Time machine excluded desktop

I have just restored the HDD on my MacBook* using the Time Machine retore. Sadly, there were NO desktop files included in the restore. I've gone to the TM preferences, but the Desktop is not excluded. Also annoying, though not as critical, the Downloads folder was also omitted from the restore.
So, 1. Is there any possibility that the Desktop files are in the TM backups? and 2. How can I ensure that it backs up the Desktop in the future?
I've tried searching the mac for "/Library/Preferences/com.apple.TimeMachine.plist" but the search returns zero results.
Thanks.
* HDD blew up. Replaced at Genius Bar. Selected full restore by Time Machine.

John Brock wrote:
I have an HFS+ formatted USB drive (journaling on), attached to my Time Capsule. How can I include it in my Time Machine backups?
you can't. TM will only back up directly attached drives.
To back up a netwrok drive like that you need to use a different backup solution. Try CCCloner or Superduper.

Similar Messages

Time machine excludes other items in /Library/Preferences/com.apple.TimeMachine.plist??

Hey. I heard that time machine excludes some items even if they are not selected by you in time machine preferences. The items time machine excludes "secretly" are located in /Library/Preferences/com.apple.TimeMachine.plist Is there any way to remove these items. Things like calendars and iphoto show up on this exclusion list. I want to make sure I dont lose those.

The only items excluded by default are cache and index files that will be regenerated automatically if deleted.

Time Machine Shows Desktop Items Only....?

I'm using a 2GHz Intel Core Duo iMac, using Time Machine to backup to a 400GB Iomega external drive.
The problem is when I go in to Time Machine to 'look back in time', the only items which appear in the historical finder windows are those items or folders actually located on my desktop, but excluding "Macintosh HD". This means, for example, if I want to restore an old file from my "Documents" folder of 1 week ago, I can not, as this can not be accessed via the desktop (bearing in mind the Macintosh HD icon also does not appear).
Any ideas? Time Machine preferences do not account for this problem - I have not restricted backup to desktop items only.

Time Machine displays whatever is selected in the left sidebar window. Try clicking on your hard drive, documents, pictures, etc. in the sidebar window one at a time and you will see the Time Machine display change to reflect their respective contents.

I have 2 WD external HD for back up. One is hooked up to the Time Machine and the other is used to store all my large photo files. The time machine excludes the second one. I need to back this up as well . How do I reformat it so it will ?

I just purchased 2 WD TB external hard drives. I have one formatted to be used with the time machine and it is working well. the other that i am using to store large files is excluded from the time machine. I can't click on it and add as per instructions. It won't allow me to. I need to back t his up as well. Ive backed up this one so I am able to reformat it but it doesn't recognize the drive unless it is formatted in FAT which is what WD advices it be formatted in. It should be in Mac extended journaling but I can't get it to mount in that. Help?

In addition, TM will not backup drives partitioned in FAT as the OP stated his 2nd EHD is formatted. My recommendation to the OP is to reformat the 2nd EHD to Mac OS Extended (Journaled) and then include it in his TM backups. Of course in order to do this the OP must first move the data on the FAT partitioned drive to his internal HD and then once the EHD is re-partitioned correctly he can move it back.
In addition as Pondini mentioned the 2nd EHD must be directly connected to the iMac rather than be a network drive, TM is NOT, repeat NOT a network backup solution with the single caveat of using a Time Capsule backup.

Time Machine: Excluded Items Do Not Appear In Excluded Window

Greetings,
I have been successfully using Time Machine for some time now. I switched to Lion about 5 weeks ago and I have also recently added a second TM 1TB Backup Drive (SeaGate) to use as an off-site backup of my 1TB External Media Drive (iOmega) and my entire 160GB Internal Drive. I have also restructured the Folders on my 1TB External Media Drive which would've effected the file path of almost every file. I have been experiencing a multitude of issues since then.
1. For the first time, I have been getting error messages telling me that the backup drive is full. I am only backing up a total of 782GB on the External and 133GB on the Internal (915GB Total). So to get around this I have been using the Exclude feature. This is where the next issue occurs..
2. When I add Folders to the Exclude list, they do not appear in the Exclude window; however the "Estimated size of full backup" dialog at the bottom right adjusts to reflect the changes. I cannot delete or use the "-" to remove folders from the list, because they do not appear to be there. I seem to be able to get around this by turning the TM Off then On again, but the trouble doesn't end there.
3. Once I have excluded enough folders for the backup to be small enough and I begin the backup, TM displays the "Preparing Backup" message for quite sometime. During this time several things tend to happen:
a) the entire computer begins to run VERY SLOW, with the PinWheel of Death showing up frequently
b) about every other time, the TM Preferences window crashes and displays an error message saying it encountered a problem and had to close
4. Even if I could successfully use this method of backing up 1 large folder at a time, it becomes very confusing as to what has been backed up recently and what still needs to be backed up. It basically goes against the entire idea of having an automated backup system to have to split up the backups in that manner.
I am very frustrated, as TM has traditionally been a trouble/worry-free system for me. I have seen many posts regarding the various error messages i've received but no one else is complaining about this Exclude issue. I am most appreciative of any help you may offer.
Thanks!
PW

Hi,
TM has never worked satifactorily for me, itworks for Pondini though!
Get carbon copy cloner to make an exact copy of your old HD to the New one...
http://www.bombich.com/software/ccc.html
Or SuperDuper...
http://www.shirt-pocket.com/SuperDuper/
Or the most expensive one & my favorite, Tri-Backup...
http://www.tri-edre.com/english/products/tribackup.html
AppDelete...
Back to your problemmm
Turn off TM, Safe Boot from the HD, (holding Shift key down at bootup), run Disk Utility in Applications>Utilities, then highlight your drive, click on Repair Permissions, trash this file...
/Users/YourUserName/Library/Preferences/com.apple.TimeMachine.plist
Reboot & try TM again.

Time Machine Excluded Files have no effect?

So, I cleared out one of my 200GB external drives, hoping to at least just backup my photos and MP3s if nothing else.
Time Machine says it needs about 365GB to do a backup. I purchased a 320GB drive today for $88 (hard to pass up a good deal on external drives) and I excluded system files, other external drives, temp folders I used for Photoshop/FCP caches, downloads folders, and a whole lot of other things. TM is STILL telling me that the backup is going to require 365GB. No matter how many items I add into the exclusion list, that size never changes.
My question is three-fold :
1. Is there a known bug with excluding files from backup, where TM has to at least backup everything once, and THEN it'll allow exclusion?
2. "Do Not Back Up" exclusion list, at the bottom, it says "Total Included : 272.4GB". Is that 272.4GB that I've chosen to NOT include, or is it saying that the backup should only take 272.4GB?
3. If the latter of my 2nd question is true, then why does TM fail every time, saying I need 365GB?
I've searched up and down these forums, Apple's own support docs, and in every TM-related help file in OS X and I haven't found an answer to any of these questions yet.
Also, if anyone knows how to span disks with TM (I have 4 internal and 3 external drives) to use for backups, that'd be great.

That's what's really confusing me. I excluded all those files before I'd ever attempted a backup. Then, I added more and more to see if I could get it working with a 200GB external drive.
However, once I purchased the 320GB drive, I figured I could just exclude a few more files and use that drive. Obviously, I reformatted it prior to even opening TM. It's a completely fresh drive.
Are you saying that TM would recalculate the space required if I were to remove all the excluded files from the list, THEN re-added them, and THEN turned it on?

Time Machine Exclude Items Not Working

So I just started using TM, or rather trying to use it.
I have a pretty big HD to backup, and since 200GB of it is just a copy of one large folder on a server I wish to exclude it from backup. So I go into Time Machine and click the "Options" button, click "+" and add the folder (it's actually ~/Documents/Audio). Everything looks fine, it tells me the size etc. Then I click "Done".
Trouble is, when I look again in the list the folder is gone. In fact no matter what I try I cannot add any folders to this list. Time Machine seems to totally throw away anything I add to the exclude list.
Any ideas anyone?
--Tim

So, I'm having somewhat the opposite problem, Time Machine is busily "Excluding..." items, currently up to about 6 million and going strong. The problem is, sort of the opposite you were experiencing, I have no files/drives in my exclude list, yet it is finding something to exclude.
I stopped it last attempt, when it had excluded some 30 million items, seemed to be making no progress whatsoever, and followed the troubleshooting hints for a full reset #A4 (http://web.me.com/pondini/Time_Machine/Troubleshooting.html). Just for grins I also erased the drive again, to start with a clean slate.
I'm backing up to a WD 1 TB drive connected to my old G4 PowerBook running 10.5.8, and connected to it over the network, with the machine and the drive shared out. I can see the drive and files, and can read from and write to the drive. TM has no issue mounting the drive, and has written a small file to it (~1 gb so far).
Is this symptomatic of some other odd TM behavior, or should I just let it run and see what it does?
Thanks for any insights,
--Jon

Time Machine excludes all of my files

When I try to back up my Time Machine to an external drive, TM excludes all of the file son my computer and does not back up. I have used an extrenal drive for 6 years without any issues and this problem started last week.
Any ideas what to do?
Thanks,
Mark

I don't have any idea what's causing this, but it's not a good idea to trust just one backup method.
Most commonly used backup methods

Time machine "Exclude these items from backups" keeps re-adding my external drive

I have several external hard drives that contain data I wish to backup. With Lion I had them removed from the "Exclude these items from backups" list and all was well.
Since upgrading to Mountain Lion I have been not so lucky. I was able to keep one out of the list by turning off Time Machine, removing the disk from the list of items to exclude from backup, then turning Time Machine back on. I have one external drive, however, that will not remove. The steps I'md oing are:
Open Options under Time Machine
Select "FreeAgent" and click on the minus sign and it dissapears from the list.
Click Save
Open Options again and "FreeAgent" is back in the list.
If I turn off Time Machine and do these steps it still goes back in.
Anyone else having this problem?
Thanks

Time Machine usually won't show a drive that's not conneted in that list.
Can you remove it from the list while it's connected?
If so, but it still comes back, the preferences file (where that's kept) may be damaged. Try a "full reset" of Time Machine, per #A4 in Time Machine - Troubleshooting.

Time Machine Excluding External Volumes?

The following threads discuss backing up external volumes using Time Machine.
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/5316613?start=30&tstart=0
https://discussions.apple.com/message/16591548#16591548
https://discussions.apple.com/message/6785149?searchText=Time%20Machine%20Exclud ing%20External%20Volumes#6785149
So apparently TM can backup external volumes but I have not been able to do so.
I've been experimenting with TM to backup external drives. It will not backup my external drive, even when I remove it from the exclusion list. It automatically re-added it to the exclusion list even though I explicitly removed it from that list.
My test:
- I plugged in a 1 GB thumb drive and formatted it as Mac OS Extended (journaled).
- I put some new files on it with unique filenames for a test.
- I told TM to run backups (several ones in sequence).
- I opened the thumb-drive volume then entered TM. TM showed only the current state with no backups.
I opened Preferences > Time Machine > Options… It listed the thumb drive as excluded. So I removed the exclusion.
I unmounted the thumb drive, mounted it again and repeated the experiment. Same result. It appeared in the exclusion list again.
What gives? How do I tell TM to backup external volumes (or not to exclude doing so)?

Yep. Read that before posting.
Also found https://discussions.apple.com/message/20711519#20711519
where Linc Davis says
External drives are automatically added to the Time Machine exclusion list. To back them up, remove them from the list. Volumes on the backup drive itself are automatically excluded, and you can't change that.
There is no reason why you shouldn't back up multiple volumes in Time Machine.
I did remove it from the exclusions list but TM added it back. What now?

Time Machine excluding items....

Hi,
Newly installed Server 10.6.6 Mac Pro.
When enabling Time Machine to backup the boot drive onto a 2nd internal drive it starts, and then starts "excluding items" and backs up only 40MB in the end while there's over 130GB of stuff to back up. There are no folders set to be excluded, the TM drive is newly formatted and empty.
Re-added the drive through system preferences, reset spotlight, trashed the preferences... everything we tried has failed. Any thoughts on this ?
Thanks,
Jay

Hi
http://manuals.info.apple.com/enUS/ServerAdminv10.6.pdf
Pages 36, 37 and 155 onwards. Time Machine is not really a 'backup' solution for OSX Server itself as such, especially if dealing with Mail and Open Directory Databases amongst others. It can also cause lock ups for clients accessing and changing data in configured share points although your mileage may vary. It's actually OK as a Time Machine destination for client workstations.
Tony

Time Machine excludes content

Brand new machine and of course I am running into problems with it ...
12 CPU machine shows 24 in activity monitor CPU history window (reported via service call) and now this new question. I am running a back up and I get this odd item of data that puzzles me. I enclose the log:
Starting manual backup
Backing up to: /Volumes/TimeMachine/Backups.backupdb
Forcing deep traversal on source: "Mountian Lion" (mount: '/' fsUUID: CBAD0224-07E6-3060-AC4A-C0E311DC8DF8 eventDBUUID: FAEA13B9-8752-444B-A459-A2AB8BD275F5)
Forcing deep traversal on source: "RAID Array" (mount: '/Volumes/RAID Array' fsUUID: 3FFAACDD-0AE0-3E31-B890-57A3C628001E eventDBUUID: 14E9C19F-F3DF-47B5-9A5B-48D1FB2ABA16)
Backup content size: 335.69 GB excluded items size: 53.92 GB for volume Mountian Lion
Backup content size: 1.98 TB excluded items size: 1.98 TB for volume RAID Array
Found 593146 files (283.36 GB) needing backup
346.04 GB required (including padding), 2.47 TB available
Now, there is nothing about the boot disk (oddly enough named: Mountain Lion) that should be excluded. I even deleted the .list ... checked the hidden flag (set to zero) and for the life of me cannot understand why 53.92 GB of the boot drive is not being backed up. The target drive has 2.3+ TB free (out of 10TB SoftRAID stripe array).
The universal fix it document chapter D5 (http://pondini.org/TM/D5.html) refers to several hidden folders... are they THAT big? Or is something else gooing on?
Not sure if it is relevant but the drive is SSD 400+ GB from OWC if that matters... RAID array is 5.75 TB internal on Apple RAID card.

Nearly 2 hours later and I am still waiting for the tmutil command to complete ... looking at the tan box I ran the suggested command and got:
Pauls-New-Mac-Pro:~ pauldbuck$ sudo mdfind "com_apple_backup_excludeItem = 'com.apple.backupd'"
Password:
/Users/pauldbuck/Music/iTunes/iTunes Music Library.xml
/Users/pauldbuck/Music/iTunes/Album Artwork/Cache
/Users/pauldbuck/Library/Safari/WebpageIcons.db
/Users/pauldbuck/Library/Application Support/Librarian/C9AC2120-A01E-5F9B-99CF-95E269C1E87D.txt
/Users/pauldbuck/Library/Calendars/Calendar Cache
/Users/pauldbuck/Library/Saved Application State
/Users/pauldbuck/Library/Containers/com.apple.QuickTimePlayerX/Data/Library/Cach es
/Users/pauldbuck/Library/Containers/com.apple.TextEdit/Data/Library/Caches
/Users/pauldbuck/Library/Containers/com.apple.gamecenter/Data/Library/Caches
/Users/pauldbuck/Library/Containers/com.apple.Preview/Data/Library/Caches
/Users/pauldbuck/Library/Containers/com.apple.ShareKitHelper/Data/Library/Caches
Doing individual "ls" commands on the files with sudo only shows the result of:
pauldbuck staff 41768960 Jun 12 13:15 /Users/pauldbuck/Library/Safari/WebpageIcons.db
as being of any significant size ...
HMMM ... the index file for Spotlight index ... i wonder if that is huge because of the 10TB time machine volume ... are all disk indexes on the root drive?
trying this:
sudo du /.spotlight-v100
8          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V1
0          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000/0004
0          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000/0005
0          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000/0007
0          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000/0008
0          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000/0009
32          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000/000a
14256          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000/000b
22096          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000/000c
976          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000/000d
13104          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000/000e
39984          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000/000f
32          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000/0011
40          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000/0015
0          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000/001a
0          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000/001c
9296          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000/001d
7160          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000/001e
4456          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000/001f
32          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000/0021
0          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000/0022
0          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000/0023
16          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000/0024
0          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000/0025
0          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000/0026
0          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000/0027
0          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000/0028
111480          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000/ 0000
111480          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache/0000
111480          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/Cache
16          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/journals.li ve
0          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/journals.re pair
0          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907/journals.sc an
1947648          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2/14A90EE0-20DF-4E1B-84EF-8E1EB37F5907
1947648          /.spotlight-v100/Store-V2
1947664          /.spotlight-v100
again, none of which adds up to 50G of data ... No guest accounts as I am the only user and it is a brand new system (not even 7 days old yet.
the only file I could conceve of bing that large at the moment would be the index on the roughly 8 TB of data stored on the back up drive... but why would that be counted against the boot drive and not the 10TB drive?
Well, I guess I will just have to chalk it up to one of life's unfathomable mysteries ...
Thanks for the help ....

Time Machine Excluding Files for Backup

The issue I'm having seems to be that any file created while the Time Machine external drive is offline will not be backed up or updated if later changes to the file are made. Any assistance would be appreciated, as I currently have a slew of files that aren't being backed-up regularly and would be lost if my laptop died.
Steps to Reproduce Problem:
1. Disconnect Time Machine external drive.
2. Create a new file in any folder that is regularly backed up. (Say, in "~/Documents")
3. Reconnect Time Machine external drive.
4. Open a new Finder window, Command-Click on the Time Machine drive, click "Back Up Now."
5. Open the Time Machine application. Navigate to the backup just created.
6. Observe that the file does not exist. (!!)
7. Exit out of the Time Machine application. Modify the file with the drive still connected.
8. Repeat Steps 4-6.
Also, I'm pretty sure this shouldn't have an effect, but my external drive is partitioned into a "Time Machine Only" section under HFS and an "Other" section under FAT32. Just thought you should know.

I am having a similar problem. During a vacation, I uploaded a variety of photos, which were saved into my iPhoto library. During that time, my computer was never plugged into the external hard drive and never ran Time Machine.
However, I've since come home and have kept my computer plugged into the hard drive for several days. Even when I hit the "Back Up Now" button, I navigate to the new picture files within my iPhoto library in the present mode, only to find that the files do not exist in any of the backups. The computer has continued backing up an older version of my iPhoto library.
I've also noticed that several new CDs I've recently added to my iTunes library are also not being backed up in each new Time Machine backup.

Time Machine plist file excluded external volumes

Mac OS 10.8, 10.9, Time Machine.
Posting here is my final step after a few hours of research. I am trying to find out whether Time Machine stores the names of excluded external volumes anywhere -- those volumes that one enters manually in the Time Machine exclusions options window. They are not in /Library/Preferences/com.apple.TimeMachine.plist. I have searched my Mac via "find" in Terminal as superuser and not found any other plist files that contain the name "timemachine" that contain this information, either. I've seen several apparently erroneous comments online that the com.apple.TimeMachine.plist file contains this information, but in my own systems, at least, it does not.
Nor does the following command reveal this information:
mdfind "com_apple_backup_excludeItem = 'com.apple.backupd'"
Pondini's excellent Time Machine resource states, with regard to the Time Machine GUI: "Excluded External Volumes (shown in black) are placed there automatically unless removed by the user, and do not appear in the plist."
My guess is that because Time Machine excludes external volumes by default, that it doesn't need a plist to store that information, and only cares about them if you delete them from the excludes list in the preferences window.
ADDITIONAL INFO: I am also aware of the com.apple.metadata:com_apple_backup_excludeItem metadata. I haven't been able to determine for certain what creates it, but my guess is Time Machine, at least as regards volumes.

Hi! I am a bit of a nerd when it comes to Mac OS, I have used True Crypt for a long time, you seem to know what you are talking about and I was just wondering if you have an easy answer for me, as I understand only 1/2 of what you wrote on your first post and other wise am lost.
I just want to know if TM works for my needs or if am doom to find another back up software.
I have a simple backup partition in my Mac Book and I store sensitive data in it, TM is backing up my computer now and that is fine, it also seems to back up my encrypted (with True Crypt) partition, but I read and read and read posts and now am confused and not sure if TM will actually back up the changes I do in the files inside the encrypted partition in my Mac Book. Or does it just back up the encrypted file without modifications inside?
If you could explain me this with an easy answer it would be fantastic! thank you!!

Time Machine Lost Backups... Without Losing them!

Hey you guys,
I don't know if any of you met this kind of strange behaviour (looked but didn't find...): Time Machine told me yesterday that the backup had failed. I was working rather heavily at the time, trashing folders and putting some order into the main HD. I then did a Backup now and everything went fine. My curiosity was aroused, so I went into Time Machine... and discovered that my backups prior to two days ago had disappeared.
I opened the Time Machine HD: everything was there. I checked, all the info is OK. I decided to sleep over it. Well, this morning everything is back to normal and Time Machine "recovered" what it didn't see the day before.
Understand, this is a new machine with almost new hard drives, checked regularly and apparently working fine.
Did somebody encounter this kind of problem? Is there something I should check, or modify, or whatever?
Thanks for your time, and have a good day.
RTP

RTP,
I then did a Backup now and everything went fine. My curiosity was aroused, so I went into Time Machine... and discovered that my backups prior to two days ago had disappeared.
Just curious, did you attempt to launch TM while that successful backup was still going on, or had it completely finish (TM menu clock icon had stopped spinning)?
As V.K. stated, sometings TM just hiccups on one attempt, but succeeds on the next. Just for inormational purposes, the following are some other reasons why previous backups may not appear in Time Machine:
*Previous Time Machine Backups Are No Longer Visible*
There are several reasons why this might be the case. Consider the following:
If Time Machine can successfully launch into its’ “time travel” interface then the software is seeing backups. It you only have two time travel windows to chose from, “Today (Now)” and a single window behind that, then Time Machine has only performed its initial full backup. You can verify this by looking at the time scale on the right. If no dates appear other than Now and the date of your first full backup then subsequent incremental backups have not been taking place.
If it has been MORE than an 1 ½ hours since the first full backup completed, then you need to determine why Time Machine has stopped backing up. It might simply be that the Time Machine Preference has been turned off.
If, on the other hand, you look at the time scale on the right and you see multiple dates going back to the time of the first full backup, but they are grayed-out, then Time Machine knows that incremental backups have been taking place. Nevertheless, only the front most window “Today (Now)” shows content. Take a look at the Sidebar of the Finder window. Among the various Devices, Shares, and Places, what is highlighted/selected? If it is the Time Machine backup disk itself that is highlighted, then click on some other location in the Sidebar to make the former backup windows appear.
You see, the Time Machine “time travel” interface displays the historical backup state of what ever location is highlighted in the Finders’ Sidebar. Since Time Machine does not back itself up, then there will be no historical backup windows visible.
Bear in mind as well, if you have added locations and items to the Time Machine “Exclude From Backup” list, then there will be no visible history of these items either if they too are highlighted or selected.
And of course, if you are looking at a file or folder that has only recently been created, then there will not be many, or any, backup copies of it depending on how long ago it was created.
*Anti-Virus Software*
If you have anti-virus software running try disabling, launch Time Machine again, and see if you can access previously backed up data. Sometimes such programs scanning processes can interfere with Time Machine.
*File Vault*
Did that user account happen to have File Vault active?
In another thread V.K. stated: "if you start TM from a filevaulted home directory all you'll see is present. you could browse your old backups of files outside your home directory but not anything in it."
*For Time Capsule / AirDisk users*
If you are backing up to a wireless device, and you have the Time Machine backup disk image (sparsebundle) mounted on your desktop while you are trying to access it via the Time Machine "time travel" interface, you may not be able to see any files from previous backups.
You see, if the backup disk image (sparsebundle) is already mounted on the desktop (a White drive icon) then Time Machine may conclude that the disk is “in use” and fail to mount it properly. Obviously, this is not a factor when backing up to a locally connected drive.
A I said, none of it may apply to your case, but it is nonetheless helpful to keep in mind.
Cheers!

Time machine excluded desktop

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