Time machine does not back up automatically to an external usb drive

When I use Time machine to back up to an external usb hd, (Western Digital with I have to use the "backup now" command. When I "Enter Time Machine" all I see is the last backup. When I look on the drive, all the backups are listed in a "Backups.backupb" directory conatained in a Sparsebundle directory. Is there some way to set it up so it backs up automatically and show all my backups?

Hi G:
By system clock, I meant the one that displays the time in the menu bar. I think I made up some new terminology!
Needless to say, I have not seen a situation like yours before.
Hopefully one of my more technical virtual colleagues will have more suggestions. I am sorry I have not been more helpful. I do not want to suggest things that will take your time that "might" work.
Barry

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HT201250 My time machine is not backing up automatically to my time capsule since my upgrade to Moutain Lion.

Since I upgraded my iMac,my time machine is not backing up automatically to my time capsule since my upgrade to Moutain Lion.

I have a similar problem. On my iMac, I swapped out (at Genius Bar) my HD via Seagate replacement program. Ever since my time machine won't backup. I get a error msg that says:
Time Machine couldn't complete the backup to "[my time machine name]"
The backup disk is not available.
Any suggestions.
Thanks

HT3275 My time machine does not back up and giving me this error message: The backup disk image "/Volumes/Data-1/Amiel's MacBook Pro.sparsebundle" is already in use. Pls help.

My time machine does not back up and giving me this error message: The backup disk image “/Volumes/Data-1/Amiel’s MacBook Pro.sparsebundle” is already in use. Pls help.

Make sure that there are no other Macs backing up at the present time.
Pull the power cord from the back of the Time Capsule
Count to ten
Plug the power cord back in
This will "fix" things about 98% of the time. Post back if you are in the unlucky 2% category.

Time machine does not back up iPhoto in mountain lion ?

My Time Machine does not back up my iPhoto library. When I open Time Machine I get Desktop display going back to installation date.
All other applications respond correctly including Mail, Contacts, etc. My Seagate drive is not involved in the present programme of repair I have been told by Apple. Any ideas?

I'm now fixed and done (update to latest software and learn how to use it)
Thanks again Ivan for the article, it alerted me to otherwise incomprehensible changes in iPhoto/Time Machine operation such as in my case would transfer 3.8GB of data to restore a single photo, while apparently loosing all photos added after that backup time.
However the article says:
When using iPhoto ’11 (version 9.2 or later) and Time Machine with OS X Lion 10.7.2 (or later), iPhoto no longer has the Browse Backups option. This means that instead of restoring specific photos within your iPhoto Library, you must restore your entire iPhoto Library.
This may be practically true but it is technically false.
To restore a single photo in iPhoto '11 with Time Machine it goes something like this:
Start with your Time Machine hard drive and navigate many steps (including showing package contents where necessary) all the way through to the photo/date you want. Drag it to your desktop. (Do not make any edits in Time Machine!) Import to iPhoto. Click on last import in iPhoto. Right click the photo and change the event name, then look for it at the right date in iphoto with the new event name.
Hopefully those with more time and patience can check this out and see what it can do. I had to do it twice with Apple suport senior tech to get it. What a pain compared to iPhoto' 09 but at least now I can restore iPhoto library or a photo if necessary.
David

Time Machine does not back up all iTunes music files

Hello, I'm trying to view the music files, on my Time Machine backup disc, from a CD that I recently imported into iTunes. My iTunes library resides on my hard drive. The backup disc shows files for some of the other music that is in my iTunes library, but not from the new CD. I did several backups after importing the new music, but the song files still do not show up in Time Machine. Any ideas for why the files don't show up?
My ultimate aim is to copy those music files onto another computer, but my research on the support pages suggests that I should not do it this way. Instead, I will copy the music files onto another disc (not using Time Machine) and then import them onto the other computer. Please confirm that this is the best way to proceed.
But in the meantime, I'm wondering why Time Machine does not show my newly imported music.
Thanks very much for any help you can provide.

New formulation of my question:
A file dated at 10:00 may not appear in the back-up dated 11:00.

Time Machine does not un-mout automatically

When my Time Machine is finished backing up (over the wireless network) it does not automatically un-mount. It used to. Any ideas why it suddenly stopped. Otherwise it works fine.

Hi G:
By system clock, I meant the one that displays the time in the menu bar. I think I made up some new terminology!
Needless to say, I have not seen a situation like yours before.
Hopefully one of my more technical virtual colleagues will have more suggestions. I am sorry I have not been more helpful. I do not want to suggest things that will take your time that "might" work.
Barry

Time Machine - does not back up

Hello - I am new to Time Machine and have spent the last few hours trying to figure out why it is not backing up to my new 1TB hard drive.
I have followed the steps in Mac 101: TM and also looked into the FAQs and have done the following:
FAQ #5 - erase and format with the Disk Utility App
A4. Full Reset of Time Machine
hard reset and deleting the
but I always get the same result:
- time machine is turned ON, the lock is unlocked for me to change things
- when i choose "back up now" from the menu bar, nothing happens. the status from the menu bar says "automatic backups off" and it also says that in the Next Backup line of the TM program.
- i start a backup by "select disk" and chose my Time machine and "Use for backup"....then the "next backup" line does a countdown from 120 seconds until one second....and thing nothing!
it just keeps one second until i click again on the time machine program and then it switches to "automatic backups off".
time machine buddy widget says "no time machine information found"
i have no idea what to try next but really would like to be able to use this feature.
thanks so much,
a
I have no idea what to try next.

Check the +Exclude these items from backups+ box in TM Preferences > Options. See if your internal HD is listed there, or anything else (besides, of course, your TM drive) that might be preventing backups.
Try the +Back Up Now+ again, while the TM Preference display is on the screen. Even if something is preventing the automatic backups, that should start something.
Watch the area where it shows *Next Backup.* You should get a series of status-type messages and a progress bar there, even if only briefly.

Time Machine does not back up anymore

Hello,
My Time Machine keeps on 'calculating' and does not back up anymore. It seems that the Time Capsule is full, but until recent it always deleted the oldest backups automatically (with a message).
Maybe a Time Machine Buddy report helps:
+Starting standard backup+
+Attempting to mount network destination using URL: afp://Marko%[email protected]/TC+
+Mounted network destination using URL: afp://Marko%[email protected]/TC+
+QUICKCHECK ONLY; FILESYSTEM CLEAN+
+Disk image /Volumes/TC/MBP_002332c8a134.sparsebundle mounted at: /Volumes/Backup of MBP+
+Backing up to: /Volumes/Backup of MBP/Backups.backupdb+
+Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandleOperationException:* -[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: No space left on device+
+Event store UUIDs don't match for volume: Macintosh HD+
+Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandleOperationException:* -[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: No space left on device+
+Exception writing exclusions cache. NSFileHandleOperationException:* -[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: No space left on device+
+Unable to create exclusions cache data.+
+Failed to write exclusions cache. Continuing anyway.+
+Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandleOperationException:* -[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: No space left on device+
+Waiting for index to be ready (101)+
+Waiting for index to be ready (101)+
Any help is greatly appreciated!
Thanks!

Do you have other data on the Time Capsule, besides backups?
It looks like the TC is so full that Time Machine can't get started far enough to delete some old backups.
If there is other data there, copy something elsewhere and delete it, at least temporarily. It doesn't have to be very large; 20 MB or so should be enough.
If not, try to delete an old backup manually per #12 in Time Machine - Frequently Asked Questions (or use the link in *User Tips* at the top of this forum).
You might want to connect via Ethernet cable if possible; especially if Time Machine is trying to do a large backup, it will have to delete a lot of old ones. It will be 2-3 times faster than via WIFI.
|
Mixing Time Machine backups and other data on a Time Capsule can be a problem. Once you get this sorted out, see #Q3 in Using Time Machine with a Time Capsule (or use the link in *User Tips* at the top of the +Time Capsule+ forum).
Message was edited by: Pondini

Meverckics time machine does not back up wiki

I am using a Mac Pro mid 2013 as a server for my team. I use it only for wiki (no other service like mail server or website host). I started using in October 2013. December 2013, the Time Machine informed me that it runs out of space (my working HD is 1 TB, at that time it is more than 500 Gb in use. The HD for Time Machine is 3TB). I just let the Time Machine keep running ( it said that it woud arrange to delete old backups to make room for new ones).
Yesterday, the wiki database is corrupted and I fully restore from TM. to my horror, the wiki is only restored to December 2013. Which means we lost the works of the last 6 months. I check the backup files in Time Machine and found out that the last wiki database (Library/Server/Wiki) was updated to December 2013 only, even though other files were updated to yesterday. I checked the TM preference and wiki database is not in list of files excluding from backing up.
My questions:
1. Does any one know why the Time Machine doesn't back up wiki while it backs up other files?
2. In future, how can I prevent this happen again?
3. Can I recover the works of last six months (in other words, does Mavericks server keep wiki database where else other than Library/Server/Wiki?
many thanks in advance!
infor:
Mac Pro mid 2013. 12Gb ram?
working HD: 1TB
time machine HD: 3TB
server service used: only wiki!

Time machine no longer working: Apple Support Communities

Time Machine will not delete the oldest backup when external hard drive is full

I may not understand this timemachine thing, but....
I have macbook pro, 15", mid 2011, mountain lion......I have a WD Passport Studio I have ben using to back up with time machine periodically. I tried to back up today and it says i do not have enough room on my external drive. I tought the time machine automatically deletes the oldest back up?

I agree with Linc's response but you also have to realize that it will keep the oldest backup and start removing snapshots if it can.
It is my undestanding that time machine does what is called a full backup the first time and then the snapshots done after that are changes since the first backup. I'm not sure if time machine then does periodic backups or just snapshots.

Time machine does not back up to external drive

I plug in my hard drive and it is working..click "back up now" and it starts, but stops within a few seconds??????

Launch the Console application in any of the following ways:
☞ Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.)
☞ In the Finder, select Go ▹ Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens.
☞ If you’re running Mac OS X 10.7 or later, open LaunchPad. Click Utilities, then Console in the page that opens.
Select "system.log" from the file list. Enter "backupd" (without the quotes) in the Filter text field. Post the messages from the last backup, beginning with "Starting standard backup." Post the log text, please, not a screenshot. Edit out excessive repeats, if any. Some personal information, such as the names of your files, may be included – edit that out, too, but don’t remove the context.

Time Machine does not backup all files

I recently did a clean install and to my horror i can see that Time Machine does NOT back up all my files.
It seems to be worst in my music library which fortunately is pretty easy to rebuild do to itunes index.
But is there any way to make sure that Time Machine does in fact back up all files?
Or is it just broken and should be avoided?
I have 1,5 year old Macbook Pro Retina 15 inches 500 GB SSD

If you use the third-party application "Dropbox," you may see files in the Finder that are not present locally, but are actually on a network server. Those files won't be backed up and won't appear in Time Machine, even though they show in a Finder window. If the files in question are in a Dropbox folder, disable the software or refer to its developer for support.
Continue only if you've ruled out Dropbox or any similar product as a possible cause of the issue.
Open the Time Machine preference pane and unlock the settings, if necessary. Click the Options button. If there is one particular folder with items that are not being backed up reliably, add it to the list of excluded items. If there are many such folders, add your home folder to the list, or add a whole volume (i.e., what Apple calls a "disk.") Save the changes.
Start a backup, or wait for one to happen automatically. When it's done, open the preference pane again and remove the exclusion(s) you made earlier. Back up again and see whether there's a change.

Time machine has stopped backing up to my Western Digital Network Drive

I have a WD 1TB World Edition drive which pretty much worked plug 'n' play when I bought it in early Jan backing up with with Time Machine instead of the bundled software. I've had a few troubles backing up, but largely due to router problems. Time machine has worked great with the drive, as promised.
Until a few days ago, when it stopped backing up altogether. The usual backup icon stopped appearing on the desktop and it came up with error message saying the backup file cannot mount or something like that. Strangely, the shared folders on the drive still show up and I can access all the mp3 files, etc I have loaded up. So, I checked the router, cabling to the drive, rebooted the drive, resetted the drive and checked the settings using MyBookWorld. This stopped the error message showing when I tried to backup and the backup icon now shows on the desktop again. But it won't backup !!! It just stalls and in Time Machine says its configuring without doing anything. I have tried hooking up to the drive directly, still no joy.
I'm now at the end of my tether. Does anyone have any ideas? I have asked WD support and they were next to useless. Thanks !

Hi, and welcome to the forums.
Time Machine does not back up reliably, if at all, to most network drives, except Time Capsules or a shared drive on another Mac running Leopard or Snow Leopard on the same local network.
Here's the criteria they must meet: Disks that can be used with Time Machine. And be careful here: just because some 3rd-party hardware claims to support Time Machine doesn't necessarily mean that Apple supports it, or that it will work in all circumstances.
We've seen a number of problems reported with that drive. Have you downloaded the firmware update that's supposed to make it work?
with error message saying the backup file cannot mount or something like that.
The exact message might help.
Time Machine says its configuring
Is the word "configuring" or is it "Calculating changes"? "Configuring" sounds more like a message from WD, or perhaps your router, than one coming from Time Machine.
Click here to download the +Time Machine Buddy+ widget. It shows the messages from your logs for one TM backup run at a time, in a small window. Navigate to the backup in question, then copy and post all the messages for that run here.
You might also try to Repair the backups. I don't know exactly how you'd get to them on a NAS, but try the procedure for a Time Capsule in #A5 of the Time Machine - Troubleshooting *User Tip,* also at the top of this forum.

I have a 2013 macpro I upgraded to yosemite. Now I find time machine does not work, nor my old back up using a click free wireless back up. What is the status of time machine and yosemite?

What is the status of time machine not working with yosemite?
I upgraded mu mac pro to yosemite and since have found time machine does not work.
Also, my old backup via a clikfree wireless backup does not work any longer.
Is anyone working on this issue?
Is there anyway I can backup my information today and until time machine &
yosemite get fixed?

These instructions must be carried out as an administrator. If you have only one user account, you are the administrator.
Launch the Console application in any of the following ways:
☞ Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.)
☞ In the Finder, select Go ▹ Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens.
☞ Open LaunchPad and start typing the name.
The title of the Console window should be All Messages. If it isn't, select
SYSTEM LOG QUERIES ▹ All Messages
from the log list on the left. If you don't see that list, select
View ▹ Show Log List
from the menu bar at the top of the screen.
In the top right corner of the Console window, there's a search box labeled Filter. Initially the words "String Matching" are shown in that box. Enter the word "Starting" (without the quotes.) You should now see log messages with the words "Starting * backup," where * represents any of the words "automatic," "manual," or "standard."
Each message in the log begins with the date and time when it was entered. Note the timestamp of the last "Starting" message that corresponds to the beginning of an an abnormal backup. Now
CLEAR THE WORD "Starting" FROM THE TEXT FIELD
so that all messages are showing, and scroll back in the log to the time you noted. Select the messages timestamped from then until the end of the backup, or the end of the log if that's not clear. Copy them to the Clipboard by pressing the key combination command-C. Paste into a reply to this message by pressing command-V.
☞ If all you see are messages that contain the word "Starting," you didn't clear the text field.
☞ The log contains a vast amount of information, almost all of which is irrelevant to solving any particular problem. When posting a log extract, be selective. Don't post more than is requested.
Please don't indiscriminately dump thousands of lines from the log into this discussion.
Please don't post screenshots of log messages—post the text.
☞ Some private information, such as your name, may appear in the log. Anonymize before posting.

I recovered my back up via a wired connection. now Time Machine does not recognise older back ups wirelessly and wants to do a first back up

I recovered a back up from my time machine via a wired connection after getting the 'white screen of death'. Now Time Machine does not recognise any back ups on the time machine when connected wirelessly and wants to do a first back up of the whole machine. How do I get my mac to recognise these older back ups? It connects to the wifi network the time machine creates fine, with the same name and password.

I recommend the following.
1. Reset the TC to factory.
Universal Factory Reset.. any model TC or AE.
Unplug your TC/AE from power or turn off at the power point.
Hold in reset. and power the TC/AE back on.. all without releasing reset and keep holding in for about 10sec. (this is often difficult without a 2nd person or a 3rd arm).
Release it when the status light flashes rapidly. If it doesn’t flash rapidly you have missed it and try again.
Note..
Be Gentle! Feel the switch click on. It has a positive feel.. add no more pressure after that.
TC/AE will reboot after a couple of minutes with default factory settings and will wipe out previous configurations of the router.
No files are deleted on the hard disk in a TC.. No reset of the TC deletes files.. to do that you use erase from the airport utility.
2. Rename the TC to SMB standard.
That means short names.. 2-20 characters but less than 10 is excellent. eg TCGenx (use number for x that is actual generation of the TC)
No spaces.
Pure alphanumeric. No apostrophe.
3. Ensure IPv6 is set to link-local..
Do the same thing for ethernet if that is used.
4. Manually mount the TC disk in Finder.
Use Go in the top menu.. connect to server.
Type in
AFP://TCname.local (where TCname is your new short name for the TC and local is default domain .. it helps using the domain I found).
You will then find the computer either can or cannot find the network resource.. if it fails something else is wrong with the actual network and you will need to fix that.
It will request the password if it is found.. password is public by default unless you changed it.. type in the password and check to keep it in your keychain.
5. Delete current TM setup and redo it with the newly named TC.
See A4 here. http://pondini.org/TM/Troubleshooting.html
If your backups cannot be found, try B6 again, now that you actually know that the disk has been properly discovered.

Time machine does not back up automatically to an external usb drive

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