Time Machine backup very slow on WD My Book For Mac external HD

I have been using a Western Digital 1 TB external HD (My Book For Mac) to backup my data today for the first time, using their SmartWare software. Everything went smoothly, I backed up 91 GB of data in 2-3 hours.
At the same time, I have also Time Machine activated, which started backing up my files a while ago, but it is crawling at 8 MB per minute. A quick calculation tells me it will take 180 hours to back up 90 GB (?).
I have 2 questions:
1. Are SmartWare and TimeMachine supposed to be run exclusive of each other?
2. If I just ran TimeMachine, why is it so slow? I use a USB 2.0 connection that worked fine for the My Book's own software.
Thanks for your help!

You should first repartition and format the drive. Most likely it is setup for use on Windows. Try this:
Extended Hard Drive Preparation
1. Open Disk Utility in your Utilities folder. If you need to reformat your startup volume, then you must boot from your OS X Installer Disc. After the installer loads select your language and click on the Continue button. When the menu bar appears select Disk Utility from the Installer menu (Utilities menu for Tiger or Leopard.)
2. After DU loads select your hard drive (this is the entry with the mfgr.'s ID and size) from the left side list. Note the SMART status of the drive in DU's status area. If it does not say "Verified" then the drive is failing or has failed and will need replacing. SMART info will not be reported on external drives. Otherwise, click on the Partition tab in the DU main window.
3. Under the Volume Scheme heading set the number of partitions from the drop down menu to one. Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.) Click on the Options button, set the partition scheme to GUID (for Intel Macs) or APM (for PPC Macs) then click on the OK button. Click on the Partition button and wait until the process has completed.
4. Select the volume you just created (this is the sub-entry under the drive entry) from the left side list. Click on the Erase tab in the DU main window.
5. Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.) Click on the Options button, check the button for Zero Data and click on OK to return to the Erase window.
6. Click on the Erase button. The format process can take up to several hours depending upon the drive size.
Do not use the WD software. If it's you wish to create a bootable backup of your drive as well as keep a TM backup, then you should create two partitions on the drive. One for your non-TM backup and one for TM. For the bootable backup use third-party software such as SuperDuper!, Carbon Copy Cloner, or SilverKeeper - Download at VersionTracker or MacUpdate.
Note that many WD drive systems cannot be used for bootable backups. You can find information related to this at the WD web site.

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Time Machine backup very slow in Lion

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Here is a log copied from Time Machine Buddy:
Starting standard backup
Backing up to: /Volumes/Time Machine/Backups.backupdb
2.20 GB required (including padding), 126.68 GB available
Copied 394 files (0 bytes) from volume Pete 02.
Copied 173985 files (861.6 MB) from volume Pete 01.
1.13 GB required (including padding), 125.79 GB available
Copied 13 files (0 bytes) from volume Pete 02.
Copied 158965 files (90 KB) from volume Pete 01.
Starting post-backup thinning
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Backup completed successfully.
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After upgrading to ML, time machine seems very slow. I usually make back up once a week. First back up took nearly a day, but completed successfully.

After upgrading to ML, time machine seems very slow. I usually make back up once a week. First back up took nearly a day, but completed successfully.

Suddenly, time machine is very slow. Used to take up a minute and now more than half an hour. Does anybody know how this can happen? Indexing the back-up disk is off, but Timde Machine keeps on indexing!

Suddenly, time machine is very slow. Used to take up a minute and now more than half an hour. Does anybody know how this can happen? Indexing the back-up disk is off, but Timde Machine keeps on indexing!

same issue here...

Time machine backups have slowed considerably since my installation of Mavericks -- why?

Ever since installation of Mavericks, time machine backups have slowed to a crawl. The message preparing backup used to to take 10 seconds to a minute, now it takes 5 minutes. The status of the backup used to show 10mb's of 80 mb's backed up, and take under 1 minute, now it takes 5 minutes. Finally cleaning up notice, and the time to clean up has increased significantly. My backups go to an external HD (7200rpm) connected vis firewire 800, that has approx 180 gigabytes available of its 1 terrabybyte capacity.

I upgraded to Mountain Lion a few weeks ago. Everything was fine with Time Machine until a few of days ago.
Same problem others described: extremely slow, taking hours to back up just a few MB.
I verified the Time Capsule drive and my Mac hard drive - no problems found.
I then erased the Time Capsule and started Time Machine. It did the full backup in a fairly reasonable amount of time (several hours, but not unexpectedly long).
When it started its first incremental backup, it reverted to the same problem: extremely slow, but it did finish eventually.
I then shut down the Mac and restarted (power cycled) the Time Capsule. Then I started up the Mac and told Time Machine to back up now. It backed up 30+ MB in just a few minutes, so it seems back to normal. We'll see how it goes when the next scheduled backup starts up.
But you might try rebooting the Time Capsule (and your Mac).
By the way, when it was in the middle of the extremely slow backup, I disabled Norton Anti-virus and it didn't seem to speed it up any. But I left it disabled after I rebooted the Time Capsule and had a successful incremental backup, so I'm not sure yet if Norton is a factor.

I am out of space on my Macbook Air and have a Time Machine Backup. I want to complete reset my mac, but wonder if I can pick and choose what I restore to my computer? Can I also use my time machine backup and external storage as well?

I am out of space on my Macbook Air and have a Time Machine Backup. I want to complete reset my mac, but wonder if I can pick and choose what I restore to my computer? Can I also use my time machine backup as external storage as well for the files I don't need everyday?

If you are using "Restore from Time Machine Backup" option from OS X Recovery, you can only choose from the broad categories presented.
... Can I also use my time machine backup as external storage as well for the files I don't need everyday?
To be clear, if you are asking if you can use the volume containing your Time Machine backup to store additional, non-Time Machine files, the short answer is yes.
It's not a good idea though, since the Time Machine backup will eventually fill all available space, after which it begins to remove old, "expired" backups to make room for newer ones. The presence of additional files doesn't change that fact, and Time Machine will not erase them, but you will encounter a dilemma should you want to store additional files on that volume when there is no remaining space. You will have to make room for them on your own, by deleting existing files. Furthermore, since Time Machine cannot back up its own volume, those additional files will not be backed up by Time Machine.
The easy solution for what you describe is to purchase additional external storage. External USB hard disk drives have become very inexpensive; about $55 will buy a perfectly suitable 1 TB drive.
You can also choose to replace your MacBook Air's internal storage with a larger capacity one. Look for a suitable replacement from OWC / MacSales:
http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/SSD/OWC/Air-Retina
That gets a little more expensive but it is the optimum solution.

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Yes you can make multiple backups on one hard drive, for example if you’ve 1TB hard drive installed in your PC and you’ve two Mac Machines with 500GB drive each then you just make two backup images with size of 500GB each.
http://www.halfspot.com/use-your-pc-hard-drive-for-time-machine-backup/

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For some reason my time machine backups have become painfully slow for some reason. They were fine earlier today, then IIRC I booted windows, then booted back into OSX to run a backup. Despite there being only 1 or two changes (files added to the system) time machine began "preparing backup" by going through all the files on my HDD! Now, it is backing up, but at the rate of about 5 Kb/s!
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iBookguy wrote:
No pre-backup thinning needed: 18.98 GB requested (including padding), 205.25 GB available
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That is a bit suspicious, but not necessarily wrong. Something caused it to think about 16 GB had been changed (it adds 20% for the "padding" in the message).
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105384 files in only 7.2mb? I doubt it...something seems fishy
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Time Machine Backup EXTREMELY SLOW

I've recently noticed that my Time Machine backups from my Mid 2009 iMac 3.06 to a WD 1tb MYBook take an incredibly long time. For example, an hourly backup where nothing has really changed (350k according to a TM log) takes over 30 minutes. I've been working with applecare and they can't pin it down. I've tried the following and nothing has changed-
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kieranroy wrote:
Hey - apologize if this has been covered, but despite much searching, I haven't found a solution to my problem...
After a hard drive crash, I restored using a Time Machine backup. I figured it would be a good idea to start a fresh Time Machine backup going forward.
Does that mean you erased or reformatted the drive?
If you deleted some or all of the backups via the Finder, cancel the backup, reformat the drive, and start over.
Using a LaCie 500GB Firewire 800 drive (formatted MacOS Extended Journaled), after one hour, only 5GB has been backed up. As my MacBook Pro has 165GB of data, at this rate, it will take almost two days.
Does that hour include the "Preparing" phase? If so, nothing at all was backed-up during that time, so the actual rate is probably much faster.
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I've removed the Time Machine drive from Spotlight indexing. I have ensured Norton AntiVirus is not running. What else can I do to speed this up? It seems extremely slow by all comparisons I've read.
First, be sure the *Partition Map Scheme* of the LaCie is correct. Use the procedure in item #C1 of the Time Machine - Troubleshooting *User Tip* at the top of this forum.
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Time Machine remains very slow despite October 5th update - Mac OS X 10.7.5 (11G63)

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Regards,
F

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Peruse Pondini's TM FAQs, for information.

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Re: OS X 10.8.2
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APF Target: OS X 10.8.2 (File Sharing Preference Panel):
1) Finder copy to a shared folder on the target's Startup Volume: 50 MB/sec
2) Finder copy to a folder on an external HD (connected to the target via FW800): 35 MB/sec
3) Time Machine: Create initial sparse bundle: 5 minutes.
4) Time Machine copy rate: < 5 MB/sec.
APF Target: OS X Server 10.8.2 (Server 2.1.1: Time Machine & File Sharing services enabled):
1) Finder copy to a shared folder on the target's Startup Volume: 100 MB/sec
2) Finder copy to a folder on an external HD (connected via FW800): 35 MB/sec
3) Time Machine: Create sparse bundle: 30 seconds
4) Time Machine copy rate: 35 MB/sec.
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1) Time Machine throughput to a 10.8.2 client is 5x slower than on Server 2.2.1.
2) Creating the sparse bundle takes 10x longer on 10.8.2 client than on 10.8.2 Server.
3) Time Machine throughput to a 10.8.2 client is 7x slower than a Finder copy to the same external volume on the same machine.
4) On 10.8.2 Server, AFP throughput to the Startup Volume is almost 3x faster than to an external FW 800 drive.
5) So worst-case Time Machine throughput to an external drive on a 10.8.2 client is 20x slower than the best-case Finder transfer to a startup-volume share on 10.8.2 Server.
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Hi,
As far as I can tell my Time Machine backups are OK. When I click the back-in-time arrow with a very small file selected it takes several minutes before I can use it again. The TM gives the impression of having frozen. Similarly if I use the Finder to look at the backup files on the external disk the machine spends very long periods of time 'fetching'. I have no reason to suspect my hard disk - it is the same with another disk. I've read all of the postings on this Forum. I am thinking about re-installing my OS from Install DVD (10.5) and updating to 10.5.5!
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I have now re-installed my system from the instal disk, then the latest combo update. Have checked all the disks to make sure they are OK and healthy. All to no avail - Time Machine simply will not run as intended on this machine. (It works just dandy on my Intel MacBook).
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I can't afford to take it to a professional right now, so any help or advice would be so greatly appreciated! Also if anyone then could suggest the best way to back up in two places (digitally and perhaps a better brand of external drive) it would be amazing.
If you need more info let me know!

If you're very lucky, you might be able to salvage the drive mechanism, and the data, by removing it from the enclosure and installing it in another one, or in a drive dock.

Restore Time machine backup from a stolen computer to a different Mac Pro

*My Mac Book Pro was stolen.* It had some Time Machine backups, but Time Machine had stopped working about 6 months before it was stolen. I had stopped using the USB drive since TM would never complete. (2 issues)
1. When I plugged in this USB backup disk to the Mac Pro just now, it asked me whether to use Time Machine with it. It told it no, ask me later so I could browse it first.
2. It looks like the old problem with Time Machine not backing up the stolen laptop shows up as a file called "2008-09-22.204132.inProgress". I am hoping that the backups previous to that one are okay. So far, browsing the files appears to me that my data is intact but perhaps spread across 40 folders.
So now, what should I do to retrieve the data I want?
A. Copy the data files and pictures manually without Time Machine? How do I know I will get the latest versions?
B. Use Time Machine with this disk and somehow ask TM to restore to a different machine? (Is that even possible?) (Will it merge the files into my user folders?)
C. Use Migration Assistant?
D. Copy and paste the entire file structure to a directory someplace and pull off the data as I need it?
*End result: I want my external hard disk wiped ASAP, and in the meantime I want my data files preserved.*
The old MacBook Pro definitely did not have Snow Leopard but the MacPro does to which I want to copy the data. It probably had Leopard. But honestly my user data is not necessary, just primarily the data, pictures, DVD projects, etc.
As a side note: My old laptop and my MacPro used the same username and password.

lhbilly wrote:
*My Mac Book Pro was stolen.* It had some Time Machine backups, but Time Machine had stopped working about 6 months before it was stolen. I had stopped using the USB drive since TM would never complete. (2 issues)
1. When I plugged in this USB backup disk to the Mac Pro just now, it asked me whether to use Time Machine with it. It told it no, ask me later so I could browse it first.
2. It looks like the old problem with Time Machine not backing up the stolen laptop shows up as a file called "2008-09-22.204132.inProgress". I am hoping that the backups previous to that one are okay. So far, browsing the files appears to me that my data is intact but perhaps spread across 40 folders.
So now, what should I do to retrieve the data I want?
start Migration Assistant located in /Application/Utilies. it has an option to migrate your data and applications from a TM backup. migrate what you want. note that users will be migrated to new users so to access your old home directory you'll have to log out and log in as the migrated user.
A. Copy the data files and pictures manually without Time Machine? How do I know I will get the latest versions?
B. Use Time Machine with this disk and somehow ask TM to restore to a different machine? (Is that even possible?) (Will it merge the files into my user folders?)
C. Use Migration Assistant?
D. Copy and paste the entire file structure to a directory someplace and pull off the data as I need it?
*End result: I want my external hard disk wiped ASAP, and in the meantime I want my data files preserved.*
The old MacBook Pro definitely did not have Snow Leopard but the MacPro does to which I want to copy the data. It probably had Leopard. But honestly my user data is not necessary, just primarily the data, pictures, DVD projects, etc.
As a side note: My old laptop and my MacPro used the same username and password.

Time Machine backup very slow on WD My Book For Mac external HD

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