Time Capsule not deleting old backups when full

I have a number of drives attached for alternating backups through Time Machine. When a generic USB drive I have gets full, it sends out a message saying that it will have to delete the oldest BU, which is fine by me. My relatively new tall Time Capsule just tells me to reduce the number of files I'm backing up or get another drive.
Also, form the numbers in the screenshot, it looks like it's trying to do a complete backup of my iMac drive when it should just be incremental, as it has been doing all along. Using 10.10.1 on a 2-year old iMac.
Any ideas why? Thanks to all in advance.

Incremetnal backups are small, so Time Machine usually does not have any trouble deleting a few of oldest incremental backups to make room for new small incremental backups.....but....450 GB is not an incremental backup, and Time Machine will not be able to delete enough data to make room for the large backup that it is being asked to complete.
If you want to keep all of the data on the current Time Capsule, you can add another USB drive to the Time Capsule, or another Time Capsule for that matter and continue backups that way.
Another option....the least expensive.....would be to erase the current Time Capsule drive and start over again with a new backup set.

Similar Messages

Time capsule not deleting old backups

My time capsule is no longer backing up due to lack of space. How can I get it to delete old backsups?

If you upgrade installed the OS, Mavericks.. then the TM seems to lose the ability to delete old backups..
Step in and do in manually.
See Q12 here.
http://pondini.org/TM/FAQ.html

HT3275 Time Machine not deleting oldest backups when the disk is full

Time Machine not deleting oldest backups when the disk is full

Unfortunately, when this happens, Time Machine cannot erase enough space to create room for the new backup. Your options now are:
1) Add a new Time Capsule or a hard drive to the USB port on the existing Time Capsule and continue with backups
2) Manually delete backups from Time Machine....which is a long and tedious process. After a few hours, not much space will be reclaimed and it will not be long before the Time Capsule is full again
3) Erase the Time Capsule....if you really do not need all the old backups from months ago....and start over with a new Time Machine backup and move forward again

Time capsule and deleting old backups

Hi after performing a recent backup to an external drive I don't have much space left on the disk. It says that time capsule will delete old backups. Does this mean that any movies backed up in these early back ups will be deleted as I no longer have them on my MacBook due to the amount of space they take up?

Time Machine is not an archive, it is a rolling backup.
If you want to keep files permanently, you must not store them only in Time Machine. If you don't have space for the movies on your main drive, buy a drive to use as an archive, put those movies on it, and make sure that disk is backed up too, since if data exists in only one place it is vulnerable.
My family digital archive doesn't fit on my internal drive so it is on an external drive. I also maintain two exact backup copies of that external drive. One is in the fire safe at home, the other is in a safe deposit box, and those two backups are rotated periodically. If the original and the backup are lost due to fire, burglary, etc., the off-site backup means there is still a safe copy somewhere. Because I can't afford to lose those photos, movies, and financial records. Online backup is another option for making sure you won't ever lose data you need to keep.

Time machine not deleting oldest backup on full network drive

Hi All,
I backup my iMac over the network to a share on a mac Mini. After around three months, the share is full. I expected Time Machine to just start deleting old backups, but it is not.
Time Machine gives me the following error:
"This backup is too large for the backup volume".
This is correct, but i thought Time Machine should have just deleted the oldest backup in this instance? Or does this not work when backing up over the network?
Thanks in advance for help and advice.
Cheers,
mdavis75
Message was edited by: mdavis75

I have the exact same problem, but I am not using TM over a network... Only my local Mac Pro w/ a 600gb external drive. I recall back when I first got Leopard that time machine did in fact ask me if I wanted it to delete old backups after the drive filled up. Then one day it randomly decided to not delete old backups anymore... Instead displaying the same error message you get.
Can anyone help? (Besides telling me not to back up certain files, and to do it less often. Those are BS solutions! I want my entire HD backed up every time automatically erasing old backups when necessary. Is that too much to ask for?)

Why does Time machine not delete old backups

I dont understand Why time machine is not deleting old backups. As it worked first time with the same size backup drive as the drive its backing up, I assumed it would just delete the old backup as needed. Do I need a bigger backup drive?

Roglee wrote:
I just want it to delete the old backup & replace it so i just have a copy. I guess i could just re format the drive each time but that just seems a waste of my time when TM should do this for me!
If this is all you want to do, turn off Time Machine, download SuperDuper! and use it for free. This will clone whatever drive you want and the free trial will erase your back up drive each time. I can't remember if it will let you choose what to back up or if it wants the entire drive. Also, I'm not sure if the Scheduler works with the free trial. Below are some verbiage for SuperDuper!. Looks like if you want Scheduling you will have to purchase a license.
Download Now!
You can download SuperDuper! v2.7.1 right now and back up and clone your drives for free— forever!
Buy Now!
Buy now to unlock scheduling, Smart Update (which saves a lot of time), Sandboxes, scripting and more!
Time Machine will keep making back ups and when it determines it needs space, it will delete older back ups. But it doesn't delete older ones each time it backs up.

Time machine will not delete old backup when space is needed

Time machine says there is not enough space to complete backup yet will not delete old backups

Start with C4.
Time Machine Troubleshooting

Time machine not deleting old backups of recovery partition

I have a Mac Mini running Lion Server. I have an external disk partitioned with a space for network backups and a smaller partition for backing up the server itself. The server has a 160GB disk, it is only using 29.27GB, the partition for backing up the server is 152GB (it's what was left over after creating the partition for the network backups). I figured since I'm only using about 30GB, 152GB should be plenty of space. However after 3 months of use I get the error "the backup is too large for the backup disk". In the past I have formatted the partition and restarted the backups, however it always fills up after 3 months. This time I decided to dig into it a bit more. I looked to see what was available in my backup, it only has one previous restore point. I browsed the disk and opened the backups.backupdb folder, checked the size of the folder with the computer name, it is only 9.44GB. I was wondering where all of the space went so I enabled hidden files, I found the .RecoverySets folder and found it was taking up 141.95GB. I looked at the recovery sets, there are 295 copies of com.apple.recovery.boot which all seem to contain the following files:
.disk_label                         749b
BaseSystem.chunklist       2KB
BaseSystem.dmg              454.6MB
boot.efi                              864KB
com.apple.Boot.plist          431b
kernelcache                       24.1MB
PlatformSupport.plist         2KB
SystemVersion.plist           478b
Of those files, the only file not dated Aug 11, Oct 6 or 12, 2011 is com.apple.Boot.plist which has a date that corresponds to when the backup was performed. These backups go all the way back to Jan 30, the last time I formatted the partition, but the user data backups only go back to the 27th and it hasn't been able to complete a backup since.
I thought Time Machine was supposed to only backup data that had changed since the last backup, and delete old revisions when space is running low, it seems that it is copying more than just the data that changed since the last backup and only deleting old revisions of user data, not system data. Is there a way to fix this permanently?

See C18 in the first linked article. Also, your backup drive should be 2-4 times your hard drive capacity.
Time Machine Troubleshooting
Time Machine Troubleshooting Problems

Since Mavericks upgrade, Time Capsule stuck deleting old backups ... for days

I have a previous generation 2TB Time Capsule shared by three of us, each with separate accounts.
I know there's not much space left on the Time Capsule and that it's therefore expected that Time Machine would make room by deleting old backups. But my account seems stuck forever on these deletions (for over 72 hours now), while the other two accounts on the Time Capsule are working just fine.
I've been through Pondini's recommendations for (a) patience and (b) finally resetting Time Machine, but on it goes.
Here is the last couple of hours of the log (filtered for this problem). The entire log for the last 72 hours is too long to post -- but the pattern is the same, with the constant deletions barely making a dent, and sometimes in fact the space available decreases.
I'd cheerfully give up on the oldest backups, but meanwhile it's been 8 days since TC has been able to complete a backup. (I have been cloning the drive daily with SuperDuper just to make sure I have a fallback until this is figured out.)
Hoping one of you can recommend a course of action.
Thanks in advance for any help...
10/28/13 8:06:51.276 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Found 1022200 files (58.34 GB) needing backup
10/28/13 8:07:01.173 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: 75.13 GB required (including padding), 16.43 GB available
10/28/13 8:07:05.162 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Ejected Time Machine disk image: /Volumes/edbern/EB’s MacBook Air.sparsebundle
10/28/13 8:07:05.162 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Compacting backup disk image to recover free space
10/28/13 8:25:44.384 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Completed backup disk image compaction
10/28/13 8:25:44.388 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Starting manual backup
10/28/13 8:25:44.915 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Network destination already mounted at: /Volumes/edbern
10/28/13 8:26:04.847 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Disk image /Volumes/edbern/EB’s MacBook Air.sparsebundle mounted at: /Volumes/Time Machine Backups 1
10/28/13 8:26:05.230 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Backing up to /dev/disk3s2: /Volumes/Time Machine Backups 1/Backups.backupdb
10/28/13 8:26:31.228 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Event store UUIDs don't match for volume: Macintosh HD
10/28/13 8:26:31.546 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Waiting for index to be ready (100)
10/28/13 8:27:25.289 PM com.apple.backupd-helper[112]: Not starting scheduled Time Machine backup: Backup already running
10/28/13 8:27:31.784 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Waiting for index to be ready (100)
10/28/13 8:27:56.892 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Deep event scan at path:/ reason:must scan subdirs|new event db|
10/28/13 8:35:43.224 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Finished scan
10/28/13 8:35:43.241 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Not using file event preflight for Macintosh HD
10/28/13 9:05:03.078 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Found 1022200 files (58.34 GB) needing backup
10/28/13 9:05:16.881 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: 75.13 GB required (including padding), 31.85 GB available
10/28/13 9:05:17.689 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Deleted backup /Volumes/Time Machine Backups 1/Backups.backupdb/EB’s MacBook Air/2013-10-28-202628.inProgress/03624AE5-22CE-463C-9265-CE6A8826C535 containing 4 KB; 31.85 GB now available, 75.13 GB required
10/28/13 9:05:17.700 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Deleted backup /Volumes/Time Machine Backups 1/Backups.backupdb/EB’s MacBook Air/2013-10-28-202628.inProgress/7503F996-8E27-4558-9308-15FC60270865 containing 4 KB; 31.85 GB now available, 75.13 GB required
10/28/13 9:23:23.471 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Deleted backup /Volumes/Time Machine Backups 1/Backups.backupdb/EB’s MacBook Air/2013-10-28-202628.inProgress/C424E6F6-EFBE-4154-A543-375E805E68C8 containing 8.3 MB; 31.86 GB now available, 75.13 GB required
10/28/13 9:28:36.239 PM com.apple.backupd-helper[112]: Not starting scheduled Time Machine backup: Backup already running
10/28/13 9:55:03.037 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Error: Error Domain=NSOSStatusErrorDomain Code=-36 "The operation couldn’t be completed. (OSStatus error -36.)" (ioErr: I/O error (bummers)) deleting backup: /Volumes/Time Machine Backups 1/Backups.backupdb/EB’s MacBook Air/2013-10-28-202628.inProgress/C434BAEA-946E-4531-BA61-74DD5A34EFF2
10/28/13 9:55:03.037 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Deleted 3 backups containing 8.3 MB total; 31.86 GB now available, 75.13 GB required
10/28/13 9:55:03.321 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandleOperationException:*** -[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: Not a directory
10/28/13 9:55:03.579 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandleOperationException:*** -[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: Not a directory
10/28/13 9:55:03.580 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandleOperationException:*** -[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: Not a directory
10/28/13 9:55:03.582 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandleOperationException:*** -[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: Not a directory
10/28/13 9:55:03.702 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Backup canceled.
10/28/13 9:55:11.830 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: [SnapshotUtilities mountPointForVolumeRef] FSGetVolumeInfo returned: -35
10/28/13 9:55:11.831 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Failed to eject volume (null) (FSVolumeRefNum: -110; status: -35; dissenting pid: 0)
10/28/13 9:55:11.832 PM com.apple.backupd[758]: Failed to eject Time Machine disk image: /Volumes/edbern/EB’s MacBook Air.sparsebundle

Alas, it spent the night fruitlessly.   I think I need to find a way to kill the existing backup or dismount the disk first. Sorry I'm a bit thick about all this.
10/29/13 12:39:06.822 AM com.apple.backupd[1628]: Starting automatic backup
10/29/13 12:39:07.028 AM com.apple.backupd[1628]: Attempting to mount network destination URL: afp://edbern;AUTH=SRP@TC._afpovertcp._tcp.local/edbern
10/29/13 12:39:07.995 AM com.apple.backupd[1628]: Mounted network destination at mount point: /Volumes/edbern-1 using URL: afp://edbern;AUTH=SRP@TC._afpovertcp._tcp.local/edbern
10/29/13 12:39:11.397 AM com.apple.backupd[1628]: Disk image already attached: /Volumes/edbern-1/EB’s MacBook Air.sparsebundle, DIHLDiskImageAttach returned: 35
10/29/13 12:39:12.969 AM com.apple.backupd[1628]: Failed to mount disk image: Error Domain=com.apple.backupd.ErrorDomain Code=31 "The operation couldn’t be completed. (com.apple.backupd.ErrorDomain error 31.)" UserInfo=0x7ffdc243f1c0 {MessageParameters=(
    "/Volumes/edbern-1/EB\U2019s MacBook Air.sparsebundle"
10/29/13 12:39:13.059 AM com.apple.backupd[1628]: Ejected Time Machine network volume.
10/29/13 12:39:13.060 AM com.apple.backupd[1628]: Waiting 60 seconds and trying again.
10/29/13 12:40:24.403 AM com.apple.backupd[1628]: Attempting to mount network destination URL: afp://edbern;AUTH=SRP@TC._afpovertcp._tcp.local/edbern
10/29/13 12:40:24.792 AM com.apple.backupd[1628]: Mounted network destination at mount point: /Volumes/edbern-1 using URL: afp://edbern;AUTH=SRP@TC._afpovertcp._tcp.local/edbern
10/29/13 12:40:27.642 AM com.apple.backupd[1628]: Disk image already attached: /Volumes/edbern-1/EB’s MacBook Air.sparsebundle, DIHLDiskImageAttach returned: 35
10/29/13 12:40:29.209 AM com.apple.backupd[1628]: Failed to mount disk image: Error Domain=com.apple.backupd.ErrorDomain Code=31 "The operation couldn’t be completed. (com.apple.backupd.ErrorDomain error 31.)" UserInfo=0x7ffdc27275c0 {MessageParameters=(
    "/Volumes/edbern-1/EB\U2019s MacBook Air.sparsebundle"
10/29/13 12:40:29.324 AM com.apple.backupd[1628]: Ejected Time Machine network volume.
10/29/13 12:40:29.325 AM com.apple.backupd[1628]: Waiting 60 seconds and trying again.
10/29/13 12:41:40.533 AM com.apple.backupd[1628]: Attempting to mount network destination URL: afp://edbern;AUTH=SRP@TC._afpovertcp._tcp.local/edbern
10/29/13 12:41:41.252 AM com.apple.backupd[1628]: Mounted network destination at mount point: /Volumes/edbern-1 using URL: afp://edbern;AUTH=SRP@TC._afpovertcp._tcp.local/edbern
10/29/13 12:41:44.549 AM com.apple.backupd[1628]: Disk image already attached: /Volumes/edbern-1/EB’s MacBook Air.sparsebundle, DIHLDiskImageAttach returned: 35
10/29/13 12:41:46.208 AM com.apple.backupd[1628]: Failed to mount disk image: Error Domain=com.apple.backupd.ErrorDomain Code=31 "The operation couldn’t be completed. (com.apple.backupd.ErrorDomain error 31.)" UserInfo=0x7ffdc26090d0 {MessageParameters=(
    "/Volumes/edbern-1/EB\U2019s MacBook Air.sparsebundle"
10/29/13 12:41:46.309 AM com.apple.backupd[1628]: Ejected Time Machine network volume.
10/29/13 12:41:46.310 AM com.apple.backupd[1628]: Giving up after 3 retries.
10/29/13 12:41:46.350 AM com.apple.backupd[1628]: Backup failed with error 31: 31
10/29/13 1:44:01.616 AM com.apple.backupd[1768]: Starting automatic backup
10/29/13 1:44:01.649 AM com.apple.backupd[1768]: Attempting to mount network destination URL: afp://edbern;AUTH=SRP@TC._afpovertcp._tcp.local/edbern
10/29/13 1:44:02.604 AM com.apple.backupd[1768]: Mounted network destination at mount point: /Volumes/edbern-1 using URL: afp://edbern;AUTH=SRP@TC._afpovertcp._tcp.local/edbern
10/29/13 1:44:07.254 AM com.apple.backupd[1768]: Disk image already attached: /Volumes/edbern-1/EB’s MacBook Air.sparsebundle, DIHLDiskImageAttach returned: 35
10/29/13 1:44:08.881 AM com.apple.backupd[1768]: Failed to mount disk image: Error Domain=com.apple.backupd.ErrorDomain Code=31 "The operation couldn’t be completed. (com.apple.backupd.ErrorDomain error 31.)" UserInfo=0x7f9af9531a70 {MessageParameters=(
    "/Volumes/edbern-1/EB\U2019s MacBook Air.sparsebundle"
10/29/13 1:44:08.962 AM com.apple.backupd[1768]: Ejected Time Machine network volume.
10/29/13 1:44:08.962 AM com.apple.backupd[1768]: Waiting 60 seconds and trying again.
10/29/13 1:45:20.105 AM com.apple.backupd[1768]: Attempting to mount network destination URL: afp://edbern;AUTH=SRP@TC._afpovertcp._tcp.local/edbern
10/29/13 1:45:20.536 AM com.apple.backupd[1768]: Mounted network destination at mount point: /Volumes/edbern-1 using URL: afp://edbern;AUTH=SRP@TC._afpovertcp._tcp.local/edbern
10/29/13 1:45:23.526 AM com.apple.backupd[1768]: Disk image already attached: /Volumes/edbern-1/EB’s MacBook Air.sparsebundle, DIHLDiskImageAttach returned: 35
10/29/13 1:45:25.145 AM com.apple.backupd[1768]: Failed to mount disk image: Error Domain=com.apple.backupd.ErrorDomain Code=31 "The operation couldn’t be completed. (com.apple.backupd.ErrorDomain error 31.)" UserInfo=0x7f9af97030e0 {MessageParameters=(
    "/Volumes/edbern-1/EB\U2019s MacBook Air.sparsebundle"
10/29/13 1:45:25.280 AM com.apple.backupd[1768]: Ejected Time Machine network volume.
10/29/13 1:45:25.280 AM com.apple.backupd[1768]: Waiting 60 seconds and trying again.
10/29/13 1:46:36.511 AM com.apple.backupd[1768]: Attempting to mount network destination URL: afp://edbern;AUTH=SRP@TC._afpovertcp._tcp.local/edbern
10/29/13 1:46:37.340 AM com.apple.backupd[1768]: Mounted network destination at mount point: /Volumes/edbern-1 using URL: afp://edbern;AUTH=SRP@TC._afpovertcp._tcp.local/edbern
10/29/13 1:46:40.510 AM com.apple.backupd[1768]: Disk image already attached: /Volumes/edbern-1/EB’s MacBook Air.sparsebundle, DIHLDiskImageAttach returned: 35
10/29/13 1:46:42.150 AM com.apple.backupd[1768]: Failed to mount disk image: Error Domain=com.apple.backupd.ErrorDomain Code=31 "The operation couldn’t be completed. (com.apple.backupd.ErrorDomain error 31.)" UserInfo=0x7f9af9608030 {MessageParameters=(
    "/Volumes/edbern-1/EB\U2019s MacBook Air.sparsebundle"
10/29/13 1:46:42.195 AM com.apple.backupd[1768]: Ejected Time Machine network volume.
10/29/13 1:46:42.195 AM com.apple.backupd[1768]: Giving up after 3 retries.
10/29/13 1:46:42.198 AM com.apple.backupd[1768]: Backup failed with error 31: 31
10/29/13 2:49:46.227 AM com.apple.backupd[1880]: Starting automatic backup
10/29/13 2:49:46.301 AM com.apple.backupd[1880]: Attempting to mount network destination URL: afp://edbern;AUTH=SRP@TC._afpovertcp._tcp.local/edbern
10/29/13 2:49:47.381 AM com.apple.backupd[1880]: Mounted network destination at mount point: /Volumes/edbern-1 using URL: afp://edbern;AUTH=SRP@TC._afpovertcp._tcp.local/edbern
10/29/13 2:49:50.418 AM com.apple.backupd[1880]: Disk image already attached: /Volumes/edbern-1/EB’s MacBook Air.sparsebundle, DIHLDiskImageAttach returned: 35

Backup disk is full ... Time Machine not deleting old backups

In my Time Machine preferences it says "The older backups are deleted when your disk becomes full." Well ... my disk is full but Time Machine is not deleting its old backups to make more room.
So now TM is failing to backup.
Any suggestions for freeing up some disk space and getting back to getting backed up?
Thanks.
Ramone

ramonekalsaw wrote:
In my Time Machine preferences it says "The older backups are deleted when your disk becomes full." Well ... my disk is full but Time Machine is not deleting its old backups to make more room.
So now TM is failing to backup.
What message does it send? See #C2 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).
It will show you how to locate the message(s) that describe the problem, then help you fix it. If that doesn't help, post back with details, including all the messages, your setup (especially the destination for the backups), what you've done, and the results.
Any suggestions for freeing up some disk space and getting back to getting backed up?
Do you have other data on the disk, in the same partition? If so, that's not a good idea, and may be the source of the problem. See #3 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).

Time machine not deleting old backups...

I am on Mavericks 10.9.1 and get the following error:
"The backup disk needs48.93 GB for the backup but only 30.99 are available. Select a larger backup disk or make the backup smalled by excluding files."
I recently had to unplug my external HD which I use for time machine back-ups, this error started when I plugged it back in just a few days ago. I have exlcuded some files from the back up and still get the error. My internal HD has 475.62GB of data on it, and I am trying to back up to a 500GB external HD, the total size of my backup is roughly 465GB.
Seems like I should have enough space for a back-up and TM should delete the old back-ups. I have been through a search of the forum and online and have not found a solution. Has anyone ran into this?
Thanks for the help!

I believe I was told that If you had older backups like ML and your disk is getting full it will not delete these because you are now backing up a new OS (Mavericks). It only deletes older backups of the same OS you are now using.

OS X 10.7 Time Machine not deleting old backups to make space

after upgrading to 10.7, Time Machine no longer deletes old (over a year old) backups to make space when needed. Drive now full. Cannot manually delete and Time Machine does not seem to have a function to perform a deletion.

See C18 in the first linked article. Also, your backup drive should be 2-4 times your hard drive capacity.
Time Machine Troubleshooting
Time Machine Troubleshooting Problems

Time capsule not showing old backups

i bought the time capsule in the middle of october and set it up. but when i got into the time machine to find the old backups it only shows the oldest back up as november 13th, and each day it moves to the next. ex tomorrow it will show the oldest as november 14th. and when i look at the time capsule i have only used 1.96 of the total 2 TB. the "tick" marks on the side of the time machine dont always show the pink, which means it was backed up to the time capsule. it shows grey marks saying it was saved on the mac(as if i was not connected to the time capsule)

I'm using the Time Machine interface from the original icon in the dock.
I figured it out. Just a minute ago I went to Time Machine, it mounted the backup and showed it on my desktop but when the "space" view came I wasn't able to browse anything. It didn't show any dates. I exited Time Machine and immediately went back and now I was able to browse all the backups and all the backup dates were shown. I tried it later and again I couldn't browse my backups. This time I waited and finally they showed up and everything worked. It just seemed to take a long time for the backups to be browseable.

Why can't time machine delete old backups when full?

My time machine disc is full and sends a message that it will delete older fileson next try. It did that before I installed OS 10.8.4.

If you have more than one user account, these instructions must be carried out as an administrator.
Launch the Console application in any of the following ways:
â Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.)
â In the Finder, select Go â¹ Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens.
â Open LaunchPad. Click Utilities, then Console in the icon grid.
Make sure the title of the Console window is All Messages. If it isn't, select All Messages from the SYSTEM LOG QUERIES menu on the left. If you don't see that menu, select
View â¹ Show Log List
from the menu bar.
Enter the word "Starting" (without the quotes) in the String Matching text field. You should now see log messages with the words "Starting * backup," where * represents any of the words "automatic," "manual," or "standard." Note the timestamp of the last such message that corresponds to a failed backup. Now
CLEAR THE WORD "Starting" FROM THE TEXT FIELD
so that all messages are showning, and scroll back in the log to the time you noted. Select the messages timestamped from then until the end of the backup, or the end of the log if that's not clear. Copy them (command-C) to the Clipboard. Paste (command-V) into a reply to this message.
If all you see are messages that contain the word "Starting," you didn't clear the text field.
If there are runs of repeated messages, post only one example of each. Don't post many repetitions of the same message.
When posting a log extract, be selective. Don't post more than is requested.
Please do not indiscriminately dump thousands of lines from the log into this discussion.
Some personal information, such as the names of your files, may be included — anonymize before posting.

Time capsule not seeing old backups, now its backing up my computer again

Hi:
I moved my TC today to a new apartment. Same computer and everything. I can mount the drive and see the macbook pro backup file but i cant connect to it with time machine. Now when I back up my computer again, it is starting a new backup of the entire system.
would maybe reinstalling leopard and using the other pro backup work? let me know thanks!

Well I called apple about this and they said i need to reinstall leopard from the latest backup.

Time Capsule not deleting old backups when full

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