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!

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Time machine lost backups.

LAte last yea, I had to remove data from my MacBook to install new software. So I checked my time machine and ensured all my data was backed up before deleting anything. Sure enough it all looked good with backup as old as two years. Today, Imhave to recover a file from last year, opened up Time Machine and guess what? Oldest backup available is Feb 25, 2015.
Where did my backups go? Why did I spend all that money on a backup system if it doesn't keep my data?
PLease tell me there is a way to recover.......

You misunderstood how Time Machine works.. you must never delete files from your Mac that you expect to be held by Time Machine.. because at some future point the TM will realign the backup to the current state of the Mac.. you maybe upgraded or patched the OS.. and at that point a very large backup happened.. and that will tend to wipe old files.. once gone files are gone for good.
The files should have been copied to a location and stored.. even to the TC on a different folder would work.. but inside a backup they are not going to last.
Please read how TM works.
http://pondini.org/TM/Works.html
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http://pondini.org/TM/20.html

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Hi,
How to save SOME time machine Mac backups from the TM disk to other disk WITHOUT formatting the destination disk?
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The ExternalTimeMachineDisk contains the folder Backups.backupdb
which contains the following folders (each one corresponding to the Time Machine backup made from each Mac):
Mac1
Mac2
MacBook1
MacBook2
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How do I delete songs from Itunes without losing them in my IPOD?

How do I delete songs from Itunes without losing them in my IPOD? I don't want 11gb of music stored on my computer when I already have it in my Ipod. Anyone have some info?

You can Transfer music manually, then delete the files from the PC without having it sync to the iPod.
HOWEVER.....
Deleting songs off of iTunes or your computer is a very bad idea unless you have created one or more backup files of all your songs.
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If you are heavily invested in your Library data (Playlists, Play Counts, Ratings, Last Played, Date Added, etc.), then:
it is critical that you also make multiple backups of your ‘iTunes Library.itl’ file.
iTMS REMINDER: While you can always take the time to re-rip the CDs you own to restore your iTunes music, if you lose your iTMS purchased music and have no backups, you will have to re-purchase them. Few exceptions are made to this rule – at least none that I am aware of.
Here is a post on developing a backup strategy:
http://discussions.apple.com/click.jspa?searchID=-1&messageID=1498152

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Hello,
I have been using an external hard drive for my Time Machine that was only used for this purpose.
I downloaded some files in it that I want to use, and I haven't backed up using Time Machine since.
Can I download the files on my MacBook from the HD without running into any problems, or is there anything else I should do?
I prefer not to partition the hd, since I will be deleting these files, or transferring them to a different HD, and using this HD only for Time Machine back ups, as I did previously.
** I am not sure if this changes anything, but I just updated from Snow Leopard to Lion.
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carolsm wrote:
Thanks Kappy, I will do that.
I just really needed these files and had no other hard drive to store them.
Do you think that it will be okay just this one time if I download the files on my MacBook without compromising my backups?
I will transfer them to a new hard drive, and erase them from my Time Machine external hard drive.
For the time being it will be fine. There is always a chance of a disc crashing and therefore not advisable practice. Some here run seperate drives with Time Machine, Cloned backup and file backup. I have a portable drive I keep Time Machine backups and file backups on. I am running that at my own risk, but no problems over the last couple of years. Just make sure I get it to my normal TM Backup disk as soon as I get home. Backing up those other files will not compromise your Time Machine backups as you asked.
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Pete

Does Time Machine bundle backup sets when it deletes a month's daily sets?

I'm asking this question to find out if I can delete the all but the last week in a month, each month, in order to extend the useful capacity of my backup drive.
In some backup systems, a periodic "bundle" is made when previous sets are deleted, so for instance, the last backup of the month has the cumulative hourly changes of that month. In this way, transient files which appear and disappear within the month are retained in the monthly backup.
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[Time Machine Test -Transient Roll-up]
   [Time Machine Test - 1. Hourly Transience
      A one hour lifetime file.rtf
   [Time Machine Test - 2. Daily Transience
      A one day lifetime file.rtf
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      A one week lifetime file.rtf
At 10:10AM of that day I removed
[Time Machine Test - 1. Hourly Transience
      A one hour lifetime file.rtf
At 10:10 the next day, August 27, I removed
   [Time Machine Test - 2. Daily Transience
      A one day lifetime file.rtf
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[Time Machine Test -Transient Roll-up]
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      A one week lifetime file.rtf
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Even so, if one wants to manage only one backup volume, rather than accumulating a stack of them over the years, one might well think about selectively deleting all but one week per month in the earliest backups available, as the projected remaining time approaches less than a few weeks. BackupLoupe's Statistics gives an estimate of remaining time left for backups on a volume, and I would suggest using that as a forecast, unless others have experience to the contrary.
Hope this is useful. It certainly is to me.

Time machine and backup

I have a quick question. I'm pretty new to macbooks. I just recently bought a macbook pro 13" and hooked it up to an external harddrive. I used Time Machine to backup the entire system. I take a lot of pictures so I've used up about half my hard drive capacity. My question is....can I use the same external hard drive just to store pics and also as Time Machine? Or...do I have to buy another external hard drive to just store pics?

Time Machine works best if it has its own, exclusive space. If you want to put other things on the same drive, partition it. See #3 in Time Machine - Frequently Asked Questions.
But before you do that, how are you going to back up those pictures? If they're in the same partition as your backups, Time Machine cannot back them up. If they're in a separate partition of the same drive, when you tell Time Machine to back it up, it will send you a message reminding you that it's not a good idea to have your originals and backups on the same physical HD. When (not if) it fails, you risk losing both copies.
If your pictures are valuable, yes, get another drive for them. Format it for a Mac, per #1 in Formatting, Partitioning, Verifying, and Repairing Disks. External HDs are excluded from Time Machine by default, so go to Time Machine prefs > Options, select the new drive, and click the minus sign at the bottom to remove it from the exclusions box. Then Time Machine will back it up along with your internal HD.

Time Machine Slow Backup

I use Time Machine to backup to a G-Technologies 4TB external HD. The backup is extremely slow, many times saying it will take 69,000 days to back up. I have almost a TB to backup. The G-Technology HD will go off line. I'm not sure if this is a HD problem or Time Machine problem. My iMac is a IntelMac with 2.4Ghz Core 2 Duo, 4GB of Ram, OSX 10.8.2. Any thoughts?

If you have more than one user account, these instructions must be carried out as an 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. Click Utilities, then Console in the icon grid.
Make sure the title of the Console window is All Messages. If it isn't, select All Messages from the SYSTEM LOG QUERIES menu on the left. If you don't see that menu, select
View ▹ Show Log List
from the menu bar.
Enter the word "Starting" (without the quotes) in the String Matching text field. You should now see log messages with the words "Starting * backup," where * represents any of the words "automatic," "manual," or "standard." Note the timestamp of the last such message. Clear the text field and scroll back in the log to that time. 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 (command-C) to the Clipboard. Paste (command-V) into a reply to this message.
If there are runs of repeated messages, post only one example of each. Don't post many repetitions of the same message.
When posting a log extract, be selective. Don't post more than is requested.
Please do not indiscriminately dump thousands of lines from the log into this discussion.
Some personal information, such as the names of your files, may be included — anonymize before posting.

Time Machine everytime backups everyting!

My main system disk "Macintosh HD", 500 GB
Media disk is exernal disk named "Media", 1000 GB.
My Time Machine disk is named "DeLorean" and its external 1,500 GB.
I have about 340 GB more free space in the Time Machine disk than my data currently uses up.
My problem is that the Time Machine VERY often starts its backup FROM THE SCRATCH!
Doing FULL BACKUP! Deleting over 800 GB of data. If you see my logs, you will see it doesnt like something about the external "Media" disk.
It does this thing called "Deep event scan at path:/Volumes/Media reason:must scan subdirs|"... * see logs later.
Funny thing is, if i delete/erase the backup, or let it do the FULL backup when it wants, it usually after that does the normal smaller backup just fine.
BUT if I unmount the Media disk even once and do one incremental backup(which it does fine), then after i mount the Media back, next time it does this FULL backup and says in the logs about the Deep even scan.
All my disks are encrypted via FileVault2. Shouldnt time machine still work or is this setup fine?
Here are the logs. Yesterday i even shuffled all my disks and erased the Media and the time machine disk and encrypted them again.
You can see the first full backup starting at 2 am, then ONE succesfull incremental backup while both disk were still mounted. When i woke up at (13:20 pm) I did one incremental backup without the Media (ummounted it) and then again new one with media mounted (13:29 pm) and BAM ! It started FULL backup (deleting 800+ GB of data). Nothing has been changed on the media disk during that time. Weird !
Logs showing fresh first new backup stuff:
Dec 18 01:03:48 imac com.apple.backupd[95130]: Copied 81.9 GB of 1047.6 GB, 1469 of 1156879 items
Dec 18 02:03:49 imac com.apple.backupd[95130]: Copied 172.8 GB of 1047.6 GB, 1516 of 1156879 items
Dec 18 03:03:50 imac com.apple.backupd[95130]: Copied 264.8 GB of 1047.6 GB, 1563 of 1156879 items
Dec 18 04:03:50 imac com.apple.backupd[95130]: Copied 357.1 GB of 1047.6 GB, 1615 of 1156879 items
Dec 18 05:03:51 imac com.apple.backupd[95130]: Copied 449.1 GB of 1047.6 GB, 1666 of 1156879 items
Dec 18 06:03:51 imac com.apple.backupd[95130]: Copied 541.5 GB of 1047.6 GB, 1696 of 1156879 items
Dec 18 07:03:52 imac com.apple.backupd[95130]: Copied 633.6 GB of 1047.6 GB, 1741 of 1156879 items
Dec 18 08:03:52 imac com.apple.backupd[95130]: Copied 725.6 GB of 1047.6 GB, 1786 of 1156879 items
Dec 18 08:10:55 imac com.apple.backupd[95130]: Copied 1796 files (736.3 GB) from volume Media.
Dec 18 09:03:53 imac com.apple.backupd[95130]: Copied 773.9 GB of 1047.6 GB, 621723 of 1156879 items
Dec 18 10:03:54 imac com.apple.backupd[95130]: Copied 803.6 GB of 1047.6 GB, 936589 of 1156879 items
Dec 18 11:03:54 imac com.apple.backupd[95130]: Copied 878.4 GB of 1047.6 GB, 1019840 of 1156879 items
Dec 18 12:03:54 imac com.apple.backupd[95130]: Copied 951.6 GB of 1047.6 GB, 1107382 of 1156879 items
Dec 18 13:03:54 imac com.apple.backupd[95130]: Copied 1034.6 GB of 1047.6 GB, 1110125 of 1156879 items
Dec 18 13:13:49 imac com.apple.backupd[95130]: Copied 1140722 files (1041.4 GB) from volume Macintosh HD.
Dec 18 13:13:58 imac com.apple.backupd[95130]: 1.72 GB required (including padding), 341.53 GB available
Dec 18 13:13:58 imac com.apple.backupd[95130]: Copied 6 files (0 bytes) from volume Media.
Dec 18 13:14:15 imac com.apple.backupd[95130]: Copied 6665 files (1.7 MB) from volume Macintosh HD.
Dec 18 13:14:17 imac com.apple.backupd[95130]: Copying Lion Recovery set
Dec 18 13:14:42 imac com.apple.backupd[95130]: Backed up Lion Recovery to /Volumes/DeLorean/Backups.backupdb
Dec 18 13:14:45 imac com.apple.backupd[95130]: Starting post-backup thinning
Dec 18 13:14:45 imac com.apple.backupd[95130]: No post-back up thinning needed: no expired backups exist
Dec 18 13:14:45 imac com.apple.backupd[95130]: Backup completed successfully.
Ends.
This backup i Initiated after i woke up, with both system disk and external "media" mounted:
Dec 18 13:22:02 imac com.apple.backupd[5781]: Starting standard backup
Dec 18 13:22:02 imac com.apple.backupd[5781]: Backing up to: /Volumes/DeLorean/Backups.backupdb
Dec 18 13:22:05 imac com.apple.backupd[5781]: 1.70 GB required (including padding), 340.96 GB available
Dec 18 13:22:05 imac com.apple.backupd[5781]: Waiting for index to be ready (100)
Dec 18 13:23:05 imac com.apple.backupd[5781]: Waiting for index to be ready (100)
Dec 18 13:23:48 imac com.apple.backupd[5781]: Copied 6 files (0 bytes) from volume Media.
Dec 18 13:23:55 imac com.apple.backupd[5781]: Copied 1780 files (8.6 MB) from volume Macintosh HD.
Dec 18 13:23:56 imac com.apple.backupd[5781]: 1.37 GB required (including padding), 341.39 GB available
Dec 18 13:23:56 imac com.apple.backupd[5781]: Copied 6 files (0 bytes) from volume Media.
Dec 18 13:23:59 imac com.apple.backupd[5781]: Copied 1596 files (268 bytes) from volume Macintosh HD.
Dec 18 13:24:00 imac com.apple.backupd[5781]: Starting post-backup thinning
Dec 18 13:24:00 imac com.apple.backupd[5781]: No post-back up thinning needed: no expired backups exist
Dec 18 13:24:00 imac com.apple.backupd[5781]: Backup completed successfully.
Ends.. This seems to work like it should.
Now, see the time stamps, i just toke some coffee and came back....
This next backup is done while "Media" drive has been umounted:
Dec 18 13:28:00 imac com.apple.backupd[5962]: Starting standard backup
Dec 18 13:28:00 imac com.apple.backupd[5962]: Backing up to: /Volumes/DeLorean/Backups.backupdb
Dec 18 13:28:01 imac com.apple.backupd[5962]: 1.37 GB required (including padding), 341.39 GB available
Dec 18 13:28:04 imac com.apple.backupd[5962]: Copied 1455 files (78 KB) from volume Macintosh HD.
Dec 18 13:28:04 imac com.apple.backupd[5962]: 1.37 GB required (including padding), 341.39 GB available
Dec 18 13:28:05 imac com.apple.backupd[5962]: Copied 115 files (93 bytes) from volume Macintosh HD.
Dec 18 13:28:05 imac com.apple.backupd[5962]: Starting post-backup thinning
Dec 18 13:28:05 imac com.apple.backupd[5962]: No post-back up thinning needed: no expired backups exist
Dec 18 13:28:05 imac com.apple.backupd[5962]: Backup completed successfully.
Incremental backup seems to finnish ok, without the "Media" drive.
This backup is the third one done just after couple minutes after i mounted the "Media" drive back on:
Dec 18 13:31:49 imac com.apple.backupd[6025]: Starting standard backup
Dec 18 13:31:49 imac com.apple.backupd[6025]: Backing up to: /Volumes/DeLorean/Backups.backupdb
Dec 18 13:31:49 imac com.apple.backupd[6025]: Deep event scan at path:/Volumes/Media reason:must scan subdirs|
Dec 18 13:31:49 imac com.apple.backupd[6025]: Finished scan
Dec 18 13:31:51 imac com.apple.backupd[6025]: 884.92 GB required (including padding), 341.39 GB available
Dec 18 13:31:51 imac com.apple.backupd[6025]: No expired backups exist - deleting oldest backups to make room
Dec 18 13:31:52 imac com.apple.backupd[6025]: Deleted backup /Volumes/DeLorean/Backups.backupdb/imac/2011-12-18-131415 containing 8.7 MB; 341.40 GB now available, 884.92 GB required
Dec 18 13:31:52 imac com.apple.backupd[6025]: Removed 1 expired backups so far, more space is needed - deleting oldest backups to make room
Dec 18 13:32:02 imac com.apple.backupd[6025]: Deleted backup /Volumes/DeLorean/Backups.backupdb/imac/2011-12-18-132359 containing 736.30 GB; 1.05 TB now available, 884.92 GB required
Dec 18 13:32:02 imac com.apple.backupd[6025]: Deleted 2 backups containing 736.31 GB total; 1.05 TB now available, 884.92 GB required
Dec 18 13:32:02 imac com.apple.backupd[6025]: Backup date range was shortened: oldest backup is now Dec 18, 2011
Dec 18 13:35:02 imac com.apple.backupd[6025]: Copied 526 files (4.3 GB) from volume Media.
Dec 18 13:35:03 imac com.apple.backupd[6025]: Backup canceled.
I canceled that scan(it would take about 12 hours again
OK. Couple questions:
- Why time machine does this deep scan? What does it actually mean?
- Why time machine thinks that it needs to do a 800GB worth of new backup. Those data have not changed a bit (they are movies).
- How its related to the unmount/mounting the Media drive?
I would really hope some answers from somebody. I have strugled with this issue almost a month now.
Thanks!

ECONOMAN wrote:
Time Machine Incremental Backups S...L...O...W and seem to bog down things so as to make the machine unusable. Why doesn't it simply backup changes, not the entire drive (less exclusions)?
Normally, that's exactly what it does. So start by calming down.
And, it gobbles processing power so I can't even check mail.
Can you schedule the frigging thing or do I just stop it all the time in order to get anything done?
It's cute, but kind of worthless.
First, are these backups larger than you think they ought to be? If so, that's likely at least part of your problem. See #D4 of the Time Machine - Troubleshooting *User Tip,* also at the top of this forum, for some possible causes and a way to find out just what's going on.
If that's no help, or they're still slow, try all the things in #D2 of the Troubleshooting Tip.
If that doesn't help, post back with details, including all the messages, your setup (especially the destination for the backups), what you've done, and the results.

Can I set Time Machine to backup both my hard drive and an external hard drive?

Hi. I've been working with a lot of family video lately and my internal hard drive has filled up significantly. iMovie doesn't seem to have a good archiving facility like Adobe InDesign which I use at work were all the relevant files are gathered together into one folder. Apple advised me to relocate my movie files to an external hard drive and herein lies my query.
Is there a way for me to set Time Machine to backup both my iMac's internal drive and the external hard drive that would contain my movie files? I've been using Time Machine for my backups for a few years now, but backing up the external as well has me stumped. If Time Machine could be used then all the necessary file accociations etc would be safely backed up as well - that's why I don't want to have to manually backup the external.
Anyone have any ideas? Thanks!

7string48 wrote:
Thanks so much Pondini!! You just quickly answered a question that none of the Mac people in 3 stores or Apple Care have been able to answer.If you can format it HFS+ (any variation of Mac OS Extended), it will work. If not, it won't.
I'm not too surprised about the Apple Stores, as they don't get much training on Time Machine. But AppleCare sure ought to know.
Oh...what about if the external drive is an array...like a Drobo with it's own proprietary formatting...I guess that would not work...??
I've never used a Drobo. A number of folks here have used them as their Time Machine drives, but I don't recall seeing anyone try to back one up with TM, so can't say for sure. But if you can format it as HFS+ (any variation of Mac OS Extended), it will work. If not, it won't.
At least part of the reason is, Time Machine uses the File System Event Store, a hidden log of changes that OSX keeps on each Mac-formatted disk/partition, to figure out what's changed and needs to be backed-up. See How Time Machine works its Magic for details.
See Time Machine - Frequently Asked Question #32 for details and considerations of backing-up multiple volumes with Time Machine.
However, even if it will work, that may not be your best strategy, depending on your circumstances:
Since Time Machine keeps copies of things you've changed or deleted, the destination needs to be considerably larger than the data being backed-up. How much larger varies widely depending on how you use your Mac, but a general "rule of thumb" is, it needs at least twice the space to be able to keep a reasonable "depth" of backups for you.
If you have a large internal HD, fairly full, plus a large external HD, and the files on the external don't change frequently, you might want to use Time Machine for the internal, and a different app to a different disk or partition, on a different schedule, for the external. Especially if space is a consideration, you might not need to keep previous versions of files on the externals. See Time Machine - Frequently Asked Question #27 for some alternatives.

Thoroughly angry and frustrated. I've run out of room and need to make more to add more songs. Once and for all, how do I, if I even CAN, delete music from my iPod Nano WITHOUT losing them from iTunes?

Thoroughly angry and frustrated. I've run out of room and need to make more to add more songs. Once and for all, how do I, if I even CAN, delete music from my iPod Nano WITHOUT losing them from iTunes?

You should take the time to familiarize yourself with the documentation that is available. You can "uncheck" a song in iTunes, and then do a manual update.

Time Machine hourly backup seems a tad large

Hi all
Occasionally, my hourly Time Machine incremental backups to my Time Capsule seem a tad large. One hour the backup is a sensible size, then an hour later, when I've been doing very little on my machine, the backup is massive (as in, several gigabytes).
Not only that, but the backup seems to grow in size as its happening. the pictures below should help illustrate.
The backup is listed as being 719MB, only an hour after a more modest backup. Time Machine seems to be claiming that is has transferred all of the required backup:
!http://img6.imageshack.us/img6/4988/picture2gih.png!
But then, only two minutes later, see how the situation has changed:
!http://img5.imageshack.us/img5/3739/picture3m.png!
And the situation continues:
!http://img87.imageshack.us/img87/9339/picture5.png!
Any ideas? This issue happens intermittently (although it is happening now... that last image was taken a few minutes ago and the backup was still going - up to 3.1GB - before I told it to stop).
I'm not certain if Time Machine is actually transferring this amount of data to the Time Capsule or not.
Cheers.

Hi,
I had the same problem today as well. The last backup was done this morning at 2 a.m. When I turned my PowerBook G4 on again this afternoon, the backup size continually grew, just like on your machine, Rob. I aborted the backup a couple of times, deleted the inProgress file, but it always got bigger and bigger. After downloading Time Machine Buddy and Time Tracker, I just let Time Machnine "do it's thing". Luckily, I had enough free space on my WD MyBook 500 GB I use for the backups, because it stopped only at 24.8 GBs, after initially displaying 61,3 MB in the menu bar, and requesting 1.05 GB according to Time Machine Buddy.
Time Machine Buddy protocol:
Starting standard backup
Backing up to: /Volumes/My Book/Backups.backupdb
No pre-backup thinning needed: 1.05 GB requested (including padding), 32.74 GB available
Copied 139261 files (24.8 GB) from volume Macintosh HD.
No pre-backup thinning needed: 1.16 GB requested (including padding), 7.36 GB available
Copied 7042 files (2.0 MB) from volume Macintosh HD.
Starting post-backup thinning
Deleted backup /Volumes/My Book/Backups.backupdb/Claas Olthoffs PowerBook/2009-03-05-202501: 7.36 GB now available
Deleted backup /Volumes/My Book/Backups.backupdb/Claas Olthoffs PowerBook/2009-03-05-192342: 7.37 GB now available
Deleted backup /Volumes/My Book/Backups.backupdb/Claas Olthoffs PowerBook/2009-03-05-123736: 7.37 GB now available
Deleted backup /Volumes/My Book/Backups.backupdb/Claas Olthoffs PowerBook/2009-03-05-113526: 7.38 GB now available
Post-back up thinning complete: 4 expired backups removed
Backup completed successfully.
So I took a look at Time Tracker to see what was backed up. I was suprised to see, that the biggest chunk was my Macintosh HD/Library/Application Support folder. This folder is 23,9 GB in size, mainly because it contains Final Cut Studio media and templates. Time Machine backed it up completey. This seems weired, because none of the files I looked at in this folder were changed during the last couple of months, if not the last year, since I installed them. I don't know why Time Machine would backup all of those unchanged files.
For the sake of completeness, the external drives contains other, non-backup, files as well.
I hope this gives you some more information to work with Pondini.
Greetings,
Claas

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