Time Machine backups cause error message "Disk No Ejected Properly"

I have a 2011 iMac using OS X version 10.9.4. I have had to change the external hard drive used with my Time Machine to get more storage. Every time the Time Machine backs up (every hour), I get the message "Disk Not Ejected Properly" Eject "FreeAgent GoFlex Drive" before disconnecting or turning it.
I am concerned about any damage that is happening because of this message. I researched this on this forum and other users had a similar problem. I tried 2 of the easier solutions: 1) make sure none of the boxes are checked in System Energy Saver (ie. put hard disks to sleep when possible, etc.) and 2) buy and connect a USB hub that has it's own power supply to keep the external hard drive powered constantly. Neither of these solutions has worked for me. I still get the message. So I have two questions. First, is damage being done to my computer because it "thinks" that I did not properly eject the disc. And, second, is there anything else I can do to stop this message besides not using the freeagent disc?

I had the same problem. it turned out to be a cable issue. Contact seagate for replacement cable.
http://www.seagate.com/support-all/

Similar Messages

I am getting error message "Disk Not Ejected Properly Eject "FreeAgent GoFlex Drive" before disconnecting or turning it-" randomly.

I'm getting a "Disk Not Ejected Properly Eject “FreeAgent GoFlex Drive” before disconnecting or turning it…" message at random times. I have seen other comments about this happening after the iMac wakes from sleep. However, this is happening to me throughout the day even when I am working on the iMac.
The iMac is up to date with OS X Version 10.9. I had recently switched from a 500GB to a 3TB Drive, both are Seagate. I have never had this issue prior to the switch.
Has anyone else experienced this issue?
I verified/repaired in the Utility Disk and a message popped up indicating the GoFlex looks "OK".

No, I am not on the USB3 interface. I contacted Seagate and they indicated that there is no known issue with OS X 10.9. In my case, they are willing to send me a new Drive, since I just received the GoFlex on 12/06. Will post an update when I install the new one. Hopefully this will solve my issue.
I suggest you contact Seagate, if you haven't already, directly. The representatives are very helpful. Good luck.

Time Machine backups hanging -- error message included

Hello. I've read a bunch of the previous topics and tried some other recommendations, but I'm still having trouble. I haven't had a good backup in 10 days now. I'm backup directly via USB to a Western Digital Passport drive.
So it wasn't until today that I found the TM Buddy. I installed that and systematically excluded certain .plist files that were apparently causing problems. Then I followed Pondini's advice and made the changes in Spotlight and Energy Saver preferences. I also renamed my computer in Sharing to just one word. I even tried a different USB cable, which actually seems to help a bit because my previous cable would cause immediate 'ejections' if it was breathed upon. And of course, I did a Repair Disk in Disk Utility which showed a normally functioning drive.
Anyway, so I was getting the 'Waiting to be indexed (100) and (101)' errors and the TM job hanging on 'Indexing...'. I finally had one run successfully after 20+ tries, but it only said it backed up around 735MB -- very low number after 10 days since the last successful backup.
Now, I'm trying a new backup and it's stuck on 'Cleaning Up' according to the spinning menubar icon. The TM widget shows the following:
Starting standard backup
Backing up to: /Volumes/Back-up HDD/Backups.backupdb
Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandleOperationException:* -[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: Input/output error
Error: (-36) Creating directory 14EB9137-94AE-44B6-BD8A-9283EC9C943D
Failed to make snapshot.
Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandleOperationException:* -[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: Input/output error
Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandl
Wow - as I'm writing this, my drive gets ejected again and the backup stops and drive disappears in Finder. I'm trying to find any other solution besides throwing $100 at another drive. My WD Passport is less than 1.5 yrs old. If it's the drive, then so be it but I'd like to be sure.
Any help, please? Thanks so much in advance.

MichaelEB wrote:
Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandleOperationException:* -[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: Input/output error
Error: (-36) Creating directory 14EB9137-94AE-44B6-BD8A-9283EC9C943D
Failed to make snapshot.
Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandleOperationException:* -[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: Input/output error
Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandl
All various ways of saying "cannot write to the drive." It either couldn't create the (hidden) log file on the TM drive, then couldn't create the folder for the backups, then couldn't write to the log again.
It's probably the drive.
Less likely (but possible considering the cable issue) is a port (try others), or other connections (hook it up directly; no hubs or daisy-chaining.
Another long shot is another USB device taking too much power intermittently. Disconnect all other USB devices.

Time Machine Backup causes system crash ...

After installing Mavericks my iMac 27" was very instable. Every now and then I noticed the spinning wheel and then step by step all functions were shutting down: 1. no menues, 2. no shortcuts, 3. no window change and so on. At the very end only swiping between desktops was possible. Tonight I just let him do hoping this will be fixed. I the morning I noticed the login screen, but without any function.
Actually I assume that the Time Machine Backup causes the problem! I switched it off about two hours ago and the system works perfectly until now.
I am using a TC 1. Gen. with Firmware Version 7.6.4 and Air-Port utility Version 6.3.2.
Routing and WIFI is both turned off on TC, I only use the TC for TM Backup and iPhoto/iTunes Media in a LAN.

Your problem is apparently caused by a third-party system modification. Reboot as usual (not in safe mode) if you haven't already done so. Launch the Terminal application, copy or drag -- do not type -- the line of text below into the window, and press return:
kextstat -kl | awk ' !/apple/ { print $6 } '
Post the lines of output (if any) that appear below what you just entered (the text, please, not a screenshot.)
Next, do the same thing with this line:
sudo launchctl list | sed 1d | awk ' !/0x|apple|com\.vix|edu\.|org\./ { print $3 } '
That's one line, not two. You'll be prompted for your login password, which won't be displayed when you type it. You may get a one-time warning not to screw up. You don't need to post the warning.
Next, this command:
launchctl list | sed 1d | awk ' !/0x|apple|edu\.|org\./ { print $3 } '
Again, one line. Finally, one more:
ls -1 /Library/{InputManagers,StartupItems}
Remember, this is all drag-and-drop or copy-and-paste, whichever you prefer -- no typing, except your password.

How to restore a time machine backup from a corrupted disk

Hi.
I have quite a problem. I recently downgraded to os x 10.5.4 due to the requirements of Digidesign's Pro Tools. I did so with a clean install in order to have the most optimized computer possible without loads of unused data. I had backed up my data using Time Machine on an external hard-drive (LaCie, 1 TB) so I wasn't worried about losing important data.
However, when I inserted my external hard-drive after the clean installation it turns out to be corrupted in some way. It is only recognized in Disk Utility, it doesn't mount on my desktop.
Disk Utility is unable to repair the disk. The errors are:
+Verify and Repair volume “Kristoffer's back-up disk”+
+Checking Journaled HFS Plus volume.+
+Invalid node structure+
+Volume check failed.+
+Error: Filesystem verify or repair failed.+
I went out and bought "Data Rescue II" at once to try to recover my data. It works fine with the stuff I've manually dragged to the disc but the Time Machine backup folders seem compressed in some way (It's only about 86 MB). And when I click a file restored from one of the Time Machine folders it seems like it's just a shortcut to an "original file". I get this error when double-clicking such a file:
+The alias "filename" could not be opened, because the original item cannot be found.+
Is there some way for me to get Time Machine to understand the back up disk even though it's corrupted? Or some other way to retrieve my data?
I have TONS of extremely important data on the disk so it would cost me a huge amount of work to format the disk and start from scratch.
ANY help is greatly appreciated

ohnoono wrote:
Hi.
I have quite a problem. I recently downgraded to os x 10.5.4 due to the requirements of Digidesign's Pro Tools. I did so with a clean install in order to have the most optimized computer possible without loads of unused data. I had backed up my data using Time Machine on an external hard-drive (LaCie, 1 TB) so I wasn't worried about losing important data.
However, when I inserted my external hard-drive after the clean installation it turns out to be corrupted in some way. It is only recognized in Disk Utility, it doesn't mount on my desktop.
Disk Utility is unable to repair the disk. The errors are:
+Verify and Repair volume “Kristoffer's back-up disk”+
+Checking Journaled HFS Plus volume.+
+Invalid node structure+
+Volume check failed.+
+Error: Filesystem verify or repair failed.+
I went out and bought "Data Rescue II" at once to try to recover my data. It works fine with the stuff I've manually dragged to the disc but the Time Machine backup folders seem compressed in some way (It's only about 86 MB). And when I click a file restored from one of the Time Machine folders it seems like it's just a shortcut to an "original file". I get this error when double-clicking such a file:
+The alias "filename" could not be opened, because the original item cannot be found.+
Is there some way for me to get Time Machine to understand the back up disk even though it's corrupted?
no, that's quite impossible. you may try using Disk warrior on that drive. it's known to be able to fix the kind of error that DU is reporting. if that doesn't work your only hope is data recovery. If Data Rescue II doesn't work you can try other data recovery software like Filesalvage or try professional data recovery services (those can can a fortune).
Or some other way to retrieve my data?
I have TONS of extremely important data on the disk so it would cost me a huge amount of work to format the disk and start from scratch.
ANY help is greatly appreciated

Time machine backup fails; error creating folder. Western Digital drive requires password which is perhaps/likely the issue. I can't eliminate the password/encryption.

Time Machine backup fails on new WD external drive (My Passport Studio); error creating folder (after several hours of Time Machine apparently working).
Background: I purchased a Western Digital drive from an Apple Store to use for Time Machine backup. I followed the Western Digital instructions that came with the drive for Mac. I didn't get the Time Machine prompt which the instructions indicated I would receive--namely to select whether I want to encrypt my Time Macine backups. (I already have a Time Machine backup I use at another location, which is perhaps why I didn't receive a prompt.)
I decided to install the Western Digital utilities and security software that comes on the disk--with a view to potentially encrypting the disk (since I still wanted to have an encrypted backup since I was mobile). I forgot that (from experience 2-years previous) that I shouldn't install Western Digital software because it just makes life really complicated.
I tried several times to do a Time Machine backup with failures each time (error creating the backup folder). I tried to get help from WD but I don't think the technicians were following what my issue was. Potentially I was not helpful in explaining it. I deleted the WD applications from my system after the first contact with WD. However the problem persisted--I still had an encrypted hard drive. After three phone sessions with three different WD techs I still could not get a solution. (By the second call I was not at all interested in having an encrypted drive--I just wanted to format and restore the drive to an unencrypted state so that I could have SOME kind of Time Machine backup.)
I still don't have a solution--either to get Time Machine working with the WD encryption/password on the drive, or to remove the encryption so I can backup. Right now my options are to return the drive to the Apple Store -- or get a return authorization from WD. Seems crazy since the drive is fine and I have the working password.

Never install "helpful software" provided by WD and Seagate (or any HD mfg.)
All such stuff is fluff and nonsense that interferes with normal HD operation.
Always when you buy a new HD, format it for Mac and then use it to TM backup or clone a HD, or archive data.
Less is more on HD new out of box. A "blank brick", no fluff and cotton candy software

Can I move existing time machine backups to new, larger disk?

I have used Time Machine with success for a long time. Now I have a much larger disk drive and want to move the old backed up files to the new drive, then continue building files after that.
The current Time Machine backup file's Info says it is --get this-- 48.66 TB in size. But it sits on a 2 TB disk. I don't know if that's a mistake or a peculiar way to account for all the updates.
In the Time Machine preference screen it says I have 169 GB of 2 TB available.
Can I just copy this folder onto the new (4 TB) disk and tell Time Machine to select that as the current disk and have it continue to build and houseclean my accumulated history?
(I've started that process, but it tells me I will be copying zillions of files and will take a boatload of time to do it. It gives me a message that there isn't enough space to make the copy. But, of course, there really is.)

See Pondini's Time Machine FAQ: http://pondini.org/TM/18.html

Time Machine backups failing (error 22) on Time Capsule

Hi
I've been happily using my Time Capsule as a Time Machine backup for the last year or so. Two MacBooks have worked just fine on there, along with a network drive to store some of the wife's files which won't all fit on her Air.
Last night the firmware was updated on the TC and now whenever I try to do a backup on either my MacBook Pro or the MacBook Air I get the following error:
The backup disk image “/Volumes/Data-2/Adrian’s MacBook Pro.sparsebundle” could not be created (error 22).
The backups have always gone into a folder "Data" on the TM previously, and whenever a TM backup began I got a dark green TM disk icon on the desktop. Now this doesn't happen and the above error shows after the TM tries to prepare the disk.
I've tried deleting the .com.apple.timemachine.plist file from the Library Preferences to recreate that, no good. I've tried rebooting both TC and MBP. I've tried moving my old backup to a different folder to start afresh. Nothing has helped.
I also cannot access the old backups - I get this error:
An unexpected error occurred (error code -6584).
I have 1TB space remaining on my 2TB TC, so that shouldn't be an issue. I've tried rolling back the firmware using the Airport Utility as well, but this hasn't helped either.
I'm running OS X Lion 10.7.3 on moth MBP and MBA.
And with that I'm stumped as to why something that was so reliable should now suddenly stop working. The last backup was showing as yesterday at 21:22, which would have been just before I did the update. The only other thing I may have done last night was to map a network drive on the MBA so the wife can connect to her folder on the TC more easily.
Any ideas/solutions gratefully received! Thanks in advance!

Sounds like the backups may be damaged. Try to Repair them, per #A5 in Time Machine - Troubleshooting

Time Machine Backup Failed: Error (12): Link of previous volume failed

I am having troubles with Time Machine, backing up to a new Time Capsule, after I have switched one of the drives being backed up. I replaced a 250 GB external drive with a 500 GB drive, but have given it the same name (otherwise lots of links break). Now I get the following error everytime Time Machine runs:
Error (12): Link of previous volume failed for Athena Disk 2
Where 'Athena Disk 2' is an external USB drive being backed up, which was swapped with a new drive.
Disk Utility reports the drive is clean. I've seen a few other references to similar problems in the forum, but no solution. Console reports that the first (internal non-switched) drive has a bunch of files being backed up, but it seems to abort when it tries to backup the drive that was switched.
I've tried disabling backups, removing the Time Capsule disk and then setting it up again, in an attempt to 'reset' something, but to no avail.
Any ideas? I'm guessing there is a filesystem ID or something similar that Time Machine is using, and it notices that something has changed, but doesn't know what to do about it.
Thanks,
Dave Filip.

I'm having a similar problem, which seemed to start coincident with either a 10.5.6 update OR the replacement of my internal drive with a larger drive (I don't remember which...).
Time Machine backup logs now start similar to this one:
2/9/09 9:30:03 AM /System/Library/CoreServices/backupd[35512] Backup requested due to disk attach
2/9/09 9:30:03 AM /System/Library/CoreServices/backupd[35512] Starting standard backup
2/9/09 9:30:04 AM /System/Library/CoreServices/backupd[35512] Backing up to: /Volumes/H. G. Wells/Backups.backupdb
2/9/09 9:30:14 AM /System/Library/CoreServices/backupd[35512] Event store UUIDs don't match for volume: Macintosh HD
2/9/09 9:30:14 AM /System/Library/CoreServices/backupd[35512] Node requires deep traversal:/ reason:kFSEDBEventFlagMustScanSubDirs|
2/9/09 9:30:23 AM /System/Library/CoreServices/backupd[35512] Backup requested due to disk attach
All of this seems right except for that business about UUIDs, but then we get this:
2/9/09 9:48:52 AM /System/Library/CoreServices/backupd[35512] No pre-backup thinning needed: 113.94 GB requested (including padding), 327.41 GB available
2/9/09 10:13:23 AM com.apple.backupd[35512] CoreEndianFlipData: error -4940 returned for rsrc type FREF (id 133, length 7, native = no)
2/9/09 10:13:24 AM com.apple.backupd[35512] CoreEndianFlipData: error -4940 returned for rsrc type FREF (id 133, length 7, native = no)
2/9/09 10:13:29 AM com.apple.backupd[35512] CoreEndianFlipData: error -4940 returned for rsrc type open (id 128, length 12, native = no)
2/9/09 10:13:29 AM com.apple.backupd[35512] CoreEndianFlipData: error -4940 returned for rsrc type open (id 128, length 12, native = no)
2/9/09 10:13:40 AM com.apple.backupd[35512] CoreEndianFlipData: error -4940 returned for rsrc type FREF (id 128, length 7, native = no)
2/9/09 10:13:40 AM com.apple.backupd[35512] CoreEndianFlipData: error -4940 returned for rsrc type FREF (id 128, length 7, native = no)
2/9/09 11:43:10 AM /System/Library/CoreServices/backupd[35512] Copied 409803 files (94.1 GB) from volume Macintosh HD.
2/9/09 11:43:10 AM /System/Library/CoreServices/backupd[35512] Error (12): Link of previous volume failed for Macintosh HD.
2/9/09 11:43:10 AM /System/Library/CoreServices/backupd[35512] Error (12): Link of previous volume failed for Macintosh HD.
2/9/09 11:43:16 AM /System/Library/CoreServices/backupd[35512] Backup failed with error: 12
which leaves me with a few questions:
a) I don't have fresh backups, and that leaves my system a bit vulnerable. Can I fix this somehow?
b) I don't want to have to start over, but if I do how can I salvage the existing backups at least for the next year or so?
c) What the heck are those "CoreEndianFlipData" errors all about?
Thanks in advance.
Ron

Time Machine backup causes network connections to fail

We have a simple network with OS X Server (10.6.4) + a 10.6.4 Mac client and a Windows XP client. For some time we have been suffering sporadic drop outs of the network connection from the iMac OS X client to the server: the shared drives just disappear and you can't reconnect.
I have now narrowed this down to a problem with Time Machine. By logging on as a user on the OS X Server I was able to observe that the user session on the server suffered the same problem sometimes and this ONLY happens when Time Machine is running - I think its always when Time Machine is backing up the server.
Its an absolutely infuriating problem and very disruptive for our business. I am loath to switch off Time Machine on the server but don't know what else to do. Has anyone else experienced this problem or got any ideas?
Message was edited by: davidav

Yep, Rikakiah, seems you are right, I am not alone! There are two other threads here which discuss the same issue:
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=11539266&#11539266
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=11539227
From my testing it seems that the problem may be related to some interplay between Time Machine and LDAP - I say this because I can sometimes clear the problem and regain access to my shares by going into Workgroup Manager, removing the group assignments (which give access to the shares), saving the change, then adding the group assignments back.
This made me think that your solution should fix it, but unfortunately although I have excluded /var/db from Time Machine backups, I am still sporadically getting the problem.
Message was edited by: davidav
Message was edited by: davidav

Should my Time Machine backup drive have a disk image on it?

My Macbook Air recently went in for repairs and got a near-total refurbishing (thanks Apple!)—new logic board and new SSD drive. When I went to restore it, it turns out that my network-attached drive (on an AirPort Extreme) was NOT creating a reliable Time Machine backup, and had not been, since last April, even though the Time Machine menu bar tool would regularly report that a Time Machine backup was complete.
Meanwhile, I also had a second, portable drive that I would periodically plug in and run a Time Machine backup on as well; it was more current (early February), so I didn't lose too much work. But Time Machine wouldn't recognize that drive to let me restore from scratch the way that I've done with Time Machine before. I could go in and pull files from it manually, which I did, but how tedious! What I ended up doing was restoring from last April from one drive, then pulling over newer files from the other drive.
Obviously I'd like to avoid this sort of thing in the future. Now, as I'm making some changes to how I do all of this (I bought a new super-small portable drive that will be my main Time Machine backup; I no longer trust network-attached storage to work flawlessly with Time Machine, at least if it's not an Apple Time Capsule), I want to make sure that my backups are reliable.
In the process of all of this, I noticed that the old Time Machine backup (the one on the NAS) had a disk image on it, while the other drive didn't. I've just finished running the first round of Time Machine on the new drive, and there is NO disk image.
Thus, my question: is this disk image required for Time Machine to work the way it is supposed to in a catastrophic loss and restore? And if so, how do I "force" Time Machine to create this image on my new drive?

Would you post a screen shot of the disk images so people can see what you are seeing? Make sure you cover any personal information using Preview. Post the screen shot in a Reply using the camera icon. Copy and paste doesn't work.
Screen shots

Using Time Machine Backup as a Startup Disk IT WOULD BE USEFUL FOR ME!!!

I'd like to be able to connect my external hard drive with TIME MACHINE BACKUP on it to other computers when I am not at home and use it as a BOOTABLE DISK! I looked in disk utility and it said it was bootable, but when I started up my computer and held down the key to choose my startup disk, the so called "BOOTALBE" disk did not appear.
Is it possible to boot up off of time machine backups without copying data???

You can't - once posted in a particular discussions area, that is where it remains - unless a moderator moves it to the appropriate area, or a more appropriate area.
You start here, and then narrow your choice down to the appropriate discussions area.
http://discussions.apple.com/index.jspa?categoryID=1
Since you are running Leopard, go to the Mac OS X v10.5 Leopard area, and below this category is a Time Machine discussions area.
http://discussions.apple.com/category.jspa?categoryID=235

Time Machine Backup Failing - error 27

Hi there,
I was backing up my Macbook to my external hard drive using time machine when someone disconnected the hard drive mid-backup. The backup failed and every subsequent backup now fails - time machine buddy spits out an error 27, which I think is a new one to this forum... output below:
Starting standard backup
Backing up to: /Volumes/Time Machine Backups/Backups.backupdb
No pre-backup thinning needed: 743.2 MB requested (including padding), 26.30 GB available
Waiting for index to be ready (917 > 0)
Stopping backupd because the backup volume was ejected!
Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandleOperationException:* -[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: Input/output error
Copied 0 files (0 bytes) from volume Mac HD.
Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandleOperationException:* -[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: Input/output error
Backup failed with error: 27
Can anyone assist? I have a feeling that subsequent backups are working but the backup log needs resetting somehow...
Thanks

greetings Deacs !
have you seen the Time Machine - Troubleshooting user tip ?

All media files vanished. When time machine backup attempted it says disk full? Confused help.

I recently upgraded from osx leopard to snow leopard on my 2008 macbook to sync my new iphone data smoothly. After the installation it was v slow as anticipated and a time machine full restore was done successfully. Now however all my media files have vanished namely precious music videos and pictures. I tries reverting back in time machine but it says no disk space. Also i have 1000 new pictures last uploaded which gas also been backed up by time machine with the computer showing the rest of the files erased. How do i recover both sets of data the old and the new?

How much free space on your internal drive and how much free space on the Time Machine drive? You can use Disk Utility in Applications/Utilities to find free space. If Time Machine gets too full it could delete your backups. I suggest your turn off Time Machine in System Preferences until you get your files restored.
Rather than enter Time Machine using the Time Machine interface, go to the extrernal drive and drill down in the backups.backupdb folder. Go to a date when you know the files existed. Select Macintosh HD > Users > You > Pictures. Do you see the data. Check size? Do the same for Music.
You can drag from these folders to your Desktop as long as you have space on your internal drive.
I suspect you'll need to erase your Time Machine and start new or you'll need to purchase a larger drive. It's recommended that your Time Machine drive is 3X larger than internal drive.

Where are time Machine Backups Located on External Disk?

I was wondering where time machine backups are located on the external disk , and what permissions you have to have to view them. I recently had to delete an account that time machine was set up on and i am only allowed to see backups in the shared folder on the volume. This is on OSX Server and several computers backup their images to the server
Thanks in Advance

On my TM drive, there is a folder called Backups.backupdb at the top level. Inside that folder is a folder named the name of my Mac (as set up for Sharing). Inside there are folders named with a date/time stamp of the backup. Inside there are folders named with my Mac's disk names. And in there are the contents of the disk in the same folder hierarchy, but only the files that changed.

Time Machine backups cause error message "Disk No Ejected Properly"

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