no stop button and I can't manually delete the files from my music folder because the copy bar is still going, nor can I shut down my computer or log off or restart. What should I do? I just got this computer in the mail today.

How about a fuller description of what you are trying to do?

I am trying to copy more or less 30G from my MacbookPro to an external hard drive and it is stuck in the "preparing to copy" step. But that for more than one hour. What should I do to make it faster? Thanks a lot in advance!

I am trying to copy more or less 30G from my MacbookPro to an external hard drive and it is stuck in the "preparing to copy" step. But that for more than one hour. What should I do to make it faster? Thanks a lot in advance!

Thanks Shootist007, by blockd files I mean files that I have changed to blocked and when I tried to move then for the first time, I had to unblock again. I am trying to backup my pictures, my songs and other files like word documents and excel tables. First I put all of them as blocked, what caused the first problems on trying to move them. Then, I've unchecked the block option and if I try to move one by one, there is no problem. The issue is to move all together, because it gets stuck in the preparing to copy files step. Anyway, if I cannot do all by once, I'll do it one by one, event though that was not suposed to happen if we are talking about technology, right? Anyway, I thank you again for trying to help me!

HT203177 I have a MacBook OSX 10.5.8 and a Time Capsule 500GB since July 2008. My problem is (for the 4th time in 4 yrs) the backup gets stuck in "preparing" indefinitely (hours). In the past, wile still under apple care warranty, tech support had me redo

I have a MacBook OSX 10.5.8 and a Time Capsule 500GB since July 2008. My problem is (for the 4th time in 4 yrs) the backup gets stuck in "preparing" indefinitely (hours). In the past, wile still under apple care warranty, tech support had me redo backup (loosing previous backups). Now I'm out of warranty and still having this problem. Any help is greatly appreciated.

I have a MacBook OSX 10.5.8 and a Time Capsule 500GB since July 2008. My problem is (for the 4th time in 4 yrs) the backup gets stuck in "preparing" indefinitely (hours). In the past, wile still under apple care warranty, tech support had me redo backup (loosing previous backups). Now I'm out of warranty and still having this problem. Any help is greatly appreciated.

"preparing to copy to applications" stuck

Long story short: I accidentally dropped a second copy of Microsoft Office into my Applications folder. I didn't mean to do that, so when the COPY window appeared saying that it was preparing to copy, I clicked the x to stop.
The status changed to "stopping" but the COPY window will not go away. I can minimize it but not close it out. I cannot shut down or log out--only a hard shutdown. How do I make this go away?
This was 24+ hours ago.
Here's a picture of the window--the animation is still cycling on the progress bar.

Hi Liz, this is what works for me every time the process runs ongoing. Bear with me.
For those who are confident with Terminal
Warning: Make sure you type in the following commands exactly as shown, case sensitive and proper spacing, please.
In Menu bar at top of screen, upper right hand corner, click on the magnifying glass icon which is “Spotlight.”
Type in “Terminal.” Click on “Top Hit Terminal”. This opens the Terminal utility.
At the prompt type:
ps aux
This command lists the currently running processes on your computer.
Not to confuse the main intent of this discussion, only going over what needs to be typed to cancel the running process. With that said.
The 1st column: USER, is where the process is running under.
The 2nd column: PID, is the process ID.
The 9th column: STARTED, lists the date and time the process started.
The 10th column: TIME, lists the total time the process has been running.
This command filters out the running process that you are concerned with by name.
In Terminal type at the prompt, but do not press “Return/Enter” yet:
     ps –ef | grep –w name
Replace “name” in the command line above with the corresponding number listed under “PID,” that is located to the right of the “USER,” from the table that was created in Terminal “ps aux” of the process you want. Remember this number and jot it down. Only after number is replaced, press “Return/Enter.”
Now for the good stuff, stopping the process that doesn’t end.
In Terminal type at the prompt, but do not press “Return/Enter” yet:
     kill -9 pid
Replace “pid” in the command line above with the same number you replaced for “name” in the command line:
“ps –ef | grep –w name” that you jotted down.
If the command above does not run under your “user” account, you will have to insert “sudo” before the above command and run the command as an administrator.
In Terminal type at the prompt, but do not press “Return/Enter” yet:
     sudo kill -9 pid
Remember to replace “pid” in the command line above with the same number you replaced it for the 1st time you ran “kill -9 pid” before inserting “sudo” in command line.
After running “sudo kill -9 pid” command you will be asked to enter your password.
When this command is run the running process will be “killed.” The running process will not be seen on Desktop or appear in Terminal command “ps aux” or “ps –ef | grep –w name” anymore.
The dreaded endless, “Stopping…, Preparing to copy” the ongoing process will be over.

HT203177 My backups using Time Machine to my Time Capsule worked fine until a week ago. Since then it gets stuck on "Preparing ...". I have left it preparing overnight and it doesn't get past this stage. What else can I do? Bob

My backups using Time Machine to my Time Capsule worked fine until a week ago. Since then it gets stuck on "Preparing ...". I have left it preparing overnight and it doesn't get past this stage. What else can I do?

Mavericks does really nasty stuff..
Try manually mounting the sparsebundle and extract the files you want.
Yet another Pondini reference. http://pondini.org/TM/15.html
We have avoided Mavericks you see knowing that it would cause these kinds of issues..
You never ever load a new OS without doing a disk image beforehand.. TM is not reliable enough or trustworthy to be depended on.
If none of the above work..
I would get a USB drive on the computer and install Mountain Lion or whatever OS you had before you unfortunately upgraded to Mavericks.. Then use TM from that decent installation but mount the sparsebundle and choose the backup from a date well before mavericks was installed.
Once you have extracted the files.. or even done a full restore you might be able to extract the files you want.

Mavericks: Backup: Stuck at "prepare" after a few successful backups

Hi,
after a few backups (two or three) the backup is stuck at the preparation phase. In the console logs I found these lines:
06.07.14 05:31:17,660 com.apple.backupd[20453]: Starting automatic backup
06.07.14 05:31:17,675 com.apple.backupd[20453]: Backing up to /dev/disk2s2: /Volumes/ExtHD03/Backups.backupdb
06.07.14 05:31:17,930 mds[76]: (Warning) QueryTask: Haven't sent anything for 60 seconds; try despite not having received RTS notification.
06.07.14 05:31:17,930 mds[76]: (Warning) QueryTask: Haven't sent anything for 60 seconds; try despite not having received RTS notification.
06.07.14 05:31:17,931 mds[76]: (Warning) QueryTask: Haven't sent anything for 60 seconds; try despite not having received RTS notification.
The backup before that logged that:
06.07.14 04:30:16,675 com.apple.backupd[18686]: Starting automatic backup
06.07.14 04:30:17,024 com.apple.backupd[18686]: Backing up to /dev/disk2s2: /Volumes/ExtHD03/Backups.backupdb
06.07.14 04:30:18,118 serveradmin[18695]: SCNetworkReachabilityCreateWithAddress[Pair] called with invalid address family 1
06.07.14 04:30:21,096 serveradmin[18716]: servermgr_swupdate[INF]: Verifying Software Update catalog configuration.
06.07.14 04:30:21,100 serveradmin[18716]: servermgr_swupdate[INF]: Verifying Software Update catalog configuration.
06.07.14 04:30:21,101 serveradmin[18716]: servermgr_swupdate[WRN]: Missing or invalid language for product items request. Using default "en".
06.07.14 04:30:25,037 serveradmin[18793]: SCNetworkReachabilityCreateWithAddress[Pair] called with invalid address family 1
06.07.14 04:30:28,204 serveradmin[18830]: servermgr_swupdate[INF]: Verifying Software Update catalog configuration.
06.07.14 04:30:28,207 serveradmin[18830]: servermgr_swupdate[INF]: Verifying Software Update catalog configuration.
06.07.14 04:30:28,207 serveradmin[18830]: servermgr_swupdate[WRN]: Missing or invalid language for product items request. Using default "en".
06.07.14 04:30:28,239 serveradmin[18831]: servermgr_swupdate[INF]: Verifying Software Update catalog configuration.
06.07.14 04:30:35,458 com.apple.backupd[18686]: Will copy (50,9 MB) from Server HD
I assume that the servermgr lines are not really relevant.
What do the lines with "mds[76]: (Warning) QueryTask..." mean?
Can I find more details about that?
Can this be the reason for the backup problem?
I was trying to do backup with a Time Capsule before, but after some time it won't even do a single backup (stuck at prepare). Now I did a fresh install with Mavericks and attached a fresh 1TB HD (SATA) with a USB HD dock. Interestingly the same happens: Some backups work, but then it is stuck at "prepare".
I have a macmini4.1 server. I installed OS X Server (3.1.2) and macports with samba3. Also the second disk in the mac mini server contains a lot of files which are shared by SMB to Windows clients.
Thanks in advance and best wishes,
Rainer

dwbrecovery wrote:
Hi, thanks for the updates.
Use Disk Utility to " Verify Disk" of HD2 to check whether it needs to be repaired.
If the verify is ok, perform a " Verify Disk Permissions " to determine if permissions are ok.
The Verifications will not make any changes to HD2
The lockup may be due to a corruption of HD2.   Is HD2 the only copy of the files?
Verify Disk:
It says "The Volume ... is apparently ok" (original German message: "Das Volume „Macintosh HD2“ ist anscheinend in Ordnung.")
The button "Zugriffsrechte des Volumes überprüfen" is grayed out. (I assume this is the one which would be "Verify Disk Permissions")
The files from HD2 are still available in my FreeBSD server. The files there are not updated currently, we were working on the new HD2 disk so far. Also I assume that from the previously working Time Capsule backup they should still be on the Time Capsule. So currently I have two backups and an older "mirror".
I was hoping at first that I simply do some clickety-click in OS X Server's file sharing to turn the mac mini into our new server. However, Apple's samba leads to broken files, disconnects and lots of other issues. So I installed samba3 from macports and disabled SMB on the max mini. I wonder whether macports or Apple's samba messed with some files.
The access rights on the file server disk are not relevant. This server is only used by me and my wife in our little IT business, so I can set each and every file and directory to a new owner etc. I assume that there are more things than only chmod and chown on Mavericks. How would I recursively set owner and rights including access control and maybe other things I do not yet know? (certainly more than "chown -R ..." :-) )
The remaining text deals with spotlight related log entries:
These are the mds entries:
07.07.14 10:11:58,573 mds[45]: (Normal) Volume: volume:0x7fe49308a000 ********** Bootstrapped Creating a default store:0 SpotLoc:(null) SpotVerLoc:(null) occlude:0 /Volumes/VMware Fusion
07.07.14 18:27:16,984 mds[45]: (Normal) DiskStore: Starting health check...
07.07.14 18:27:16,984 mds[45]: (Normal) DiskStore: Starting health check...
07.07.14 18:27:29,302 mds[45]: (Normal) Volume: volume:0x7fe49308b000 ********** Bootstrapped Creating a default store:0 SpotLoc:(null) SpotVerLoc:(null) occlude:0 /Volumes/Recovery HD
07.07.14 22:41:08,262 mds[45]: (Warning) QueryTask: Haven't sent anything for 60 seconds; try despite not having received RTS notification.
07.07.14 23:35:46,839 mds[45]: (Warning) QueryTask: Haven't sent anything for 60 seconds; try despite not having received RTS notification.
08.07.14 00:36:54,550 mds[45]: (Warning) QueryTask: Haven't sent anything for 60 seconds; try despite not having received RTS notification.
08.07.14 01:37:49,723 mds[45]: (Warning) QueryTask: Haven't sent anything for 60 seconds; try despite not having received RTS notification.
08.07.14 02:38:39,597 mds[45]: (Warning) QueryTask: Haven't sent anything for 60 seconds; try despite not having received RTS notification.
08.07.14 03:39:29,512 mds[45]: (Warning) QueryTask: Haven't sent anything for 60 seconds; try despite not having received RTS notification.
And these are the mdworker entries: (I add some comments in between)
The following files are not on HD2, but on the Server HD disk. I removed them in the meantime - they were a copy of the previous installation of the OS X Server Wiki:
06.07.14 20:00:05,609 sandboxd[130]: ([19811]) mdworker(19811) deny file-read-xattr /Users/fsc/Desktop/Wiki (pre-plugin fstype:hfs fsflag:480D000 flags:250000005E diag:0 isXCode:0 uti:public.folder plugin:internalPlainTextImporter - find suspect file using: sudo mdutil -t 973707)
06.07.14 20:00:05,770 sandboxd[130]: ([19819]) mdworker(19819) deny file-read-xattr /Users/fsc/Desktop/Wiki (pre-plugin fstype:hfs fsflag:480D000 flags:250000005E diag:0 isXCode:0 uti:public.folder plugin:internalPlainTextImporter - find suspect file using: sudo mdutil -t 973707)
06.07.14 20:00:05,824 sandboxd[130]: ([19820]) mdworker(19820) deny file-read-xattr /Users/fsc/Desktop/Wiki (pre-plugin fstype:hfs fsflag:480D000 flags:250000005E diag:0 isXCode:0 uti:public.folder plugin:internalPlainTextImporter - find suspect file using: sudo mdutil -t 973740)
06.07.14 20:00:08,124 sandboxd[130]: ([19820]) mdworker(19820) deny file-read-xattr /Users/fsc/Desktop/Wiki (pre-ls-info-1 fstype: fsflag:0 flags:250000005E diag:0 isXCode:0 uti:public.folder plugin:internalPlainTextImporter - find suspect file using: sudo mdutil -t 0)
06.07.14 20:00:08,289 sandboxd[130]: ([19821]) mdworker(19821) deny file-read-xattr /Users/fsc/Desktop/Wiki (pre-plugin fstype:hfs fsflag:480D000 flags:250000005E diag:0 isXCode:0 uti:public.folder plugin:internalPlainTextImporter - find suspect file using: sudo mdutil -t 973740)
06.07.14 20:00:47,512 sandboxd[130]: ([19821]) mdworker(19821) deny file-read-xattr /Users/fsc/Desktop/Wiki (pre-plugin fstype:hfs fsflag:480D000 flags:250000005E diag:0 isXCode:0 uti:public.folder plugin:internalPlainTextImporter - find suspect file using: sudo mdutil -t 975066)
06.07.14 20:00:47,828 sandboxd[130]: ([19820]) mdworker(19820) deny file-read-xattr /Users/fsc/Desktop/Wiki (pre-plugin fstype:hfs fsflag:480D000 flags:250000005E diag:0 isXCode:0 uti:public.folder plugin:internalPlainTextImporter - find suspect file using: sudo mdutil -t 975066)
06.07.14 20:00:47,886 sandboxd[130]: ([19811]) mdworker(19811) deny file-read-xattr /Users/fsc/Desktop/Wiki (pre-plugin fstype:hfs fsflag:480D000 flags:250000005E diag:0 isXCode:0 uti:public.folder plugin:internalPlainTextImporter - find suspect file using: sudo mdutil -t 975128)
Don't know what these are:
07.07.14 17:52:05,969 sandboxd[130]: ([62565]) mdworker(62565) deny mach-lookup com.apple.distributed_notifications@1v3
07.07.14 18:27:17,240 sandboxd[130]: ([63869]) mdworker(63869) deny mach-lookup com.apple.distributed_notifications@1v3
From here on the log messages are after the spotlight has been enabled on HD2:
This is from a backup directory of a Nintendo 3DS. The "content" directory contains files with an .app extension which are certainly not Mac compatible app packages. What does the log message actually tell me? (one of the mdutil commands displays the full path to the file "00000003.app" in the contents directory)
07.07.14 22:42:56,249 sandboxd[130]: ([72059]) mdworker(72059) deny file-read-data /Volumes/Macintosh HD2/Storage/backups/nds/3ds-backup/3ds-rot/2012-09-13/00032600/content (pre-ls-info-2 fstype:hfs fsflag:4809000 flags:40000005E diag:0 isXCode:0 uti:com.apple.application-file plugin:/Library/Spotlight/Application.mdimporter - find suspect file using: sudo mdutil -t 446464)
07.07.14 22:42:56,255 sandboxd[130]: ([72059]) mdworker(72059) deny file-read-data /Volumes/Macintosh HD2/Storage/backups/nds/3ds-backup/3ds-rot/2012-09-13/00032600/content (pre-ls-info-2 fstype:hfs fsflag:4809000 flags:40000005E diag:0 isXCode:0 uti:com.apple.application-file plugin:/Library/Spotlight/Application.mdimporter - find suspect file using: sudo mdutil -t 446464)
07.07.14 22:42:57,615 sandboxd[130]: ([72059]) mdworker(72059) deny file-read-data /Volumes/Macintosh HD2/Storage/backups/nds/3ds-backup/3ds-rot/2012-09-13/00032600/content (pre-ls-info-2 fstype:hfs fsflag:4809000 flags:40000005E diag:0 isXCode:0 uti:com.apple.application-file plugin:/Library/Spotlight/Application.mdimporter - find suspect file using: sudo mdutil -t 446465)
07.07.14 22:42:57,642 sandboxd[130]: ([72059]) mdworker(72059) deny file-read-data /Volumes/Macintosh HD2/Storage/backups/nds/3ds-backup/3ds-rot/2012-09-13/00032600/content (pre-ls-info-2 fstype:hfs fsflag:4809000 flags:40000005E diag:0 isXCode:0 uti:com.apple.application-file plugin:/Library/Spotlight/Application.mdimporter - find suspect file using: sudo mdutil -t 446465)
Looks like some PNG files problems:
07.07.14 22:44:04,907 mdworker[72111]: ImageIO: PNG [00][00][00][00]: invalid chunk type
(above line repeated several times)
Don't know what these are:
07.07.14 22:58:23,267 mdworker32[72522]: CGSConnectionByID: 0 is not a valid connection ID.
07.07.14 22:58:23,267 mdworker32[72522]: CGSGetSpaceManagementMode: No connection with id 0x       0
07.07.14 23:02:14,903 mdworker32[72597]: CGSConnectionByID: 0 is not a valid connection ID.
07.07.14 23:02:14,903 mdworker32[72597]: CGSGetSpaceManagementMode: No connection with id 0x       0
Looks like a bad MIDI file:
07.07.14 23:14:22,107 mdworker[72819]: 23:14:22.099 NOTE:      [0x10ed87000] StandardMidiFile.cpp:201: ReadStandardMidiFile: Sequence::ReadStandardMidiFile(): invalid track length
Bad cpio file:
07.07.14 23:15:16,304 mdworker[72901]: cpio importer encountered an error (3) scanning "(a file with .cpio extension)".
Bad photoshop file:
07.07.14 23:23:52,812 mdworker[73073]: ImageIO: readPhotoshopImageResource Corrupt 8BIM data. Reported 8BIM length (32754 bytes) exceeds actual length (31400 bytes).
I would assume that spotlight shouldn't stumble over incorrectly understood files (bad images and the like...)...

I changed Time Machine drives. Now I'm stuck in "Preparing Backup..."

I was using a 1TB drive for Time Machine; I've now upped it to a 3TB drive.
The new drive is an exact copy of the old one. But when I try to do a Time Machine backup, it's been stuck in "Preparing Backup..." for over 12 hours. What could be wrong?
Thanks.

I forgot about that article. Still, 12 hours is too long, so I would erase/reformat the larger drive and try HT5096 again. Note that "Ignore ownership" is to be done on the new drive and not the old one (italics mine in the following quotation):
Open a new Finder window. In the Finder sidebar, click the icon of the new backup drive and choose Get Info from the File menu or press Command-I (⌘-I)
Make sure "Ignore ownership on this volume" at the bottom of the "Sharing & Permissions:" section is not checked.

TM stuck on preparing [number] items

Hey.
My Time Machine usually works fine with my MBP, OS X 10.6.3 and my WD MyStudio harddrive.
But for the last couple of days TM has been stuck in "preparing files" mode, where it's supposed to prepare all files before it makes the back up. It's been loading for hours now and it has gone up to about 3000 files, even though I've barely made any changes to my system at all (IMHO it should be more like 30 files to prepare). The preparation is taking forever!
I kept it running during the night but once it got to the actual "backing up files" mode it got stuck on 19.8 out of 700 mb. So I had to restart it from the beginning and now it's back to "preparing-for-ages" mode again =(
Is there some way to get around the preparation cycle to make it go straight to the back up activity? Or maybe reduce the 3000 (?) files that has been changed?
It feels like I just want to hit the "force quit" button for TM but there isn't one =(

blizzyman wrote:
Hey.
My Time Machine usually works fine with my MBP, OS X 10.6.3 and my WD MyStudio harddrive.
But for the last couple of days TM has been stuck in "preparing files" mode, where it's supposed to prepare all files before it makes the back up. It's been loading for hours now and it has gone up to about 3000 files, even though I've barely made any changes to my system at all (IMHO it should be more like 30 files to prepare). The preparation is taking forever!
There's likely a problem with the data on your system, or the backups, or the backup drive. Start by verifying your internal HD and repairing your backups (and any other non-boot volumes being backed-up), per #A5 in the Time Machine - Troubleshooting *User Tip,* also at the top of this forum.
If that doesn't help, see #A1 there, to download the +Time Machine Buddy+ widget. See the yellow box in #C2 for explanations of common messages.
You might also want to see #D4 for some reasons for extra-large backups.
If that doesn't provide a clue, post back with full details of what you've done, and the results, and copy and post the widget messages here.
Is there some way to get around the preparation cycle to make it go straight to the back up activity?
No. It's trying to determine what needs to be backed-up. This process will start over on each backup attempt until one completes normally.
It feels like I just want to hit the "force quit" button for TM but there isn't one =(
Do you mean it won't cancel? If so, see #D6 in the Troubleshooting Tip.

PSE 8 for Mac stuck on "preparing to install"

Hi all,
Just received the disk of PSE 8 for Mac as a present. I try to install and it gets stuck on "preparing to install."
Equipment: MacBook Pro Running 10.6.2
Have Lightroom 2, Lightrroom 3 Beta, Acrobat 8 Pro, Flash Player and Community Help Client
Previously i bought and downloaded PSE 8 but I had the same issue. I 'returned it" and got my money back.
Ideas please?
Best,
Scott

HI Scott,
Copying the text from your post on the other thread which really helped in understanding this issue:
Scott says:
"I double click the disk and use the setup.app to install.
It checks the sys profile. I then put in my serial number, etc.
Then it just stays on “Preparing to install”. (How long is it meant to do this? Maybe I am not waiting long enough?)
I click the install button. It goes grey and then back to white.
Eventually I lose patience and quit out."
Your issue is definately different than the one which could have been resolved by the Tech Doc link which I sent you earlier, actually there are two time the string "Preparing to install.." is shown during the installer workflow, first during the initialization process before the Welcome Screen is shown to the user and second for 1-2 seconds between the transition of user clicking on Install button and Progress Bar being shown to the user. Since, in your case, installer is stucking at Progress bar, the Preparing to Install string is visible evidently to you. A screenshot would have been really helpful in understanding this issue. My bad I should have asked for it...
Regarding the current situation, the workaround here with which Barbara tried to help you, will not work, because your's is very specific and rare issue which we have seen reported only once before on the forum, so I am sure we will get it sorted out.Please follow the below steps:
1. Go inside the <Macintosh HD>\Applications\Utilities\Adobe Installers\ folder.
2. If there are any uninstall alias of Adobe sub components like ESTK, Extension Manager, Bridge, Adobe Updater, etc, then please invoke that installer and uninstall all those sub components.
3. Now try to install PSE 8 again.
4. If it still doesnt work, then please run the CS4 clean up script for Mac, and select CS4 from the drop down and let me know what all applications it is listing in it as available for cleaning/deleting.
http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/406/kb406241.html#CS4CleanMac
Please keep me informed, if anything doesnt work out then eventually we will setup a time to meet over the internet and I will get this issue resolved.
Regards,
Ankush

Ios 8 stuck at preparing Update

Erm now my ios 8 is stucked at preparing update.and i hope it can download....i forgotten to do a backup and deleted my apps....reply me please

Just came out a 45 minute chat and a one hour call with Apple. It looks like my iTunes backup of my iPad mini got somehow corrupted. Happily I also own an iPad Air and I am restoring it from that device. If your backup also got corrupted during the installation of iOS8 I am afraid you can only set it up as a new device and start all over again. You can download your apps from the App Store, your music from the iTunes Store and try to get your pictures back from iPhoto or so. I don't see a way to use the old backup if it is corrupted as well.
If you can't restore try to hold both buttons for 30 seconds or so until you see the "connect to iTunes" logo on your screen. If iTunes is complaining about turning off "Find My iPhone" you can delete the device via iCloud.com.
Life's getting easier and easier :-)

HT203177 Finder stuck at "Preparing to copy.."

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