IS my TimeMachine backing up properly?

How can I be sure my TM back-up is "working" properly? I need to do a bootable clone and want to verify my data is safe and backed up before beginning the process. I opened the folders in my TM backup. When I open the iPhoto on the back-up, it opens to my current iPhoto library, even when I try opening an older folder of the iPhoto library. Is this normal? How can I be sure my pictures are really there? Also, I see the various user files on the TM backup but when I try to open them, it says I don't have permission to do so and does not give the option for entering the user password. Is this normal? I was only able to open the user folder from the account in which I was logged in. In case it's relevant: My external disk for TM back-up failed a few months ago while still under warranty--it became "read only." The company was very nice in dealing with it and replaced it. However, the replacement is a refurbished device. Thanks so much for your assistance.

OK. All you need do is double-click on the Desktop icon for your Time Machine drive. You should find a folder in there in which will be all the folders and files related to your backup. You can also open the Console in your Utilities folder and read the log entries related to Time Machine backups as they occur. You can select the backup drive's icon and Press COMMAND-I to open the Get Info window. In the top panel it will tell you how much of the drive is currently in use. That will reflect an amount of space that should be at least equal to the amount of data stored on your hard drive.
As for bootable clones you should buy just an external drive in an enclosure. Nothing fancy. The enclosure should support at least one of the disk ports on the computer - USB and/or Firewire. I recommend you buy something from OWC. They have drives, enclosures, and drives in enclosures. You can save some money by DIY. See below:
Get an external drive at least equal in size to the internal hard drive and make (and maintain) a bootable clone/backup. You can make a bootable clone using the Restore option of Disk Utility. You can also make and maintain clones with good backup software. My personal recommendations are (order is not significant):
1. Carbon Copy Cloner
2. Get Backup
3. Deja Vu
4. SuperDuper!
5. Synk Pro
6. Tri-Backup
Visit The XLab FAQs and read the FAQ on backup and restore. Also read How to Back Up and Restore Your Files. For help with using Time Machine visit Pondini's Time Machine FAQ for help with all things Time Machine.
Although you can buy a complete external drive system, you can also put one together if you are so inclined. It's relatively easy and only requires a Phillips head screwdriver (typically.) You can purchase hard drives separately. This gives you an opportunity to shop for the best prices on a hard drive of your choice. Reliable brands include Seagate, Hitachi, Western Digital, Toshiba, and Fujitsu. You can find reviews and benchmarks on many drives at Storage Review.
Enclosures for FireWire and USB are readily available. You can find only FireWire enclosures, only USB enclosures, and enclosures that feature multiple ports. I would stress getting enclosures that use the Oxford chipsets especially for Firewire drives (911, 921, 922, for example.) You can find enclosures at places such as;
1. Cool Drives
2. OWC
3. WiebeTech
4. Firewire Direct
5. California Drives
6. NewEgg
All you need do is remove a case cover, mount the hard drive in the enclosure and connect the cables, then re-attach the case cover. Usually the only tool required is a small or medium Phillips screwdriver.
I recommend doing your initial clone using Disk Utility. It's part of OS X and free:
Clone using Restore Option of Disk Utility
1. Open Disk Utility in the Utilities folder.
2. Select the destination volume from the left side list.
3. Click on the Restore tab in the DU main window.
4. Select the destination volume from the left side list and drag
it to the Destination entry field.
5. Select the source volume from the left side list and drag it to
the Source entry field.
6. Double-check you got it right, then click on the Restore button.
Destination means the external backup drive. Source means the internal startup drive.

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I am migrating to a new iMac via TimeMachine back up. My iPhoto libraries are on external drive. I'd like to migrate only the internal hard drive data to the new internal Drive then just plug in iPhoto library drive. Is this going be a problem?

I am migrating to a new iMac via TimeMachine back up. My iPhoto libraries are on an external drive. Both drives are backed up on Time Machine. I'd like to migrate only the old internal hard drive data to the new internal Drive and then just plug in iPhoto library drive to the new iMac. This would save having to transfer several hundred GBs of data. Will this work using Set Up Assistant?

Your user account on the new Mac must have a different UID than on the old one. See the pink box in Problems after using Migration Assistant for an explanation.
You'll need to change the permissions on the iPhoto library on the external HD. Do a Get Info on it, click the padlock at the bottom of the Sharing & Permissions section of the Info window and enter your Admin password.
Then click the plus sign, select the user account you want on the next screen, and click Select. Then change Read only to Read & Write for that user via the little arrows. Finally, click the "gear" icon and select Apply to enclosed items. That may take a few mintutes on a large library.

HT201269 Why isn't my cell phone backing up properly to my laptop? Backed it up three times in two days. I replaced my old cell phone, had to setup as new, then backed up from "last backup" but it didn't work at all. The last backup was available was mo

My cell phone will not back up properly to my laptop. I have tried three times in two days as I knew I was getting my new phone today and wanted to save all my information. The problem is that it backed up very random things like things from my IPod from years ago, and did not back up all the information it should have from my "old" cell phone. Now I am missing almost everything. What happened and can i fix this?

First, make sure you are using the most current version of iTunes 11.1.3 (8). Second, what version of iOS 7 was your old phone running, i.e. 7.0, 7.0.1, 7.0.2? If your back-up was made with a version of iOS that is newer than the version on your new phone, it will not sync. For example, if your back-up was of a phone running iOS 7.0.4, and your new phone was running 7.0.2 out of the box, the back up will not sync to the new phone until it is updated to iOS 7.0.4.

How to Use A Timemachine Back Up Drive for backup and storage?

I bought a 1TB external drive, and installed a 1TB SSD in my Macbook Pro 13in Early 2011 i-5, and have 426gb free, the other 200 or so is for bootcamp. I used the external as a timemachine back up, but there should be some extra space right??? I need someplace for storage for my videos and photos for work, and I don't want to go out and buy another 500gb external. Can I just use the one for timemachine for both timemachine and storage?

I plan on getting a second drive eventually but this is more of a last minute kind of transfer, i need to take a bunch of wedding videos and move them over to my laptop, and I don't have the money or time to get another external.
how would I use the current one I have for storage, because when I plugged it in it reads it only as a time machine back up and drive and opens differently, I don't have it on me now to test it again, but just drag and drop files into it?

Iphone 4s won't back up properly in Windows 7

Hello,
So, from what I can tell, this is a fairly common issue, but I've searched forever and haven't been able to find a satisfactory solution. Basically, my iPhone 4s refuses to back up properly in Windows 7. It gets about half way and gets stuck. I have tried resetting warnings, deleting the lockdown folder, deleting the backup both through preferences in itunes, and directly from my computer. I've also done a complete resotre of the phone itself at least 2 times, and the issue still persists. Occasionally, it will sync, but I get the "iTunes could not back up iphone because the backup could not be saved on the computer" error. I thought I fixed this issue a few days ago through some combinaition of the above, but it has just returned, and now refuses to go away. Please help.
Thank you

How large is the backup to iCloud you are attempting? How much free space is available in iCloud?

I updated my phone and i guess it didn't back up properly. It reset my phone back to factory settings. Anything I can do to get back my pictures, phone list, videos, apps,etc?

I updated my phone and I guess it didn't back up properly. It reset my phone back to factory settings. Anything I can do to get back my pictures, phone list, videos, apps,etc?

The folder where your backup data is stored changes depending on the computer's operating system. Since iTunes only keeps one backup per device, you should ensure the backup folder is included in your periodic data backup routine.
iTunes places the backup files in the following places:
Mac: ~/Library/Application Support/MobileSync/Backup/
Windows XP: \Documents and Settings\(username)\Application Data\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup\
Windows Vista and Windows 7:\Users\(username)\AppData\Roaming\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup\
Note: If you do not see the AppData or Application Data folders, you may need to show hidden files (Windows XP, Windows Vista and Windows 7).
copied from "about backups"http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1766
If you don't have, you'll have to start all over again. Apps can be downloaded again for free, but any data like game settings or similar will not be included, these are part of the backup.

I synced my phone to my computer, went down and upgraded my phone, and found that before I could sync my new phone my computer crashed. No, I didn't have it backed up properly. Is there anything I can do???

I synced my old iphone4, went down and upgraded to the iPhone 5c. When I came back my itunes wouldn't open properly and is now no longer functioning. Is there any way that I can sync my new phone to my old itunes???

Follow these instructions EXACTLY: Remove and reinstall iTunes and related software components for Windows Vista, Windows 7, or Windows 8 - Apple Support

Actions won't play back transformations properly

The transformations 'skew', 'distort', and 'perspective' wont' play back properly in PS CC2014. You can record an action, but it will play back differently. Not just a few pixels different, but a lot. I also tested a number of existing actions that I used in PS CS3, but they play back wrong too, even though they worked fine previously.
How is this possible? Is it a bug? Anyone knows something about this issue?

When you record action that deal with sizes. You need the think about what your recording. The thing is there is a lot going on. You need to record the action to work the way you want them to. You need to take into consideration that you may not many things about the document the action is being used on. Unless you know somthing like the action will only be use on un-cropped landscape images from a particular. In that case you know every document is x pixel wide and y pixel high.
More often you have no idea of what size a document is you do not know the number of pixel wide, high or the resolution the document is. Size can be tricky to deal with. You can record things in absolute pixel sizes, relative to resolution and relative to document size. How Photoshop units is set determines how many steps are recorded. Steps like transform are prime examples. Is your transform recorded Absolute pixel sized a location, Relative to resolution or relative to Document size.
Crafting Actions Package UPDATED Aug 10, 2014 Added Conditional Action steps to Action Palette Tips.
Contains
Action Actions Palette Tips.txt
Action Creation Guidelines.txt
Action Dealing with Image Size.txt
Action Enhanced via Scripted Photoshop Functions.txt
CraftedActions.atn Sample Action set includes an example Watermarking action
Sample Actions.txt Photoshop CraftedActions set saved as a text file.
More then a dozen Scripts for use in actions
Example
Download

I need help with Time Machine - Won't back up properly

I'm new to Macs, my MBP is barely a month old, so bare with me. I do understand computers pretty well and I've been trying like **** to read up and fix this on my own, but it's starting to tick me off.
Okay so I got a "WD My Passport" external HD for Xmas and my goal is to have Time Machine back everything up on it. The problem started after a backup was halfway through and froze. I thought wiping the Passport clean and starting over would do the trick, but it was tricky figuring out how to erase "Backup In Progess Files"
I read up on the "Disk Utility" stuff and partioned the Passport, which set it back to normal it seemed like. So I tried the backup one more time, but again it froze a little less than half way through.
So now "Disk Utility" won't even let me erase the Passport or Partition it - it tries for about 10 minutes and eventually says it can't "unmount". Yet when I enter Time Machine it shows that some files have been backed up in "Star Wars Mode", but it seems like that's only saved to the MBP itself?
Please correct me if I'm wrong with my logic, and any help is much appreciated. I'll provide further input if it helps too, just let me know.

Sounds like a bad Passport may be the culprit. If Disk Utility can't erase or properly mount the drive, it may have serious problems.
I've used Passports for Time Machine with great success, but I've also had to replace 2 of them as they eventually went bad. Try another external hard drive and I'll bet it works.

HT3500 My iMac (running Lion 10.7.3) is connected wirelessly to a Laserjet 2550. This has operated fine for a long time, but now th printer cannot be found when TimeMachine back ups are taking place. Does anyone know the cause & remedy please?

My iMac (running Lion 10.7.3) is connected wirelessly to a Laserjet 2550. This has operated fine for a long time, but now the printer cannot be found when Time Machine back ups are taking place - Bonjour does not show any devices being available when Time Machine is running. Does anyone know the cause & remedy please?

Your points match mine pretty well,though here are some thoughts:
1. I thought about this theory myself this morning (iTunes possibly causing more issues), but I haven't been able to verify it.
2. When I set up a new user it seemed better for a while, but the issue croppped back up. Yesterday I fully wiped the machine and reinstalled from scratch. I did not reimport my user from TimeMachine, but the problem has come back. My thinking was that I might have some really old software or prefs hanging around causing the issue. No dice.
3. This is my current theory of the issue, so my next step will be to pull the RAM from Crucial and see how the system behves. IF that doesn't eliminate the problem, I'll pull the factory installed RAM and replace it with the 3rd party RAM. The odd thing is how many people seem to have similar issues - I know two personally, and have seen several posts on forums. I think the most common point for this happening was the 10.7.2 update, which would point to software as the culprit.
4. That matches my experience.
My hope is that this will be repaired in the forthcoming 10.7.3 release (current production version is 10.7.2), but otuside of what I noted above, I'm at a loss.

Timemachine backs up all iTunes music every hour

Hi,
My Timemachine disk is running full. After read the FAQ I used the TimeTracker app to figure out what was backed up. It turns out that every backup contains a full copy of my Music/iTunes/ folder. Why does it keep making a complete backup of that folder?
It used to work perfectly. But I lost my harddrive and had to restore from the timemachine disk, shortly after the restore the backup disk was full so my problem could be related to the restore.
Any ideas?

Tobiasen wrote:
TimeTracker shows that the size of every backup is around 39GB. When I drill down inside TimeTracker it says the itunes folder is around 39GB.
If this is limited to your user account, and only affects iTunes, something may be corrupted on your internal HD.
Verify your internal HD, per #A5 in Time Machine - Troubleshooting (or use the link in *User Tips* at the top of this forum). As noted there, if that finds problems, see the yellow box to fix them.
If it's ok, try an experiment. If your iTunes folder is in your Music folder, put a small test file in the Music folder, but not in the iTunes folder. (If it's somewhere else, put a test folder in the same folder that contains your iTunes folder).
Then exclude the iTunes folder from backups temporarily, per #10 in Time Machine - Frequently Asked Questions (or use the link in *User Tips* at the top of this forum).
Run a backup, then another. See if the test file gets backed-up both times.
Post back with the results; then we can figure out how to fix it.

Time Machine won't back up properly.

Greetings everyone,
I am running into some problems with Time Machine. For one reason or another, it won't conduct a full back up of my system to external hardrives. I have tried to back up my MBP with one old and one brand new Seagate External Hard Drive (with more than enough storage space available) yet I continue to run into the same problem. The backup stalls with roughly 50GBs or so of data remaining. I have made sure that all the necessary drive settings are correct and that my MBP HD is verified etc. Could someone advise of any issues that may be affecting this?

Trying Pondini's Time Machine Buddy. Getting this messagE- can anyone interpret these hieroglyphs?
I tried erasing and reformatting an external HD to Pondini's instructions but the initial TM back-up always fails.
Starting standard backup
Backing up to: /Volumes/Untitled/Backups.backupdb
Ownership is disabled on the backup destination volume. Enabling.
Event store UUIDs don't match for volume: Macintosh HD
Backup content size: 104.8 GB excluded items size: 7.9 MB for volume Macintosh HD
No pre-backup thinning needed: 125.75 GB requested (including padding), 465.29 GB available
Waiting for index to be ready (909 > 0)
Error: (-36) SrcErr:YES Copying /Applications/iWeb.app/Contents/Frameworks/iWidgets.framework/Versions/A/Resour ces/HUD-DctrlRight-N.tiff to (null)
Error: (-36) SrcErr:YES Copying /Applications/iWeb.app/Contents/Frameworks/iWidgets.framework/Versions/A/Resour ces/HUD-DctrlUp-H.tiff to (null)
Error: (-36) SrcErr:YES Copying /Applications/iWeb.app/Contents/Frameworks/iWidgets.framework/Versions/A/Resour ces/HUD-DctrlUp-P.tiff to (null)
Error: (-36) SrcErr:YES Copying /Applications/iWeb.app/Contents/Frameworks/SFArchiving.framework/Versions/A/Res ources/fi.lproj/Localizable.strings to (null)
Error: (-36) SrcErr:YES Copying /Applications/iWeb.app/Contents/Frameworks/SFControls.framework/Versions/A/Reso urces/rotate_knob_select-b.tiff to (null)
Error: (-36) SrcErr:YES Copying /Applications/iWeb.app/Contents/Frameworks/SFControls.framework/Versions/A/Reso urces/SFCDisclosureArrowDown.tiff to (null)
Error: (-36) SrcErr:YES Copying /Applications/iWeb.app/Contents/Frameworks/SFDrawables.framework/Versions/A/Res ources/French.lproj/Localizable.strings to (null)
Error: (-36) SrcErr:YES Copying /Applications/iWeb.app/Contents/Frameworks/SFDrawables.framework/Versions/A/Res ources/French.lproj/SFDMotionPathToolHUD.nib/keyedobjects.nib to (null)
Error: (-36) SrcErr:YES Copying /Applications/iWeb.app/Contents/Frameworks/SFDrawables.framework/Versions/A/Res ources/Rotate4.tiff to (null)
Error: (-36) SrcErr:YES Copying /Applications/iWeb.app/Contents/Frameworks/SFDrawables.framework/Versions/A/Res ources/Rotate5.tiff to (null)
Error: (-36) SrcErr:YES Copying /Applications/iWeb.app/Contents/Frameworks/SFDrawables.framework/Versions/A/Res ources/Spanish.lproj/Localizable.strings to (null)
Error: (-36) SrcErr:YES Copying /Applications/iWeb.app/Contents/Frameworks/SFDrawables.framework/Versions/A/Res ources/Spanish.lproj/SFDAutoMaskHUD.nib/keyedobjects.nib to (null)
Error: (-36) SrcErr:YES Copying /Applications/iWeb.app/Contents/Frameworks/SFInspectors.framework/Versions/A/Re sources/English.lproj/SFIMetricsInspector.nib/keyedobjects.nib to (null)
Error: (-36) SrcErr:YES Copying /Applications/iWeb.app/Contents/Frameworks/SFInspectors.framework/Versions/A/Re sources/English.lproj/SFIMovieInspector.nib/info.nib to (null)
Error: (-36) SrcErr:YES Copying /Applications/iWeb.app/Contents/Frameworks/SFInspectors.framework/Versions/A/Re sources/hud-icon_exposure-min.tiff to (null)
Error: (-36) SrcErr:YES Copying /Applications/iWeb.app/Contents/Frameworks/SFInspectors.framework/Versions/A/Re sources/hud-icon_sharpen-min.tiff to (null)
Error: (-36) SrcErr:YES Copying /Applications/iWeb.app/Contents/Frameworks/SFInspectors.framework/Versions/A/Re sources/Japanese.lproj/SFITextListSubInspector.nib/keyedobjects.nib to (null)
Error: (-36) SrcErr:YES Copying /Applications/iWeb.app/Contents/Frameworks/SFInspectors.framework/Versions/A/Re sources/zh_CN.lproj/SFIFillSubInspector.nib/keyedobjects.nib to (null)
Error: (-36) SrcErr:YES Copying /Applications/iWeb.app/Contents/Frameworks/SFLicense.framework/Versions/A/Resou rces/da.lproj/SACountry.strings to (null)
Error: (-36) SrcErr:YES Copying /Applications/iWeb.app/Contents/Frameworks/SFLicense.framework/Versions/A/Resou rces/English.lproj/License.rtf to (null)
Stopping backup.
Error: (-36) SrcErr:YES Copying /Applications/iWeb.app/Contents/Frameworks/SFProofReader.framework/Versions/A/R esources/Portuguese.lproj/Hyphenation.dat to (null)
Copied 89 files (2.0 GB) from volume Macintosh HD.
Copy stage failed with error:11
Backup failed with error: 11

How can I tell if time machine is actually backing up properly when the calculation of estimated time left is incorrect.

I have recently bought a reburbished iMac ( installed with Mountain Lion) and successfully transferred the content of my old imac ( snow leopard) using migration assistant. This onlt took an 1.5 hours.
I have noe connected up an external USB drive and started a time machine back up to back up 200GB of content. It has been running for 12 hours and says 4.63 GB of 200 has been done. Now I know that this calculation is not reliable and USB can get choked but how do I know if the process is actually running ok and how long to wait before giving up. The time machine icon is moving around.
Please please any help would be appeciated - I want to get using my new Mac.
thanks
Susie

See D2.
Time Machine Troubleshooting
Time Machine Troubleshooting Problems

IPhoto not backing up properly in Time Machine

My WD external drive (should have read the reviews on Costco before buying it) failed on me and I had to restore my iPhoto library from Time Machine(TM). When I got it back there were ~250 ghost photos (black box with the file name listed). If I tried to edit the file, the screen would go blank but the photo is shown as a thumbnail at the top of the screen. Sometimes in the main photo page, as I scroll up and down of the sections where the ghost files are, they pop up very briefly and then disappear. If I try to "Show File" on one of the ghost files, it cannot find it. If I select a good picture and then use the show file option to get into the originals folder inside iPhoto, and then do a search for one of the missing files, it is not there. I have seen similar problems listed here, so this is nothing new. Luckily I had all of my photos stored as data on my iPod so I was able to import them back into iPhoto which saved the day.
Now that I am paying more attention to TM, I have noticed that if I open my iPhoto library and then open TM, I can actually see the photos that TM is backing up. Guess what.... TM is actually making ongoing backups of what is currently a perfectly good and fully populated iPhoto Library. There are ghost file photos in my TM backup that are perfectly good photos in my library right now.
Why is TM loosing these photos??? They are there in full format (not just thumbnails) right now.
In the meantime, I have resorted to making a manual "Copy and Paste" of my library every time I import new photos as I have little faith in TM. I should not need to do this. Please help.

TD, thanks. Won't drag and drop on the same disk "Move" it rather than make a copy of it?? It would on a PC.
You're copying to the same disk? That's not a back up. A back up is a copy of the data on another disk.
If you are just taking up double the space then select the Library and go File -> Duplicate., Copy and paste is fine for chunks of text, it is not good for doing anything with large amounts of data.
The TM forum for 10.6 is here:
http://discussions.apple.com/category.jspa?categoryID=263&start=0#threads
Regards
TD

TimeMachine backing up to Buffalo LinkStation

Hi there,
I'm considering upgrading to Leopard primarily because of the Time Machine, but I'm not certain I would be able to use it as I'm envisioning it.
I have a Buffalo LinkStation NAS drive, is it possible to configure Time Machine to use it as a backup storage drive? I have a MacBook Pro, so it would be ideal to have it backed up to NAS since it wouldn't need to be connected.
Is that possible? If not, do you know of any other software that would that sort of backup with Buffalo NAS (automated backup, set it and forget it kind of thing).
Thanks,
Alex

Time Machine doesn't currently support backing up to a generic NAS. It supports backing up to Time Capsule (which is a NAS, but which has specifications that Apple knows and supports).
There are reports here of people who have gotten Time Machine working with various NAS products, and it works in some cases, while in other cases it has stopped working and caused crashes in Leopard. I'd say, since it isn't supported (and since the only way to get it to work is to set a system preferences like ...allowUnsupportedNetworkVolumes), that it's best to avoid it and go with Time Capsule, or with a locally attached drive (Firewire preferred, but USB2 would work).

IS my TimeMachine backing up properly?

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