Time machine network backup really ***** (truly)

Ok I've said it..
Ok I've had enough..
Come on Guy's. Apple really has to take some flack here. No more excuses. You advertised timemachine backup to a network share would work easily. You advertise apple software works without a hitch (unlike MS windows)...but I've had nothing but hastles setting up time machine to backup to a mac server attached usb drive. I've BEEN a windows user before and I tell you this is just like going back to the dark side!
And another thing
No I'm not trying to use an airport extreme mount
No I'm not trying to use a NAS
No I'm not trying to back up a linux or PC volume
I'm being a good little customer. It's all using mac to mac. Yes, it's Leopard to Leopard...
Hastle one:
The drive mount. I've successfully done this for 3 networked macs. It took a while, was working a few days, but the mount is unreliable. If one of the macs goes down, time machine doesn't work anymore. I get the error "backup disc image could not be mounted". Apparently the problem is with the "sparseimage". One solution I've read is to delete the sparseimage then try again. Fine
Hastle two:
I can't work out how to delete the sparseimage! I get an error cannot do - "the item token is in use"
Apple needs to take a cold shower on time machine.
Where is the help on this? Where is the customer apologies? Where are the solutions?
Obviously there was not pre release testing. Wait a minute WE are the pre-release testing!
It is just plain unreliable as a backup solution for macs on a home ethernet network..even when all the gear is actually mac!
I give it a rating of 1 out of 10 on this.
Come on guys lift you game!
Message was edited by: sfsfsfs
Message was edited by: sfsfsfs

I have had nothing but problems with Time Machine. We are wasting our valuable time with a product that SIMPLY DOES NOT WORK. Apple needs to weigh in here. We are wasting our "TIME" on our "MACHINES" Now I see why Apple calls it TIME MACHINE!

Similar Messages

Time Machine network backup swapped to USB backup

Hi there,
I have a Time Machine Backup drive connected to my Airport Extreme network, which backups both my iMac and Macbook Pro which I love - it is totally no hassle and has been great.
However I have just moved house and will not be able to set up a network again for a few weeks - my question is can I plug my Time Machine drive directly into my MacBook Pro/iMac to back up as normal? I don't want to erase the backups already on the drive, I just want to add to it as it would do automatically on the network. Has anyone had any experience with this - I'm hesitant to try it out incase I lose my backups!
Thanks!

Hi. Don't know if you ever got yours working, but was having the same problem after many successful backups and nothing changed on my system. I shut down my computer and then unplugged the TC for a few minutes. Let it restart. Then restarted my computer and reselected the TC in Preferences>Time Machine>Options and now it's backing up normally. Of course I have no idea if this actually fixed the problem, but it is working.

Can't find my data from Time Machine network backup

Migration assistant shows inconsistent sizes for applications, computer settings and other files/folders, about 30GB when I had 270 GB only in pictures.
I did a clean Mavericks install.
How do I find my data from the TimeMachine network backup?
The size of the TimeMachine backup is consistent with what I had before ( >300 GB)...so how do I recover it?.
I'm using a new user account name in the clean installation.
Thanks

Read a few threads about this being a problem with account access, so I renamed the account in my new installation to the account name used to create the backup and found the old accounts....now when trying to proceed it told me there was a conflict with the account name and i had to use a different one!!.
Apple has stopped to be simple...
So how are we suppose to use the migration assistant if either way there is a problem? ( using same or different account name )...

Time Machine network backups?

Is this information still up to date? https://discussions.apple.com/message/7515914#7515914, i.e. can I still not use TM via WLAN (2 Macs connected via WLAN, TM drive (USB) attached to one of them; I'd like to use that disk for both Macs without having to carry the drive around the house every time.)
Thank you!
Peter

Sorry, but that is Not an available feature at this time. You can use two external hard drives with one Mac with Time Machine in ML, But you cannot use two Macs connected to one external drive with TM.
Hope this helps

Time Machine + Network User

Is it possible for a network user to use Time Machine to backup their home folder ?
I really want this feature but last time I tried it seemed not to be possible…?

You could make them all mobile users so they have a copy of the data on they're computers, then share a volume and enable it as a time machine destination, enable quotas on that disk ( cant be the same as where you keep they're homes or time machine will suck up they're quota ), set the the quota on the disk ( sudo edquota user ) and have them all backup there, you could exclude all system files if all you want is they're homes.
Another thing you could do is backup the whole share but you would have to recover files for them.
Hope it helps, if you find a better way do let me know

Can I use Time Machine to backup ONLY an external drive?

I am having problems with the internal HD on my iMac and Disk Utility is telling me I need to reformat the drive and restore from backup. Only problem is that my 3TB Lacie Thunderbolt drive I was using for Time Machine recently failed (think it may have happened during an electrical storm brownout). Yep, I know, ***** to be me
The issues with the internal HD are preventing the iMac from booting and I would prefer not to have to purchase various repair software to find one that really works such as Disk Warrior or similar ((despite it getting very good reviews). I suspect it make be HFS corruption but no way to really tell that I am aware of.
I have setup an external drive with Yosemite and booted from that so now my old internal drive is seen as an "external drive".
I am using Disk Utility to make an image copy to a new 3TB external drive I purchased. Writing the DMG is going to take some time.
What I would like to do is to set up Time Machine to backup to a separate external 3TB hard drive (the second one I purchased) and have TM create a backup of ONLY the old internal drive - not the new system as well as the old internal unit.
Is this possible and if so can anyone advise how to do this. Does not seem I can exclude the system drive I am now booted from so that it is not backed up. (This makes sense that TM would be designed this way given its primary purpose is to backup a system).
If TM cannot be configured in this way, is there another option I can use?
Thanks
Andrew

Thanks for that advice. I have heard of it but a friend who does IT support at a University nearby suggested using Disk Utility to save an image - hence this is currently underway at present. Once this is finished I will try Carbon Copy Cloner.
I have another friend who has an older version of CCC - do you know if an old version will work ok or if only the latest supports Yosemite?
Also once I have the clone completed from CCC, is the process then to reformat the old internal drive and then clone from the CCC external drive back to the internal and then reboot and trust all is well?
Appreciate your help Csound1.
Regards
Andrew

On imac 10.6.8 using current version of Aperture. How can I access the Aperture Library on my external hard drive that I use with time machine for backup? I can only access the application but not the library..

On imac 10.6.8 using current version of Aperture. How can I access the Aperture Library on my external hard drive that I use with time machine for backup? I can only access the application but not the library..

Go into Time Machine (the program not the bundle on the extrnal disk) and using Time Machine's browser go to the Folder where the library lives. You could look in the library bundle in Time Machine but that won't really tell you much,
If you want to make sure it truely has backed up your library you will need to restore it and open the restored library with Aperture.
If all this still has you confused you need to read up on Time Machine in order to get a feel for how it works, for what it is doing and for how to restore files from it.

Time Machine prepares backup but cancels without error message before starting backup

Hello.
I'm running OS 10.9.1 on a 2013 iMac. Time Machine has not backed up for a few weeks. Have tried verifying the backup with no problems reported. Can't mount 1TB Time Capsule or relevant sparsebundle in Disk Utility. Went to Console and copied the relevant logs:
1/12/14 8:25:06.310 AM com.apple.backupd[1456]: Starting manual backup
1/12/14 8:25:06.320 AM com.apple.backupd[1456]: Network destination already mounted at: /Volumes/Data
1/12/14 8:25:29.000 AM kernel[0]: hfs: mounted Time Machine Backups on device disk4s2
1/12/14 8:25:31.268 AM com.apple.backupd[1456]: Disk image /Volumes/Data/Macintosh.sparsebundle mounted at: /Volumes/Time Machine Backups
1/12/14 8:25:31.284 AM com.apple.backupd[1456]: Backing up to /dev/disk4s2: /Volumes/Time Machine Backups/Backups.backupdb
1/12/14 8:25:31.481 AM mds[65]: (Error) Volume: Root store set to FSOnly with matching create! (loaded:1)
1/12/14 8:26:00.273 AM com.apple.backupd[1456]: Deep event scan at path:/Users/[redacted]/Pictures/iPhoto Library cellphone/Database/apdb reason:contains changes|must scan subdirs|fsevent|missed reservation|file event|
1/12/14 8:26:04.372 AM com.apple.backupd[1456]: Finished scan
1/12/14 8:26:04.376 AM com.apple.backupd[1456]: Not using file event preflight for Macintosh HD
1/12/14 8:26:44.000 AM kernel[0]: disk4s2: 0xc005 (UNDEFINED).
1/12/14 8:26:51.000 AM kernel[0]: disk4s2: 0xe000c2e4 (UNDEFINED).
1/12/14 8:26:51.601 AM diskimages-helper[1470]: terminating disk4 - image is no longer available
[here follows various repeated disk4s2 undefined messages]
1/12/14 8:26:51.603 AM com.apple.backupd[1456]: Stopping backup to allow backup destination disk to be unmounted or ejected.
[here follows various repeated disk4s2 undefined messages]
1/12/14 8:26:52.000 AM kernel[0]: hfs: Runtime corruption detected on Time Machine Backups, fsck will be forced on next mount.
1/12/14 8:26:52.000 AM kernel[0]: disk4s2: 0xe000c2e4 (UNDEFINED).
[last two lines repeated about a dozen times]
1/12/14 8:26:52.000 AM kernel[0]: hfs: cat_delete() failed to delete thread record id=81 on vol=Time Machine Backups
1/12/14 8:26:52.000 AM kernel[0]: hfs: Runtime corruption detected on Time Machine Backups, fsck will be forced on next mount.
1/12/14 8:26:52.000 AM kernel[0]: disk4s2: 0xe000c2e4 (UNDEFINED).
1/12/14 8:26:52.000 AM kernel[0]: disk4s2: 0xe000c2e4 (UNDEFINED).
1/12/14 8:26:52.239 AM com.apple.backupd[1456]: Backup canceled.
1/12/14 8:26:52.000 AM kernel[0]: hfs: BlockMarkFreeInternal() trying to free unallocated blocks on volume Time Machine Backups
1/12/14 8:26:52.000 AM kernel[0]: hfs: Runtime corruption detected on Time Machine Backups, fsck will be forced on next mount.
1/12/14 8:26:52.000 AM kernel[0]: hfs: unmount initiated on Time Machine Backups on device disk4s2
1/12/14 8:26:57.284 AM com.apple.backupd[1456]: Ejected Time Machine disk image: /Volumes/Data/Macintosh.sparsebundle
1/12/14 8:26:57.000 AM kernel[0]: AFP_VFS afpfs_unmount: /Volumes/Data, flags 0, pid 1500
1/12/14 8:26:57.000 AM kernel[0]: ASP_TCP Disconnect: triggering reconnect by bumping reconnTrigger from curr value 0 on so 0xffffff8054511530
1/12/14 8:26:57.000 AM kernel[0]: ASP_TCP Detach: Reply queue not empty?
1/12/14 8:26:57.759 AM com.apple.backupd[1456]: Ejected Time Machine network volume.
This basic sequence seems to have happened every time I've tried to run backup lately. Pondini's A6 mentions the deep event scan related to iPhoto but not what to do about it. Help?

I decided, based on various clues from Pondini's page, that the hard drive in my Time Capsule was failing. I started a full backup on my second Time Capsule and am currenly only using the original as an internet router.

Can I use time machine to backup on my server HD?

I've mac Leapard with Time Machine but never made use of it because:
- I don't have and don't want to have an external HD.
- Don't have Time Capsule, and cannot afford it.
Yet I was wondering if it was somehow possible to use Time Machine, to backup directly to my server (online) for example.

-(.)^(.)- wrote:
Time Machine backups are NOT supported for NAS devices except Time Capsule or a USB HDD connected to an AirPort Extreme Base Station. All other options are hacks.
I would add that even if a network drive were available, unless it was formatted HFS+ with either GUID or APM depending, it would not be acceptable anyway for TM.

Trouble getting time machine to backup latest numbers file.

I'm able to use Time Machine to backup my macbook wirelessly to an external hard drive attached to my iMac. However, I recently noticed that I am failing to back up the latest version of a numbers file.
Has anyone noticed any incomplete or outdated files - that shouldn't be - in their number file back ups?

Well, Time Machine unfortunately is bugged beyond use for some people. It is nearly impossible to tell if TM will work every single time until Apple will take a look at their programming and fix the darn thing.
Anyways, back to the point. The problem with updated files is that TM will look for new things that are indexed as new, and by indexed as new as in the Spotlight regards the file as updated since last backup. I don't really know if this would work, but you could give it a try.
Try this:
1) Duplicate the file into the same folder with a different name
ex. filename.doc, and make a new file called filename_1.doc
2) Make sure that this file is in the same folder as the other file.
3) Back up
I think that would make Spotlight tell TM to backup the updated documents.

Time machine completes backup but does not actually backup any files

I have had this problem sporadically with time machine for a while now, most of the time it works great and everything is smooth sailing, but every now and then time machine will run and go through all of the steps but it skips actually backing up any files. For example, if I put a new word document on my desktop right now and tell time machine to back up, everything will go as it should and time machine will run and go through all of the stages (making back up disk available, calculating changes, cleaning up) except it doesn't actually transfer any files. When I go into to time machine the new word document won't appear in any of the backups. Restarting my computer does fix this but it is a very inconvenient way to fix the problem and it also leaves me having to manually go into time machine to make sure that it is in fact backing up files. And no I do not have some weird exclusion in the time machine preferences.
In the console my system log reads:
Jan 13 22:42:24 brad-bargers-macbook-pro com.apple.backupd[8462]: Starting standard backup
Jan 13 22:42:24 brad-bargers-macbook-pro com.apple.backupd[8462]: Attempting to mount network destination using URL: afp://Brad%[email protected]/Time%20Capsule
Jan 13 22:42:30 brad-bargers-macbook-pro com.apple.backupd[8462]: Mounted network destination using URL: afp://Brad%[email protected]/Time%20Capsule
Jan 13 22:42:31 brad-bargers-macbook-pro hdiejectd[8470]: running
Jan 13 22:42:33 brad-bargers-macbook-pro com.apple.backupd[8462]: Disk image /Volumes/Time Capsule/Brad Barger’s MacBook Pro_002500a2b268.sparsebundle mounted at: /Volumes/Backup of Brad Barger’s MacBook Pro
Jan 13 22:42:33 brad-bargers-macbook-pro com.apple.backupd[8462]: Backing up to: /Volumes/Backup of Brad Barger’s MacBook Pro/Backups.backupdb
Jan 13 22:42:38 brad-bargers-macbook-pro com.apple.backupd[8462]: No pre-backup thinning needed: 828.8 MB requested (including padding), 153.74 GB available
Jan 13 22:42:45 brad-bargers-macbook-pro com.apple.backupd[8462]: Copied 6 files (93 bytes) from volume Macintosh HD.
Jan 13 22:42:46 brad-bargers-macbook-pro com.apple.backupd[8462]: Starting post-backup thinning
Jan 13 22:42:46 brad-bargers-macbook-pro com.apple.backupd[8462]: No post-back up thinning needed: no expired backups exist
Jan 13 22:42:46 brad-bargers-macbook-pro com.apple.backupd[8462]: Backup completed successfully.
Jan 13 22:42:48 brad-bargers-macbook-pro com.apple.backupd[8462]: Ejected Time Machine disk image.
Jan 13 22:42:48 brad-bargers-macbook-pro com.apple.backupd[8462]: Ejected Time Machine network volume.
Jan 13 22:42:58 brad-bargers-macbook-pro hdiejectd[8470]: quitCheck: calling exit(0)
Jan 13 22:43:30 brad-bargers-macbook-pro com.apple.launchd[1] (com.apple.netauth.sysagent[8463]): Exited with exit code: 255
Sorry for the info dump and I hope my question makes sense. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

b_cubed wrote:
Thanks you for your response. I was wondering if it didn't have to do with disk utility in some way. Just to be clear what do you mean when you say "altering other volumes on the same drive"?
If you have more than one partition on a drive, and add, delete, or resize any of them, Disk Utility does a +*Verify Disk+* on the entire disk. So even if you didn't touch the boot volume, whatever DU does will cause what you've seen.
It is rather odd, that it only affects some of us. Those who have it, have it consistently. It happens on any number of hardware configurations, and I could always reproduce it with a fresh install of SL on an empty partition, so it's clearly nothing to do with any settings, preferences, 3rd-party anything, etc.
This was reported to Apple in October; on November 12 the TM engineers were able to reproduce it. They don't tell us any more than that; all we can do is hope it'll be fixed in a future update.

Time Machine - Preparing backup - It's endless

My C2D Mac Mini is hanging on Time Machine - Preparing Backup for the second time since "Upgrading" to 10.5.2
I had to re-format my backup disk last time and start all the backups again.
Here is an extract from the console log:
29/04/2008 23:50:13 /System/Library/CoreServices/backupd[1094] Starting standard backup
29/04/2008 23:50:13 /System/Library/CoreServices/backupd[1094] Backing up to: /Volumes/LaCie Disk/Backups.backupdb
29/04/2008 23:50:15 /System/Library/CoreServices/backupd[1094] Event store UUIDs don't match for volume: Macintosh HD
29/04/2008 23:50:15 /System/Library/CoreServices/backupd[1094] Node requires deep traversal:/ reason:kFSEDBEventFlagMustScanSubDirs|kFSEDBEventFlagReasonEventDBUntrustable|
Does anyone recognise this? I'm a Mac novice so I don't understand what it all means. I hope I don't have to reformat and start again as I was converted to Mac from PC on the advice that "A Mac Works!"
My backup drive is a 500GB Lacie Mini if that is of any relevance. Spotlight is told not to index the drive and also the Lacie drive is told not to back itself up.
Can anyone help as it's driving me nuts!

Are Lacie really that bad? I thought that the main reason they are mentioned in these forums is that Lacie are one of the only brands of external storage that apple actively promote through their own web stores so there a good chance that quite a few Mac users will buy one. Anyway I can't afford to buy another Hard Drive at the moment and the lacie works perfectly apart from Time Machine.
The problem seems to be with Mac OS the more I delve into these forums and more importantly the 10.5.2. update which is where Time Machine appears to be providing users with a lot of troubles.
The Apple support self service on the website is far from comprehensive as I guess they want you to purchase Apple Care for ongoing support after the 90 days initial period but come on apple give us a break and sort it out or provide a support email address for specific problems!

Time Machine same backup size every time

Anyone have any idea why Time Machine would backup the same amount every time? Every hour mine backs up 1.8 GB, unless I've added more than that to my hd.
I only back up the internal drive on my macbook to a 500 GB Time Capsule via wifi (802.11n only, 5GHz). Not that I figured it would make a difference, but it still does it if backed up via ethernet.
I've also noticed that as soon as it completes the backup, it will backup all over again - and not because an hour has passed. I'm not sure if it does this every time (but I think i does), or if it does it more than twice when it happens.
Thanks in advance!

See if the following might give you some ideas as to why...
*_Incremental Backups Seem Too Large!_*
Open the Time Machine Prefs on the Mac in question. How much space does it report you have "Available"? When a backup is initiated how much space does it report you need?
Now, consider the following, it might give you some ideas:
Time Machine performs backups at the file level. If a single bit in a large file is changed, the WHOLE file is backed up again. This is a problem for programs that save data to monolithic virtual disk files that are modified frequently. These include Parallels, VMware Fusion, Aperture vaults, or the databases that Entourage and Thunderbird create. These should be excluded from backup using the Time Machine Preference Exclusion list. You will, however, need to backup these files manually to another external disk.
If you do a lot of movie editing, unless these files are excluded, expect Time Machine to treat revised versions of a single movie as entirely new files.
If you frequently download software or video files that you only expect to keep for a short time, consider excluding the folder these are stored in from Time Machine backups.
If you have recently created a new disk image or burned a DVD, Time Machine will target these files for backup unless they are deleted or excluded from backup.
*Events-Based Backups*
Time Machine does not compare file-for-file to see if changes have been made. If it had to rescan every file on your drive before each backup, it would not be able to perform backups as often as it does. Rather, it relies on a process called FSEvents. This is a system log that records changes that occur with all the directories on your Mac. Moving / copying / deleting / & saving files and folders creates events that are recorded in this log. At the beginning of each backup, Time Machine simply looks at this log to determine what has changed since the last backup. [http://arstechnica.com/reviews/os/mac-os-x-10-5.ars/14]
Installing new software, upgrading existing software, or updating Mac OS X system software can create major changes in the structure of your directories. Every one of these changes is recorded by the OS as an event. Time Machine will backup every file that has an event associated with it since the installation.
Files or folders that are simply moved or renamed are counted as NEW files or folders. If you rename any file or folder, Time Machine will back up the ENTIRE file or folder again no matter how big or small it is.
George Schreyer describes this behavior: “If you should want to do some massive rearrangement of your disk, Time Machine will interpret the rearranged files as new files and back them up again in their new locations. Just renaming a folder will cause this to happen. This is OK if you've got lots of room on your backup disk. Eventually, Time Machine will thin those backups and the space consumed will be recovered. However, if you really want recover the space in the backup volume immediately, you can. To do this, bring a Finder window to the front and then click the Time Machine icon on the dock. This will activate the Time Machine user interface. Navigate back in time to where the old stuff exists and select it. Then pull down the "action" menu (the gear thing) and select "delete all backups" and the older stuff vanishes.” (http://www.girr.org/mac_stuff/backups.html)
*TechTool Pro Directory Protection*
This disk utility feature creates backup copies of your system directories. Obviously these directories are changing all the time. So, depending on how it is configured, these backup files will be changing as well which is interpreted by Time Machine as new data to backup. Excluding the folder these backups are stored in will eliminate this effect.
*Backups WAY Too Large*
If an initial full backup or a subsequent incremental backup is tens or hundreds of Gigs larger than expected, check to see that all unwanted external hard disks are still excluded from Time Machine backups. Time Machine will attempt to backup any hard disk attached to your Mac, including secondary internal drives, that have not been added to Time Machines Exclusion list.
This includes the Time Machine backup drive ITSELF. Normally, Time Machine is set to exclude its’ own backup disk by default. But on rare occasions it can forget. When your backup begins, Time Machine mounts the backup on your desktop. (For Time Capsule/AirDisk users it appears as a white drive icon labeled something like “Backup of (your computer)”.) If, while it is mounted, it does not show up in the Time Machine Preferences “Do not back up” list, then Time Machine will attempt to back ITSELF up. If it is not listed while the drive is mounted, then you need to add it to the list.
*Recovering Backup Space*
If you have discovered that large unwanted files have been backed up, you can use the Time Machine “time travel” interface to recovered some of that space.
Launch Time Machine from the Dock icon.
Initially, you are presented with a window that represents “Today (Now)”. DO NOT make changes to file while you see “Today (Now)” at the bottom of the screen.
Click on the window just behind “Today (Now)”. This represents the last successful backup and should display the date and time of this backup at the bottom of the screen.
Now, navigate to where the unwanted file resides.
Highlight the file and click the Actions menu (Gear icon) from the toolbar.
Select “Delete all backups of <this file>”.
*FileVault / Boot Camp / iDisk Syncing*
Note: Leopard has changed the way it deals with FileVault disk images, so it is not necessary to exclude your Home folder if you have FileVault activated. Additionally, Time Machine ignores Boot Camp partitions as the manner in which they are formatted is incompatible. Finally, if you have your iDisk Synced to your desktop, it is not necessary to exclude the disk image file it creates as that has been changed to a sparsebundle as well in Leopard.
Let us know if this resolved your issue.
Cheers!

Time Machine "preparing backup" eternally upon wake from sleep

at a bit of a loss here...
iMac 24" (version which offered 7300GT as BTO option)
10.5.5 with all updates applied
LaCie 500 gig USB 2.0 drive directly attached.
Up until about two months ago, Time machine functioned fined. Then for some reason, the following started to happen. (no known reason, no software update related etc, that I know of)
scenario... Time Machine functions correctly EXCEPT when waking from sleep. If iMac wakes from sleep and attempts a backup immediately (e.g. more than one hour has passed), it gets stuck "preparing backup" forever. I've let it run overnight (actually as long as about 30 hours), it never stops. Finder and other programs become extremely non-responsive, machine is almost unusable. Literally, the only way out is to manually shut down external drive, with attendant warnings/errors.
What I've done:
1) deleted the time machine .plist file
2) erased, repartioned (as a single partition) external drive
3) started brand new time machine backup (takes about three hours)
At this point, time machine will backup up fine... I can force a successful backup, if I leave the machine running, at one hour it does a successful backup.
BUT, as soon as it goes to sleep, time machine is hosed.
The only workable method for using time machine is to turn the external drive and time machine off when not using it, and turn the whole shootin' match on to do what essentially becomes manual backups. These backup are fairly lengthy, as time machine also does lengthy "preparing backup", but they complete in about 30 minutes to one hour.
Given that time machine doesn't give mountable/cloneable backup, I'm probably going to go back to Carbon Copy Cloner. Still, I like the ease/regularity of Time Machine, and would use it if it works.
Any ideas?
thanks

It could be a number of things. There are lots of things that Time Machine does in order to "manage" backups -- apart from just copying data to the backup drive.
It has to manage the transition of hourly backups into daily backups and must also transition daily backups into weekly backups. Each time it does this it has to move a lot of data around. It also has to maintain indexes of everything so you can quickly find backups should you want to perform a restore.
I've also noticed that there are circumstances that can cause TM to question whether it can trust it's existing backup database... I've caught Time Machine saying that it needs to do a "deep traversal" of the backup (basically it wants to check and see what it really has) and this can take a very long time.
Still... 30 hours is an extremely long amount of time. I'm almost wondering if there's a problem with either your USB bus or your drive when they wake up such that you may be getting a huge number of retries on something that should have happened quickly.
I'd suggest you start the "Console" utility, select "All Messages" at the left, and then watch the messages being written to your log file. Not only does Time Machine log all of it's progress messages to the system.log (in more detail than you'd see in the Time Machine UI), but so do lots of other system processes. If you're getting USB bus problems the error messages would likely show up in the same log. I'm especially suspicious about non-TM related causes since you said you've already blown away your TM backups & preferences and started from scratch and you're still getting the problem.
Try re-creating your problem with the Console log messages being displayed and see if you can't see something in the log that would let you get a little closer to the root cause.
Regards,
Tim

I got this error while my mac was backing up to time machine: he backup disk image "/Volumes/Data/Sanjeev's iMac.sparsebundle" could not be created (error (null)). Please could someone help

I got this error while my mac was backing up to time machine: he backup disk image “/Volumes/Data/Sanjeev’s iMac.sparsebundle” could not be created (error (null)). Please could someone help

Has the backup been working ok??
If that is the case simply reboot the TC.. or if that fails, reboot the whole network, restarting in correct order..
modem.. wait 2min
TC.. wait 2min

Time machine network backup really ***** (truly)

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