Time Machine causing my system drive to fill up

I really don't know what's happening!
I turned on Time Machine agian after having it off for a month or so. It ran a new back up (whch took almost 12 hours) and all seemed normal. But now, whenever it runs an hourly back up, my system drive gets filled up with something - I don't know what - until it has zero space left!
I can't tell what it's doing or what files have been stuck onto my system drive. If I could tell that, I'd remove them.
So I have two qusetions:
First, what is happening with my system drive? The only thing I've changed is turning on Time Machine. Why would it transfer files to my system drive instead of (or in addition to) storing backups on my backup drive? (The BU drive is a Western Digital 2TB)
Second, is there any way I can determine what files have been added to my system drive to make it fill all the way up? Is there some way to search by a criteria of "files saved to system drive in the last day"?
Please help, it's making my computer useless!

Oh boy Joe, what Apple doesn't tell you is that 10 GB of free disk space is not enough AND isn't free for your use, and in my experience 10.5.8 will be sluggish with less than 30 GB free, higher OS versions needing even more.
Open Activity Monitor in Applications>Utilities, select All Processes & sort on CPU%, any indications there?
How much RAM & free space do you have also, click on the Memory & Disk Usage Tabs.
In the Memory tab, are there a lot of Pageouts?
See if you can clear off a few GBs.
How much free space is on the HD, where has all the space gone?
OmniDiskSweeper is likely the easiest/best, and is now free...
http://www.omnigroup.com/applications/omnidisksweeper/download/

Similar Messages

Time Machine causing slow system

I have been experiencing a problem since starting Time Machine. The system becomes very slow to come out of sleep mode (20-30 seconds). Every application becomes slow, but the slowest of these seems are the applications that have anything to do with the drives (mounting DVD, system preferences, Time Machine, Activity Monitor, Disk Utility, Finder).
I have tried connecting the external drive (Maxtor OneTouch 4 Plus 500GB) via both Firewire 400 and USB, but neither connection method solves the problem. I have used Disk Utility to verify both drives, repair both drives and repair permissions of both drives, but nothing has helped.
The slow response can be corrected by restarting the system, but the problem comes back and gets progressively worse the longer that the Time Machine is allowed to run.
Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.

Let it run, is what I have to say. Time Machine works well with some external hard drives, and poorly with others. I suggest either getting a new external hard drive (which I personally am too cheap to do), or just do time machine back ups at night when I'm asleep. It would save the frustration of slow back up time and still get the job done. Also, you might want to check your time machine preferences. There could be some settings that you could change to help out.

HT3275 When I press "select backup location" in the Time Machine section of System Preferences, my external hard drive doesn't appear as an option. How do I change this?

When I press "select backup location" in the Time Machine section of System Preferences, my external hard drive doesn't appear as an option. How do I change this? My external hard drive is a FreeAgent GoFlex Drive.

Hi, what Format is the external Drive?
They usually come PC Formatted for Fat32/MSdos, or NTFS... is there anything on it now?
How to format your disks...
http://www.kenstone.net/fcp_homepage/partitioning_tiger.html
(To Install OSX on an IntelMac the Drive it needs the GUID Partitioning scheme mentioned at the bottom.)
Thanks to Pondini, Formatting, Partitioning, Verifying, and Repairing Disks...
http://Pondini.org/OSX/DU.html

Time machine causes error message " Disk not properly ejected" with USB backup drive

I am using iMac OS X Lion and Time Machine causes the error message with a WD 1.5 TB drive in aThermaltake dock, USB. every time I wake up the computer.... Ejection of Time Machine and shut it down and turn opp power to drive causes the error message problem to disappear. What is the solutin?

If it were mine I would replace the drive with another brand. WD drives EHD's tend to have more issues than any other EHD. If you want to continue using it you can try resetting the SMC (may take 2-3 tries) and/or restarting in Safe Mode to reset some caches, it's possible one or more has become corrupt.
SMC RESET
Shut down the computer.
Unplug the computer's power cord and all peripherals.
Press and hold the power button for 5 seconds.
Release the power button.
Attach the computers power cable.
Press the power button to turn on the computer.
PRAM RESET
Shut down the computer.
Locate the following keys on the keyboard: Command, Option, P, and R. You will need to hold these keys down simultaneously in step 4.
Turn on the computer.
Press and hold the Command-Option-P-R keys. You must press this key combination before the gray screen appears.
Hold the keys down until the computer restarts and you hear the startup sound for the second time.
Release the keys.

Cannot install Mountain Lion as the installer provides message that my target drive is using Time Machine. My target drive is my internal drive and I use an external drive for Time Machine. When I check the Time Macine set up under system prefereces it sh

Cannot install Mountain Lion as installer sys the target drive I have selected is using Time Machine. The target drive I selected is my internal drive. I have an external drive that I use for Time Machine backup. When I go to System Preferences and look at the Time Machine set up it shows my target disk is the external drive. What to do?

Yes, you’ll be able to do that.
(116841)

Had hard drive renewed due to product recall (iMac) backed up complete system on time machine . Had the drive done got mac back tried to reinstall from time machine .The new drive tells me that the space has been taken up but can't find where the file hav

Had hard drive renewed due to product recall (iMac) backed up complete system on time machine . Had the drive done got mac back tried to reinstall from time machine .The new drive tells me that the space has been taken up but can't find where the file have gone. Need to free up the space that the ghost file take up so I can drag drop from ex drive onto harddrive

Here's the scoop, new friend.....
When you boot into Time Machine you'll get the same OS X Utilities screen as you would if you booted into the Recovery HD. So, from there go into Disk Utilities to erase/format your internal drive. After that's done, back out to the OS X Utilities screen and select the restore option. Just follow the prompts to select the TM back up date you want to restore from and where to restore it to. Pretty straight forward.

Seagate drives not compatible with Time Machine causing OS lag/hangs?

Setup-
Intel iMac (Early 2006)
Mac OS X 10.5.1
Seagate FreeAgent Pro 750GB External Drive
Reproducible Issues
MacOS X lags at start up with the Seagate drive connected via Firewire and Time Machine enabled.
MacOS X hangs at shutdown with the Seagate drive connected via Firewire and Time Machine enabled. The only way to turn off the iMac is to hold the power button down.
I have contacted both Apple Support and Seagate Support. The outcome with Apple resulted in finding no issues with my iMac. The same can not be said of my 35 minute call with Seagate this morning.
The Seagate rep took me through basic troubleshooting steps and then proclaimed that it was Apple's issue and that Apple had issued a patch for this problem. However, the rep was unable to even provide the name of the patch. The problem with this declaration was the fact that it was based on disabling Time Machine and restarting the iMac once. On the second, fifth and seventh reboot after getting off the phone, the iMac hung on shutdown and lagged on reboot.
To add insult to injury the Seagate rep told me not to use the touch sensitive power button on the Seagate drive, since "it doesn't always work properly." Quoted word for word.
A co-worker of mine uses Time Machine with a LaCie drive on his PowerMac G5 and has had zero issues from day one. At this point in time I'm probably going to wipe the drive and return it to Costco unless someone can suggest an alternative.

Hmmm...bought at costco
I bet it is formated with the Master Boot Record Format. it will mount and OS X will read it, but Time Machine will not be able to use it.
You need to be in finder, under go menu, choose utilities. in folder that opens, double click disk utility. This will open a window that shows all your connected drives. Highlight the seagate drive ( the top choice, thats give the drives storage size). in the top group of buttons in the right side of the application window click the partition button. The Volume scheme will show current. Highlight this and choose 1. to the right of that is a place where you can name the drive. Use only normal letters and numbers here. On the bottom of that window, click the options button, and select GUID. click OK and give it a few minutes. close the disk utility application when it is finished
After it is formatted, the drive should show up on your desktop and Time machine should recognize it.

Time machine doesn't recognize old time machine backups after new drive

After getting my original hard drive replaced on apple care. Time machine refuses to recognize time machine backups dating back to October when I first installed Leopard. The Records are there on an "off-board" Lacie drive. Any fixes for this? I have had so many problems with Time Machine I am afraid to turn it back on. Last time it took over 40 hours to do an initial back-up.

Yes I had been having multiple problems and once saved the entire system in archive and install and also time machine had been active since October when I first installed it. all of this was saved to an off-board Lacie drive I can find the old time machine files easily enough but time machine since the new drive, does not recognize them. Since I got the drive back with tiger installed, I first had to re-install Leopard so I don't know if that caused Time machine to start over . I did do an archive and install at that time but there was nothing really to archive since they had not recovered my old files. If this wasn't bad enough The Technician replaced my administrator password with his own and the was off for a few days and I couldn't do anything for awhile. You have been very helpful thank you for your time on my behalf.
Respectfully,
Thomas Carlisle

Time Machine encryption - after restart, drive won't mount

Hi all.
I enabled Time Machine on my Drobo drive, enabling encryption. All was good, Time Machine started encrypting away.
I restarted my Mac, and now my Drobo won't mount.
In Disk Utility, it looks like this:
I'm unable to verify, repair or mount the disk.
I wasn't prompted for the Time Machine encryption key, I assume that this is stored in my Keychain and unlocked on the fly?
But regardless - I'm unsure of what to do next! I've got quite a bit of data on the drobo, and didn't expect it to render the drive completley useless. I'll be gutted if I lose my files on my Drobo besides the Time Machine backup I had.
Any help, suggestions, advice would be much appreciated.
Update: Output from Disk Utility when trying to verify the drive:
Verifying partition map for “Drobo”
Checking prerequisites
Checking the partition list
Checking for an EFI system partition
Checking the EFI system partition’s size
Checking the EFI system partition’s file system
Checking all HFS data partition loader spaces
Checking Core Storage Physical Volume partitions
Checking storage system
Checking volume.
disk1s2: Scan for Volume Headers
Invalid Volume Header @ 8795614850560: unsupported format
disk1s2: Scan for Disk Labels
Invalid Disk Label @ 8795598069760: cksum mismatch
Invalid Disk Label @ 8795602264064: cksum mismatch
Invalid Disk Label @ 8795606458368: cksum mismatch
Invalid Disk Label @ 8795610652672: cksum mismatch
/dev/disk1s2 is not a CoreStorage volume
Problems were found with the partition map which might prevent booting
Error: Storage system verify or repair failed.

Here is the output of `diskutil coreStorage list`:
>: diskutil coreStorage list
CoreStorage logical volume groups (1 found)
|
+-- Logical Volume Group 493EC175-1234-465E-B6F5-324615AD2B94
    =========================================================
    Name:         -none-
    Sequence:     0
    Free Space:   0 B (0 B)
    |
    +-< Physical Volume 92E1ADAF-4567-40C6-BA94-4DB39023E3F3
        Index:    0
        Disk:     disk1s2
        Status:   Failed
        Size:     -none-
Not looking good? But I badly need to recover the data on this drive. How can I ever trust Time Machine to backup my files in the future if it corrupts things like this?

Can I use Time Machine as a backup drive for my Vista 32 PC?

I cannot see any of my Mac computers or Time Machine on my network through my Vista PC, even though I have a wireless card in the PC which can connect wirelessly. I have my PC sitting next to my Time Machine that is the hub for my network. I am connected to the internet via ethernet connection daisy chained through my Time Machine which is connected to my cable router.
I cannot figure out why my PC cannot "see" my Imac, emac, Time Machine, and macbook that are all connected to my wireless network. The PC and Time machine are the only devices with an ethernet wired connection.
I would like to use the Time Machine's 1 terabyte drive to back-up my Vista PC.

I would first set up my mac and vista to do simple file sharing and then work my way from there. If you are unable to figure out simple fire sharing i would go look on other forums or advice. Its rather simple to do but it can also cause a lot of headaches. I have wanted to connect my mac and windows server to my network for a while and just recently figured it out.

Time machine on one external drive, multiple MAC's

Dear all,
I have connected a external drive "LaCie" to my Imac. Time machine on this Imac works fine.
I am trying to get my Macbook's Time Machine to use the LaCie drive as well, but it just won't work. I know there are similar topics on this forum dealing with the same issue, but the solutions described just do not work. What is going wrong?
My Imac is called ImacHans. My personal account "Hans" is the same on the Imac as well as on the Macbook. Passwords are identical. On both machines I am administrator. My Macbook connects to the Imac wirelessly. From my MacBook I can see the ImacHans in the finder. I can browse it's contents. In the finder I can see the "eject button" behind the ImacHans, so I guess that means the ImacHans is mounted? Within the finder I can browse to the LaCie drive. I can add new folders and delete them. Which means I have read and write access rights.
In Time Machine's preferences (on the MacBook) I can select the LaCie. So far so good, but when I ask Time Machine to "back up now" it fails within seconds. The error message is "Time Machine Error, the backup volume could not be found".
What is going wrong?
Any help is much appreciated.
kind regards,
hans.

This may do it from my original idea:
http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1329
Symptoms
If you back up to a Mac OS X 10.5 Server volume or Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard computer using Personal File Sharing via Time Machine, and the password to access the network volume is changed, Time Machine will report "The backup volume could not be mounted" in Mac OS X 10.5.
Products Affected
Mail, Time Machine
Resolution
Mount the network based volume va the Finder's Connect to Server option. Go to Time Machine preferences in System Preferences, click "Change Disk" and reselect the mounted volume as the backup disk.

Using Mac Mini, Time Machine and External Hard Drives as a Backup Server

Hello...
I own a graphic design studio and have been looking for a long time to create/buy a no-thinker backup system for my macs. I have 4 workstations that I would like to backup to one central "server".
So what I was thinking was buying a Mac Mini, 3-4 external USB 2.0 Hard drives, external Blu-Ray burner and upgrade all our systems to OS 10.5. What I need to know is, will each work station with Time Machine on it back up across the network to a specific drive on the Mac Mini? If I have each workstation automatically mount one external across the network onto the desktop, will Time Machine recognize that hard drive as a legitimate drive to backup to?
Having the external Blu-Ray disc burner will give me the ability to burn data to a disc so I will have a way to take some of my information off-site. Since we are a graphic design studio, we use large amounts of disc space and regular DVD-R (4.6 gigs) is just not enough to back up some projects.
Can someone enlighten me, and tell me if this would work or not. It's the only way I can see me creating something that has enough space, will back up automatically across the network and allow me to make off-site copies of my data without spending $5,000.00.
Thanks for any comments you might have on this topic.
-SoupGFX

I'm a member of a freelance graphic artist team and have been scraping by with my MacMini and CS3. I recently obtained a used iMac (approx. 2 years old) and, instead of painstakingly transferring everything left on the Mini to the iMac, I wanted to know if it's possible to turn the MacMini into a pseudo external hard drive using the FW800 port.
I already had an external attached to the Mini and plan on using that as well, but I tend to hoarde information and run out of space really quickly. So keeping the mini around, preferably in a way that I can access it as an external through my iMac, would be perfect. I have very little experience with networking and don't have a wireless connection (yay modem cables!) so I don't quite know how to figure this out.
Has anyone done this? Would a FireWire 800 work? Would I need to set up a network between the two and use them as independently connected computers?

Time Machine with multiple hard drives

I use a very large external hard drive for time machine. I back up to this time machine, the two hard drivs that are inside my macbook pro, 512GB ssd, and 250GB SSD that is in the optical drive. I then backup a 1TB portable hard drive which holds all my movies and then I backup another 1Tb portable hard drive which holds all my "reserve" files, which means they are files that are no longer important to be on my computer. Old pictures, music, etc.
Now, I can't plug all of these drive's in at once. So, let's say I have to do a backup and I have nothing plugged in but the time machine external hard drive. Will it only backup the two hard drives that are in my computer and then later somehow let me go and restore the other drives? Or will it attempt to restore all 4 drives at one time? Because if the one in my computer mess's up, the other's may not be messed up and I do not want it to restore those.
I have used Time Machine before to restore my system. But never since I have started adding extra drives for Time Machine to backup.
I am also planning on adding, yet another drive for it to backup which is a 1TB portable hard drive that I keep raw files on for photography. I'm just curious how this works when and if the time comes.

well superduper is FREE, CCC isnt.........CCC can do the daily updates etc,. Superduper DOES NOT. the CCC and Superduper CLONES are bootable.......so, if your HD crashes, you can throw in the CLONE, and youre back and running in mins, rather than hours etc .
You should NEVER consider a backup a "backup", ........2 copies is 1, and 1 is none.....always have 2 copies of important files / pics etc etc,......... DECADES of work have been lost by people who thought their stuff was safe because they had a (meaning 1) backup.
Simplicity? Yes, Simplicity is my religion. CLONE your HD with programs and settings, ......and use a 2nd HD updated daily / weekly etc (preferable 2 such 'seecond' harddrives, copies of each other) with all personal stuff / work / pics / vids/ documents.....
superficially time machine is simpler, "smack a button and everything backs up".......in REALITY however when it "all goes up in flames"................the pro method (and my method) is QUICKER and more reliable by far to get down and running.
Ive restored other peoples from total crash and burns via Time machine.......and "my" way............my way always ends up faster by a mile. Also personal / work etc files are kept autonomous to the system data / programs OS,.....as it logically should be.
Time machine is the fastest incremental backup........but its as slow as paint peeling if you need it in case of a TOTAL CRASH.......wherein a bootable clone can be thrown in , in less than 20 mins.

Time machine restore from network drive kernel panic

I had a late 2013 macbook pro 15" retina, I was backing up with time machine to a network drive (western digital my cloud). All of my backups are there and the data looks valid. In April I ended up selling the macbook pro, then recently I bought another one and attempted to restore from the network drive.
I chose the option to restore on boot from network device, it properly detects and lets me browse my previous backups. I choose restore, the restore will run for a few hours and then reboot with a kernel panic.
panic(cpu 0 caller 0xffffff00184c0ac1): "Unable to find driver for this platform: \"ACPI\".\n"0/SourceCache/xnu/xnu-2422.90.20/iokit/Kernel/IOPlatformExpert.cpp: 1541"
I've tried a few different backups, one from April, one from march...both result in the same error. Any ideas why this would happen?

Time Machine full system restores only work if the backup disk doesn't need drivers separate from Mac OS X to mount. To make a long story short, you CAN'T do a full system restore with the disk your backups are on.

Time Machine and a network drive combined

I figured out how to connect Time Machine with a network drive (like LaCie Mini). It works great, the only thing is, everytime I restart the mac I need to re-connect manually to the server in order TM can run.
I wondered why OS X gives not the option to connect to certain servers AUTOMATICALLY when starting up?
thanks for help

Well,
PLEASE can you tell us how you figured out how to backup to a network drive because Apple tech told me you could not do that!
To your question though, on those LaCie drives, you have to log in with a password, right? On the drives I have used with clients, although the password was filled in for me, we had to press OK every single time to actually connect to the drive... I could not bypass the login procedure on the drive, it had nothing to do with OSX. You might serve yourself well to see if LaCie can offer you a way to connect to the drive automatically?
Although I know nothing about scripts, could you just get a script to run automatically at startup to connect you to that drive?
I'm interested in this topic so please feel free to share what you know and your experience with it. Thanks in advance.
I was also frustrated to find out that I couldn't even back up via Time Machine to a drive connected via USB to my Airport Extreme... I mean come on!

Time Machine causing my system drive to fill up

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