Time Machine calculating changes and never stops

I have a 27" iMac and I have an intermittent problem with Time Machine.
It will work great and then it will get hung on calculating changes and the only thing I can do is turn off the external drive to make it stop
I have fixed the permissions on the c:\ drive and run repair disk on the external drive
I am a Mac newbie so I don't know what else to do. Any ideas on how to proceed to solve this problem?
TIA
Mark

Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandleOperationException:***
-[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: No space left on device
Check with airport utility.. is there any space left on the TC. if not it cannot work.
You will need to delete something or erase the drive after an archive..
The former TM should do itself.. but it is better IMHO to take action yourself.. not to delete files but to archive and start again. Still that is my opinion only.
Are you plugged in by ethernet? If not it will either take forever or not work.

Similar Messages

Time Machine - Calculating Changes

Many have suffered from Time Machine getting stuck at 99% after a Time Capsule added to system. I was tortured by the same problem and finally fixed it by reasoning things out. Remember, Time Machine looks to back up everything. When you add a Time Capsule your old Time Machine files remain somewhere. In my case it was on another smaller internal SATA. When I added the TC, I forgot to exclude my old Time Machine drive. I went into TM preferences and excluded it and Voila! No more problems. Calculating 99% went away and the backup through ethernet Time Capsule proceeded quite quickly and without problem. I guess Time Machine does not like to back up it's own files on a non-selected drive.
I hope this helps others who are suffering. Worked like a charm.
Ted Stam

hc2008 wrote:
Network destination already mounted at: /Volumes/WD External
Disk image /Volumes/WD External/HCC.sparsebundle mounted at: /Volumes/Time Machine Backups
Backing up to: /Volumes/Time Machine Backups/Backups.backupdb
It +has found+ the sparse bundle. It's not looking for the previous backups on your other internal HD.
Backup content size: 157.8 GB excluded items size: 3.5 GB for volume Macintosh HD
That message is sent when +Calculating Changes+ finishes -- TM has estimated how large the backup will be. The +Copying xx of yy GB+ message should be shown on the TM Preferences panel and the menu when you press the TM icon in your Dock.
Try all the things in #D2 of the Time Machine - Troubleshooting *User Tip,* also at the top of this forum.
Be sure the disk is formatted properly -- either GUID or APM *Partition Map Scheme* and +Mac OS Extended (Journaled)+ Format.
Try all the things in #D2 of the Time Machine - Troubleshooting User Tip, also at the top of this forum.
Also try connecting via Ethernet if possible, for the first full backup. That will be much faster, of course, and will rule out a bad WIFI connection.
As a last resort, per your earlier post, try erasing the TM disk.

HT201250 once time machine starts running, it never stops. what could cause this?

Using WD, My Passport for Mac, 2TB with Time-Machine. Updated software on MacBook, now once time machine starts running an update it does not stop untill cancel it!

1. The first time takes very long always, after that it will only do changes very hour and you will not notice it. The drive must be correctly formatted, Guid Partition Table, Mac Os Extended (journaled).
2. If you installed any of the 'smart' software that came with the disk (specifically with the WD disk), you have to uninstall it completely immediately, because it will cause data loss and speed at the minimum: in macs you do not not need such additional software, just make sure that the disk is correctly formatted. If you had such software installed, and now uninstalled, you better reformat the drive, restart the mac, and then start all over again with TM.
Lex

Time machine calculates changes then stops

My Time Machine backup, which was working fine until yesterday, now just says that it is calculating changes and then preparing them, and then it stops
all together.

This looks like it might be what you are looking for
Jan 21 14:49:38 macbookpro com.apple.backupd[9932]: Error: Flushing index to disk returned an error: 0
Jan 21 14:49:39 macbookpro com.apple.backupd[9932]: Backup canceled.
There were also these other messages
Jan 21 14:46:57 macbookpro com.apple.backupd[9932]: 2012-01-21 14:46:57.483 FindSystemFiles[9939:907] PackageKit: *** Missing bundle identifier: /Library/Receipts/NeoOffice-3.0.1-Intel.pkg
Jan 21 14:46:57 macbookpro FindSystemFiles[9939]: PackageKit: *** Missing bundle identifier: /Library/Receipts/NeoOffice-3.0.2-Intel.pkg
Jan 21 14:46:57 macbookpro com.apple.backupd[9932]: 2012-01-21 14:46:57.484 FindSystemFiles[9939:907] PackageKit: *** Missing bundle identifier: /Library/Receipts/NeoOffice-3.0.2-Intel.pkg
Jan 21 14:46:57 macbookpro FindSystemFiles[9939]: PackageKit: *** Missing bundle identifier: /Library/Receipts/NeoOffice-3.0.2-Patch-3-Intel.pkg
Jan 21 14:46:57 macbookpro com.apple.backupd[9932]: 2012-01-21 14:46:57.485 FindSystemFiles[9939:907] PackageKit: *** Missing bundle identifier: /Library/Receipts/NeoOffice-3.0.2-Patch-3-Intel.pkg
Jan 21 14:46:57 macbookpro FindSystemFiles[9939]: PackageKit: *** Missing bundle identifier: /Library/Receipts/NeoOffice-3.1.1-Patch-1-Intel.pkg
Jan 21 14:46:57 macbookpro com.apple.backupd[9932]: 2012-01-21 14:46:57.487 FindSystemFiles[9939:907] PackageKit: *** Missing bundle identifier: /Library/Receipts/NeoOffice-3.1.1-Patch-1-Intel.pkg
Jan 21 14:46:57 macbookpro FindSystemFiles[9939]: PackageKit: *** Missing bundle identifier: /Library/Receipts/NeoOffice-3.1.2-Patch-1-Intel.pkg
Jan 21 14:46:57 macbookpro com.apple.backupd[9932]: 2012-01-21 14:46:57.488 FindSystemFiles[9939:907] PackageKit: *** Missing bundle identifier: /Library/Receipts/NeoOffice-3.1.2-Patch-1-Intel.pkg
Jan 21 14:46:57 macbookpro FindSystemFiles[9939]: PackageKit: *** Missing bundle identifier: /Library/Receipts/vpnclient-api.pkg
Jan 21 14:46:57 macbookpro com.apple.backupd[9932]: 2012-01-21 14:46:57.502 FindSystemFiles[9939:907] PackageKit: *** Missing bundle identifier: /Library/Receipts/vpnclient-api.pkg
Jan 21 14:46:57 macbookpro FindSystemFiles[9939]: PackageKit: *** Missing bundle identifier: /Library/Receipts/vpnclient-bin.pkg
Jan 21 14:46:57 macbookpro com.apple.backupd[9932]: 2012-01-21 14:46:57.503 FindSystemFiles[9939:907] PackageKit: *** Missing bundle identifier: /Library/Receipts/vpnclient-bin.pkg
Jan 21 14:46:57 macbookpro FindSystemFiles[9939]: PackageKit: *** Missing bundle identifier: /Library/Receipts/vpnclient-gui.pkg
Jan 21 14:46:57 macbookpro com.apple.backupd[9932]: 2012-01-21 14:46:57.504 FindSystemFiles[9939:907] PackageKit: *** Missing bundle identifier: /Library/Receipts/vpnclient-gui.pkg
Jan 21 14:46:57 macbookpro FindSystemFiles[9939]: PackageKit: *** Missing bundle identifier: /Library/Receipts/vpnclient-kext.pkg
Jan 21 14:46:57 macbookpro com.apple.backupd[9932]: 2012-01-21 14:46:57.505 FindSystemFiles[9939:907] PackageKit: *** Missing bundle identifier: /Library/Receipts/vpnclient-kext.pkg
Jan 21 14:46:57 macbookpro FindSystemFiles[9939]: PackageKit: *** Missing bundle identifier: /Library/Receipts/vpnclient-profiles.pkg
Jan 21 14:46:57 macbookpro com.apple.backupd[9932]: 2012-01-21 14:46:57.506 FindSystemFiles[9939:907] PackageKit: *** Missing bundle identifier: /Library/Receipts/vpnclient-profiles.pkg
Jan 21 14:46:57 macbookpro FindSystemFiles[9939]: PackageKit: *** Missing bundle identifier: /Library/Receipts/vpnclient-startup.pkg
Jan 21 14:46:57 macbookpro com.apple.backupd[9932]: 2012-01-21 14:46:57.506 FindSystemFiles[9939:907] PackageKit: *** Missing bundle identifier: /Library/Receipts/vpnclient-startup.pkg
Jan 21 14:46:57 macbookpro FindSystemFiles[9939]: Using system path cache.
Jan 21 14:46:57 macbookpro com.apple.backupd[9932]: 2012-01-21 14:46:57.582 FindSystemFiles[9939:907] Using system path cache.
Jan 21 14:47:17 macbookpro com.apple.backupd[9932]: Node requires deep traversal:/ reason:contains changes|must scan subdirs|fsevent|

HT3275 Backing up 87.6 MB of 87.6 MB' and never stops.

My time machine keeps backing up 87.6 MB of 87.6 MB again and again and again.
I erased my time capsule drive ('0'ing out never did complete - seemed to hang at the very last stage - but a quick erase seemed to work perfectly) as I wanted to start fresh after putting a bigger HD into my Macbook Pro.
I have 'verified' my backup with no errors shown.
I have deleted the 'in progress' file (more than once).
Now the time machine says: 'Backing up 87.6 MB of 87.6 MB' and never stops.
If I delete the 'in progress' file within the sparsebundle it just prepares the files and gets back to this point again.
I usually backup over wifi but have bee trouble shooting over ethernet connection.
I just checked and it changed to 'backing up 130 MB of 130 MB' and now 'backing up 131.9 MB of 131.9 MB'. But it has been working continuously ever since I manually started the backup (again) this morning - without finishing or re-calculating anything.
Cant find any solution in the pondini FAQ.
system.log: (aaaaaaaa and xx@xxx substituted for the actual names)
Feb 7 12:10:32 aaaaaaaa com.apple.backupd[550]: Starting standard backup
Feb 7 12:10:32 aaaaaaaa com.apple.backupd[550]: Attempting to mount network destination using URL: afp://[email protected]/AirPort%20Disk
Feb 7 12:10:32 aaaaaaaa com.apple.backupd[550]: Mounted network destination using URL: afp://[email protected]/AirPort%20Disk
Feb 7 12:10:42 aaaaaaaa com.apple.backupd[550]: QUICKCHECK ONLY; FILESYSTEM CLEAN
Feb 7 12:10:45 aaaaaaaa com.apple.backupd[550]: Disk image /Volumes/AirPort Disk-1/aaaaaaaa.sparsebundle mounted at: /Volumes/Time Machine Backups
Feb 7 12:10:45 aaaaaaaa com.apple.backupd[550]: Backing up to: /Volumes/Time Machine Backups/Backups.backupdb
Feb 7 12:16:52 aaaaaaaa com.apple.backupd[550]: No pre-backup thinning needed: 938.4 MB requested (including padding), 542.56 GB available
Any ideas? Thanks.
Model Name:    MacBook Pro
Model Identifier:    MacBookPro5,4
Processor Name:    Intel Core 2 Duo
Processor Speed:    2.53 GHz
Number Of Processors:    1
Total Number Of Cores:    2
L2 Cache:    3 MB
Memory:    8 GB
Bus Speed:    1.07 GHz
Boot ROM Version:    MBP53.00AC.B03
SMC Version (system):    1.49f2
System Software Overview:
System Version:    Mac OS X 10.6.8 (10K549)
Kernel Version:    Darwin 10.8.0
Boot Volume:    1TBDrive
Boot Mode:    Normal
Secure Virtual Memory:    Enabled
64-bit Kernel and Extensions:    Yes
Message was edited by: hangingbyathread
Message was edited by: hangingbyathread

Despite having little faith in getting a resolution I thought I'd post my latest update (in case anyone else is suffering the same fate).
I guess I will take everything down to an Apple store and see if they can help.
I was having issues getting the Time Machine Buddy widget to load and realized that the 'Dash board' was not working at all so I deleted my dashboard preferences.
Once I got Time Machine Buddy working l looked up and saw that my time machine has given me the error message: " . . . Time Machine must create a new backup for you." !!!
I don't know/doubt that this was related to my backup issues but have now just finished a complete new backup after erasing my entire backup drive (once again).
I have excluded my drop box and google drive folders- just in case.
It seemed to be working OK (hardwired over ethernet).
BUT now Im back where I started.
I did notice that sometimes the number of MB being 'backed up' was continually, but slowly, growing yesterday. It went through numerous 'attempts' Eventually it got to 'cleaning up'. And did for well over an hour……. (I went to bed)
I tried again this evening and it once again made a number of backups.
My time machine says that the oldest backup is 4pm yesterday (even though, yesterday it had an older backup from the night before) and my most recent was yesterday at 11:49pm - and it ran all night!!!!!
Here's the last of many, many, many 'buddy' logs(which backup I just cancelled):
Starting standard backup
Attempting to mount network destination using URL: afp://xxxx@xxxxxxx._afpovertcp._tcp.local/AirPort%20Disk
Mounted network destination using URL: afp://xxxx@xxxxxxx._afpovertcp._tcp.local/AirPort%20Disk
QUICKCHECK ONLY; FILESYSTEM CLEAN
Disk image /Volumes/AirPort Disk/yyyyyyyyyyyyy.sparsebundle mounted at: /Volumes/Time Machine Backups
Backing up to: /Volumes/Time Machine Backups/Backups.backupdb
No pre-backup thinning needed: 1.54 GB requested (including padding), 548.52 GB available
Copied 86.5 MB of 576.9 MB, 20331 of 69709 items
Copied 288.5 MB of 576.9 MB, 348008 of 348008 items
Copied 348426 files (663.1 MB) from volume 1TBDrive.
No pre-backup thinning needed: 933.6 MB requested (including padding), 548.52 GB available
Copied 83.6 MB of 83.6 MB, 1954 of 41494 items
Copied 2896 files (83.6 MB) from volume 1TBDrive.
Backup canceled.
Ejected Time Machine disk image.
Ejected Time Machine network volume.

Time machine calculating size

Time machine calculation size forever (at least all night) and never concludes. Have to force reboot to recover. MAC os 10.7.4.

This simple procedure will clear your Time Machine settings, including both overt and hidden exclusions. The backups won't be affected. If you have a long exclusion list that can't be recreated easily, you may prefer a more complicated procedure that preserves the exclusion list. In that case, ask for instructions. Otherwise, do as follows.
Triple-click the line below to select it:
/Library/Preferences/com.apple.TimeMachine.plist
Right-click or control-click the highlighted line and select
Services ▹ Reveal
from the contextual menu. A Finder window should open with a file selected. Copy it to the Desktop. Then move it (the original, not the copy) to the Trash. You'll be prompted for your administrator password. Reboot, recreate your settings in the Time Machine preference pane. It will show that you have no backups. Don't be alarmed; that's expected. Run a backup to test. If TM now performs as expected, delete the file you copied to the Desktop.

Time Machine Menu Extra, and Preference Pane not remembering Recent Backups

For some reason, all of a sudden under my Time Machine Menu Extra, and the Preference Pane it's self shows the most recent backup as "--". I will watch it back up successfully, and no change. I can even load into time machine, see my recent hourly backups for the last few days and still refuses to update. Any ideas?

Hello jr:
Welcome to Apple discussions.
I have never seen that before. However, I think I would trash the preference file (com.apple.timemachine.plist) and restart your computer.
Barry

I updated my mac which is an O X LION .7 but after the update has completed the mac rebooted itself and never stop booting

i updated my mac which is an O X LION .7 but after the update has completed the mac rebooted itself and never stop booting

flamebliss wrote:
yes wen i try booting in Safe Mode it behave the same. i have downloaded the combo update of 10.7.5 from another laptop, so how do i run it on my mac. THANKS for helping
The goal is to mount the combo update .dmg on the desktop and then open and run it. If you can't get to the desktop to begin with, that won't work. Another approach is to treat the Mac's hard disk as just another HD by using a second Mac and then connecting the problematic one via Target Disk Mode. See http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1661. Note that both Macs will need Firewire ports and you'll need a FIrewire cable to connect them. With the combo updater, one of the steps in the process is to select the drive you want to install the update on. Once you're successfully connected in Target Disk Mode, the problematic drive should appear in the list.
If that doesn't work or Target Disk Mode isn't possible, the only other solution is to boot into Recovery Mode; see http://support.apple.com/kb/ht4718. Note that once booted into recovery mode, you have access to Disk Utility, and you should try running Repair Disk after selecting the bad drive to see if something's wrong with the directory which could be fixed. When you select that drive, you should also look at S.M.A.R.T. Status at the bottom of the window. It should say "Verified." If it says Failing or Failed, the HD needs to be replaced.
If the HD is OK, all that's left that I can think of is to reinstall Lion using Recovery Mode. I hope you've maintained current backups or at least complete Time Machine backups. Of course, if you have a backup and the backup is bootable, you could boot from that, wipe the internal HD clean, and clone the backup onto the internal HD.

I have partitioned my time capsule, but I can't get it to work as a Time Machine back up and permanent media server for both mac and PC. What format do I need to partition the drive to so that it works for both mac and windows and so that it will be visab

I have partitioned my time capsule, as I want part of it to act as a media server for both mac and windows. However I don't know what format that I need to partition it to. I also can't make it a permanently accesible drive. I want to restore the drive to the original format (which I don't know) and start again and re-partition the drive in a format that can be used for media by both mac and PC and for time machine back-ups and make the media part of it permanetly accesible so I can add and acccess my files.
Thanks

You are mixing up a couple of things here.
The TC drive cannot be partitioned without removing it.. did you do that?
If you partition it you must use a Mac disk utility and use the HFS+ ie standard Mac format. And GUID partition table not windows type.
You can select erase disk in the airport utility.. that will take the disk back to original format. No partitions. TC is deliberately not partitioned as it is not a media server.. it is a backup device for TM. Over time .. the disk will be filled with TM backups so you have a long history of file changes to your computer.
There is no media server in the TC.. it is merely disk storage.. you can serve files from it to a media device.. but the TC itself is dumb as dumb.
Now the actual format of the drive is irrelevant to the PC.. The TC offers SMB file services to the network. You can copy files to and from the TC as if it was a local disk without caring one iota about the format. The TC handles that .. it is not a local disk .. it is a network drive.
Although you cannot partition the TC. you can still copy files to it.. this does have implications for TM.. but as long as there is plenty of free space should not be a major issue.
You can create a disk image via the disk utility in a Mac.. and as stated you can create partitions if you do it on a Mac with the disk directly connected which means breaking warranty if any exists on the TC.

HT3275 Time machine at home and it will not allow me to remove the listing of my external hard drive from the excluded files list.

Please help guys, I have a Time machine at home and it will not allow me to remove the listing of my external hard drive from the excluded files list.
I am trying to use time machine to back up the hard drive. For backing up from Macbooik pro and Imac, there is no problem. It seems to not want to allow the external drive to be removed from the Excluded list and as such will not back up from it.
Is there a way to be able to transfer files (music, movies etc) to time machine, format the external drive then put the files back to hard drive?
Sorry it is a long winded question but it is driving me nuts that I cant sort this out.
The <Macbook and Imac are both running mountain lion.
Thanks Guys

As for the hard drive to which you have never been able to write, is it by any chance in NTFS format? OS X can read NTFS for importing files, but it does not contain code for writing on an NTFS volume. That's a choice, not a bug.
There is third-party software available to install NTFS-writing capability into OS X. An example is Paragon NTFS for Mac OS X. Another alternative would be to use a disk format that both Macs and Windows systems can use for both reading and writing; this would require either a new drive or erase the existing data.
If by "the new system software" you mean OS X 10.9 Mavericks, you may want to repost that portion of your query in the Mavericks forum at https://discussions.apple.com/community/mac_os/os_x_mavericks . I haven't made the leap yet.
I don't know what other problems you have been having, so I cannot comment on them. You don't seem to have any other recent postings on these forums.

Mac OS X Server 10.6.7 update - Time Machine not working and other trouble.

I've upgraded my mid 2010 mac mini server to 10.6.7 with server Combo download.
After installation (without any errors) i've detected this troubleshooting.
Time Machine (backup hd is the 2nd 500GB Hd of mini server) dont work more and
display error message that suggest to verify hard disks (done with no errors detection).
Mac Help display white page.
And if try to install Server Admin Tools, installation utility not recognize system HD and cannot be done.
The mac mini server seems however works and services seems works rights. Can be rebooted without problems.
I've tried to backup the system disk on the second hd with Carbon Copy Cloner without problem and it recognize system disk well.
I've upgraded also two others mac minis (mid 2010) with standard 10.6.7 version (no server) and a macbook and a macbook pro without problems (but i've not tried time machine on them).
Thanks in advance for any help!

I know the problems with Time Machine on Mac OS server. In your case: Look at the log files, searching for "backupd", if that tells you anything.
In my case, Time Machine in the last year stopped several times. Occasionally, there was a helpful message in the log files where I could identify a file where it had hung -- typically intermediate build results of Xcode. After excluding or deleting the offending files (where possible), Time Machine ran successfully.
Another situation which has repeatedly occurred is that time machine just hangs and does not progress, and no log entry helps. In 3 such cases what helped was to delete the spotlight index (e.g., with TinkerTool System) and let it rebuild. It took inordinately long (10 hrs) and there were log entries by mdworker that it had difficulty processing files. But when the spotlight index was finally rebuilt, Time Machine worked again.
BTW: I don't need Time Machine to backup the server system, for that I run mirrors etc., but for user files it is most convenient and has helped several times. Thus I have excluded nearly everything but /User/*.

Could not restore CS5 using Time Machine after changing to Mac OS8.3

Could not restore Photoshop CS5 using Time Machine after changing to Mac OS8.3 - the change was dictated by a power supply problem (now fixed) in my Macbook Pro - that has been fixed.

Restoring the Adobe application via Time machine is not a good practise and may cause other issues as well.
Please install the application properly rather restoring.

My fan keeps running and never stop

my laptop is dell studio 1458
the system is the latest archlinx x64, and now i am using kde 4.6
the problem is that the fan of my laptop keeps running all the time and never stop.
Is there any solution to this problem?
Thx...

The warning is there so that people realize they need to be aware of the possible outcome if they don't properly check their fans during the setting up of the software.
The guide even suggests to keep a constant watch on the CPU's temperature during testing, and suggests how you can immediately spin up the fans to max in case of a too high temperature:
Second warning: Some of the steps outlined below describe how to tweak fan speeds. Before doing this be sure you have a low cpu load and are comfortable playing around. If at any time during tweaking you notice the CPU temperature start to rise dramatically, do a echo "255" > /sys/class/hwmon/hwmon0/device/pwm1 to spin up the fan all the way until things cool down. Basically, you should know what you're doing before fooling with the configuration file.
Alternatively, there's a fan control deamon called dellfand. A related topic can be found here:
https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=54865
Essentially, all these tools do the same. The temperature is polled and the fan speed is adjusted.
As far as I know, there is no alternative way / graphical tool to do this for you.
*edit*
considering this is a dell studio, have you checked the system's bios to see if the automated fan control is enabled?
Last edited by stefanwilkens (2011-04-29 13:03:18)

Time Machine, Folder sync and iDisk

Hi, I've been using the local iDisk sync to store my files but I fear they may be deleted when some sync fails (again) so I would like to have Time Machine. I moved my files to the Documents folder in my Home folder to have Time Machine but I would like it to be synced with the Documents folder in my local iDisk in order to be synced "to the cloud". On the other computers I would sync the Documents folders (Home and iDisk) so I have Time Machine too.
What I plan to accomplish is to sync the files from Documents -> Documents (iDisk) -> Cloud -> Documents (iDisk) -> Documents and the other way around.
I would like some help, an idea of a sync program that could sync the folder with the local iDisk everytime it was changed so the sync is automatic.
Info: Time Machine is up and running, iDisk local sync is activated, all updates are installed - on all of the Macs and there are 5 computers: MacBook, MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, iMac, Dell PC running XP with mapped iDisk and offline copy.
Info2: Anything that costs more than $25 or is not incremental copy is out of question (slow internet and low budget-ironically)
Message was edited by: Eduardo Araripe

Using Sync Two Folders. Not the best option but...

Time Machine taking forever and backing up extensive files. Help!

Ever since we upgraded my spouse's iMac, Time Machine has been acting up. My Mac store/guru guy migrated all the files from her really old G5 to her "new" (refurbished) aluminum iMac... NOT from the external HD she used for her Time Machine back-ups. When we connected the external HD to her new iMac, Time Machine automatically made a new back-up folder and did a complete back-up to that new folder. That was unexpected but understandable. After that, however, subsequent back-ups take forever, and Time Machine insists on preparing tens of thousands of files for back-up every time it runs, even though the great majority of said files had not been touched and did not need to be backed up. I will periodically check Time Machine preferences during these interminable back-ups, and sometimes it will be stuck in the "preparing" phase, and sometimes in the "finishing up" phase. The poor external HD just cranks and cranks and cranks.
I've read many of the Time Machine-related questions and responses, but none seem to address this particular problem. I tried putting the external HD on the Spotlight Preferences/Privacy/Indexing exclusion list, quitting System Preferences, then opening it up again and reversing the process to see whether Spotlight would re-index the external HD (per one communities suggestion I read), but that didn't seem to take place.
I have yet to visit the site referenced several times as the Time Machine FAQ gold mine; will do that next.
Any other ideas, anyone?

Thanks, Joe. My software is up to date. I forgot to mention that, after this first began happening, I erased the external HD and had Time Machine start all over again. It did the first, complete backup overnight, but subsequent ones still take longer than they should and it still prepares 90,000 - 120,000 items when it should be doing no where near that many files on an hourly basis. I'm wondering whether the cable needs to be changed out, as well. We're running OS 10.6.8.

Time Machine calculating changes and never stops

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