Time Machine on NAS, sparse image bundles, etc

I have a specific question about using Time Machine with a NAS drive. I have a NAS setup, and I just installed a 2nd drive there specifically for backups. I have 2 macs, a MBP & an iMac. I followed instructions somewhere for creating a sparsebundle disk image on the NAS drive for each machine to get time machine to work over the network, and got it to work. Since the drive is 1TB, I made 2 images at 450GB each, even though the 2 machines only currently need about 90GB & 150GB.
Now, based on advice elsewhere, I set up Superduper to back up to the same drive. This uses a similar process of creating a sparse image on that drive. Note that I say sparse image, not sparsebundle - I tried using the existing sparsebundles already created, but superduper didn't seem to want to do that, and in fact although sparsebundle is a choice in their menu, only sparse image would work. So I went ahead and did this but only with my MBP. It indeed created a separate sparse image, and it takes up the full amount of space necessary to back up the entire drive (90GB).
What I'm wondering is if I'm running the risk of quickly running out of room on my NAS drive, since I think TM will fairly quickly eat up as much space as you give it (450GB X 2 = 900 GB), and the superduper backup is taking up the full amount of hard drive space needed (90GB) to make a full backup (based on what I had read, I thought that somehow using superduper onto the same drive as your TM backups would mean superduper would 'piggy back' on TM's backed up files and only add the components needed to create a startup disk, and therefore not take up much space.) I was still hoping to also back up the iMac (120GB) with Superduper onto the same drive, but don't want to do that yet until I have some peace of mind about this question...
Thanks for any insight you may have!

doublelibra wrote:
I have a specific question about using Time Machine with a NAS drive. I have a NAS setup, and I just installed a 2nd drive there specifically for backups. I have 2 macs, a MBP & an iMac. I followed instructions somewhere for creating a sparsebundle disk image on the NAS drive for each machine to get time machine to work over the network, and got it to work. Since the drive is 1TB, I made 2 images at 450GB each, even though the 2 machines only currently need about 90GB & 150GB.
you should know that TM backups to 3rd party NASes are not officially supported. you used a hack to make it work. but you use it on your won risk and with no guarantees.
Now, based on advice elsewhere, I set up Superduper to back up to the same drive. This uses a similar process of creating a sparse image on that drive. Note that I say sparse image, not sparsebundle - I tried using the existing sparsebundles already created, but superduper didn't seem to want to do that, and in fact although sparsebundle is a choice in their menu, only sparse image would work. So I went ahead and did this but only with my MBP. It indeed created a separate sparse image, and it takes up the full amount of space necessary to back up the entire drive (90GB).
What I'm wondering is if I'm running the risk of quickly running out of room on my NAS drive, since I think TM will fairly quickly eat up as much space as you give it (450GB X 2 = 900 GB)
no, that won't happen. TM is very economical in how it stores backups. on every backup it only backs up afresh new and changed files. everything else is *hard linked* to existing backup copies. that's why incremental TM backups are usually quite small and fast.
, and the superduper backup is taking up the full amount of hard drive space needed (90GB) to make a full backup (based on what I had read, I thought that somehow using superduper onto the same drive as your TM backups would mean superduper would 'piggy back' on TM's backed up files and only add the components needed to create a startup disk, and therefore not take up much space.)
NO. nothing like this is remotely true. superduper and TM backups are fully independent and don't interact at all. use separate sparse bundles for TM and superduper backups.
I was still hoping to also back up the iMac (120GB) with Superduper onto the same drive, but don't want to do that yet until I have some peace of mind about this question...
Thanks for any insight you may have!

Similar Messages

[Q] Time Machine w/ External Sparse Image

Hello,
I have a external USB 2TB HD (NTFS) that I want to use for external backup for both a Windows 7 PC and my MBP (Snow Leopard, 500GB HD), I created a 650GB sparse image to use Time Machine with it but I do not find a way of setting the Sparse Image in a way that it shows as a TM option.
Notes: I will mount the external HD directly to the USB port of the MBP using NTF-3G. With the above configuration I can mount the Sparse Image and use it for Carbon Copy Cloner backups
Any help would be greatly appreciated.

A sparse image saved in a remote NTFS network share works...
That's not a supported configuration either.
Mac 101: Time Machine

Time Machine and mounted sparse bundle disk image - file by file backup?

I think I had this system working in Leopard, but upon upgrade to Snow Leopard it seems to have broken. Does anyone have any idea how I can get Time Machine to back up the contents of a mounted sparse bundle disk image in real time - file by file within the disk image? For example, I have a 2GB sparse bundle disk image that i keep all of my bank statements/files/records in. It auto-mounts on boot and stays mounted. I use the disk image to keep it password-protected, so if I unmount it it is fairly safe. In Leopard, I would exclude the .sparseimage file from backup, but it would still backup the mounted image itself on a file-by-file basis, so I could enter Time Machine and explore the image folder by folder, file by file (say I deleted an old bank statement by mistake, I could go into time machine and recover as if it were a normal file/folder).
In Snow Leopard, after a clean install, and creating a new sparse bundle disk image and excluding the .sparsebundle file, I can't seem to get this to work even though the image is mounted. Is there any way to trick Time Machine into backing up the mounted image as it would any other folder? I know I can back up the .sparsebundle file incrementally but in order to recover a lost document I'd have to remount the old bundle and that seems rather roundabout.
Thanks,

I think you're trying to bypass the finder to mount the disk. Try this (I'll bold the key steps):
- *Turn off Time Machine* in the System Preferences.
- Option A: If you directly use a hard disk (not wireless) that has the sparsebundle you want to open, *connect the disk* but don't double click on the sparsebundle.
- Option B: If you are using wireless, this means use shift-command-k (or shift-apple-k), and if it says "Connect As..." in the upper right instead of disconnect, then use that button to *connect to that wireless drive*.
- Confirm the sparsebundle shows in that folder before proceeding...
- *Open Terminal* (Applications>Utilities>Terminal.app)
- Type: *hdiutil attach -noverify* (<-- notice a *space " "* must be included after typing this here but *DON'T hit return* yet.)
- *Drag the sparsebundle to the cursor in terminal*, and it should fill in something like /Volumes/HardDrive/COMPUTERNAME.sparsebundle for you. Now you can hit return, and the disk will mount.
- After you are done browsing sparsebundle's mounted image, *eject the mounted disk* like you would any other disk (not the sparsebundle image itself, just the disk icon that appeared if you successfully mounted it).
- Turn *Time Machine back on* in the System Preferences.
Hope this helps.

AES-256 user home directory sparse image bundle in Lion?

Snow Leopard and previous had file vault to protect users' home directories as, I believe, AES-128-encrypted sparse image bundles. As I understand it now, under Lion, the options are to enable AES-128 whole disk encryption, or, if upgrading an existing snow leopard machine with a legacy file vault user account, to maintain that legacy file vault user home directory. However, under this second approach, additional users' home directories cannot be individually "file-vaulted" and instead, would require that legacy file vault be decrytped and then the entire disk be encrypted.
I am thinking that it would be advantageous from a security standpoint if an individual user home directory could remain encrypted, if that user were not actively logged in. Then, all contents would be inaccessible to other users, including administratively privileged users, and also that user's home directory would remain encrypted when the computer was turned on and booted up because as I understand it, file vault 2's real strength lies in protecting "data at rest" versus "data on a powered up and mounted file vault 2 volume".
To that end, I am wondering, regardless of whether file vault 2 is enabled or not, whether an existing user home directory and all of its contents be converted to an AES-256-encrypted sparse image bundle, using Disk Utility, and exist at the /Users directory space, mounting and decrypting "on the fly" from the login window at user login just like how a legacy file vault home directory is treated under snow leopard, independently of whether file vault 2 was enabled on the whole disk or not. This would also permit later addition/conversion of another "file vaulted" user account whether fle vault 2 were enabled or not.
To recap, an AES-256-encrypted sparse image bundle that would mount upon user login just like a legacy file vault user home directory does. Does anyone know if something like that is doable, and has that road already been travelled successfully? If so, I'd love to read a step-by-step, play-by-play, set of instructions on how to do just that.

I think I got a solution worked out. I don't mind if things get installed in /opt as long as pacman tracks it, and I found ruby-enterprise-rmagick in the AUR as an orphan. I adopted it, updated it, installed it, and it's working great with my code.

Nas on airport extreme not recognized by time machine. same nas was previously used as time machine backup on different airport extreme. are there any configuration files that i can delete to fix this problem ?

nas on airport extreme not recognized by time machine. same nas was previously used as time machine backup on different airport extreme. are there any configuration files that i can delete to fix this problem ?

Time Machine has been working just fine, but in the last week or two it has given up the ghost. I reset the connections to the drive, and it will basically save a few bytes of data and then hang.
Although Apple originally announced, prior to the release of the first 802.11n AirPort Extreme Base Stations (AEBSn), that it would support Time Machine backups to AirPort Disks, they removed that option before they did finally release the base station for sale.
Since then, Apple has posted (as you have noted) that they DO NOT support Time Machine backups to AirPort Disks. As far as I know, they have not changed from that position and those who do these backups find that they become corrupted over time. Sorry, but it sounds like you just confirmed that for yourself.
1) Has one of the recent updates either on the AE (firmware) or OSX disabled this function?
No. Again, this feature has never been supported by Apple for every generation of AEBSn released.
2) Are there any changes I can make to get this working again?
If your data backups are critical to you, then you will want to use a different solution for your Time Machine backup destination drive strategy. I would suggest that you connect your WD My Book directly to your Mac in the mean time.
Your other options would be to either use a Time Capsule (which interestingly does support TM backups to AirPort Disks) or a non-Apple solution like the Drobo FS or HP MediaSmart server.

"Time machine error, The disk image cannot be mounted" What can I do??

I ran the time machine. Then, "preparing backup" showed up for a long time. After that, a window pop out: "Time machine error, The disk image cannot be mounted" What is disk image? What can I do (I can't back up anything)
P.S. I use time capsule for backup. there were no problem on connection

I'm having the same issue. I do not have TC as my base station. It says right in the book that if you choose, you do not have to have it run as your router, just as a part of your existing wireless network. All software is up to date and I have already shortened the name of both my TC and TC disc to 6 characters and no spaces! I've already spoken with someone today about this. He really didn't know. Have tried backing up both wirelessly and directly connecting with an Ethernet cord. I had to finally call because when I attempted to register the product to get online support, apple.com didn't recognize the serial number!!! The gentleman on the phone got it registered for me. I bought the TC from an official apple store and for whatever reason when he put in the serial number his computer said that this TC was so "old" I guess that there was technically "no support." That basically means that even though my parents just purchased this for me a week before Christmas, that it was made a year ago and the warranty is not good?? I need to do more research on that. Right now I am very unhappy about this. I am a firm apple user and have been for years, but this is frustrating.
I had read somewhere else (not sure I've been searching apple for what seems like forever now) to make sure that the TC was showing up in "devices" of the Finder. Mine doesn't show up there, but rather in the "Network" window. Is this an issue? If it is, can anyone tell me how to fix that. I have Time Machine backing up to my TC, so I do not see why it would be.
UPDATE: I just opened up my TC on the "Shared" section of the Finder window and deleted the old "sparsebundle" (I had no clue that anything had backed up way back at 3:30pm on Dec 29) and now I get a slightly new message: Time Machine Error: The backup disc image could not be created." So now the word "mounted" is replaced with "created." This error showed up a lot sooner than the original one. Ok, no clue. I am going to try to Change the Disc again, and try again. I will post another update.
Message was edited by: kryzma

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 error: backup disk image could not be created

Iet up my new time capsule day and it's working great. Now that I've got everything sorted out, I'm ready to do the initial time machine back up on it. I went into preferences, changed the backup location to my TC and clicked 'back up now'. Very quickly I get a message that the backup failed: "Time Machine Error - The backup disk image could not be created".
I've searched the apple support area but haven't been able to figure this one out. Can anyone help, please? This is an initial backup. (FYI, it worked great on my old external drive.)
Many thanks

I had the same problem. I installed my Time Capsule, fired up Time Machine and got an error that said "The backup is too large for the backup volume. The backup requires 436.8 GB but only 182.2GB are available."
Coincidently, these are the same sizes as the space used and the space available on my iMac's drive.
I looked in /Volumes and saw that the sparsebundle was being created on the local disk and not on the main disk. Trying to backup again gave me the "Time Machine error: backup disk image could not be created." message.
I poked around the forums, and found a post about the machine name setting in sharing. I decided to give it a look, and lo and behold, I did not have a machine name. So I gave my box a name, kicked off Time Machine again, and it worked.

HT3275 Time machine error, backup disk image "/volumes/data-1/.sparesbundle " already in use. I don;t know what this means, can someone help?

My Mac mini time capsule is showing an error Time machine error, backup disk image "/volumes/data-1/.sparesbundle " already in use. I don;t know what this means, can someone help?

I had a similar problem and I solved it as follows -
In Time Machine - > I deselected time capsule Data Disk as a destination.
Then I pulled the power plug on the Time Capsule, twiddled my thumbs for 15 secs, plugged the power back in.
Went back t Time Machine -> Re-Added the Time Capsule Data Disk as destination. And then tested by selecting Backup Now.
All went well and the backup picked up from before the problem.
BTW - I also have a USB drive connected to Time Capsule that is an alternate disk for Time Machine to backup.
In Mountain Lion the GUI lets you add more than one Time Machine backup destinations very easily so I think it a good idea to have redundancy.
Hope this helps.

Time machine backup blocked; disc image sparse bundle needs ejecting

Team, I cannot backup to 2Tb time machine; error message as above. How do I 'eject' this disc image and what exactly is it?
Thanks
Nick B

OK, we fixed this for now with the simple, but common Mac way of
throwing something in the trash.
In this case it seems to be a temporary network connection to the remote Time Machine partition. When Time Machine balks, the icon for the temporary mount gets stuck on the Desktop. We threw it in the trash (unmounting it) and then Time Machine can resume.
Apple networking is annoying, but then on the other, it's easy. We lose printing in a similar way.
Anyway, although we seem to be OK, I'd like to understand this a bit better. I can see in the "/Volumes" folder (in Terminal) three Time Machine mounts, not one as I would have expected, and they all appear to point to the same place:
drwx------   9 root                   wheel 264   Jun 22 10:23 TM-2
drwx------   9 root                   wheel 264 Jun 22 10:23 TM-1
drwx------   9 MYUSERNAME staff   264 Jun 22 10:23 TM
On the remote machine, the disc TM appears only once.
If you look at the listing of all three, they are identical. What gives?
Is this a consequence of the fact that we are putting the time machine backups on a remote machine (that is not a Mac OS server). We have to mount the remote disc before Time Machine will run, but from that point it works perfectly -- or as perfectly as any mac networking thing seems to work.

Time Machine and NAS: Cannot create backup image

I'm wondering if anyone else has encountered this problem when setting up Time Machine with a NAS. I'm using a Thecus N4100 Pro mounted via AFP. I've enabled Time Machine on unsupported disks so that I can select one of my NAS shares as the backup destination. So far so good. Time Machine attempts to create a backup and ultimately fails because it cannot create the backup disk image. Any idea what's going on?
I just set up a Time Capsule for my parents and it worked very well. I've thought about replacing my AirPort Extreme with a TC if I cannot get Time Machine working with my NAS. However, I'd rather use the NAS for obvious reasons (like, I already own it!).
Can anyone point me in the right direction? Or will this not work?
Thanks!
-Rob

A little searching of the forums answered my questions on setting up Time Machine to work with my NAS. However, I still have one question I hope someone can answer.
The instructions I found describe creating a sparsebundle and copying it to the NAS before Time Machine will work. To create the bundle, one must use the Ethernet ID of the computer. So, what if one is using two network interfaces (ie: WiFi and wired Ethernet)? I prefer wired Ethernet, but use WiFi as well when I'm on the couch, etc.
If I set up the sparsebundle using the WiFi Ethernet ID, will that prevent me from backing up when connected via wired? Or vice-versa? How does Time Capsule handle this?
Thanks,
Rob

Best approach for Time Machine / Entourage / FileVault / sparse bundle disk

I am looking to set up Time Machine belatedly on my G5 to provide hassle-free backup for me and my family. I use Entourage. I also want to provide a small amount of encrypted storage. I’ve scoured the obvious places which have plenty of ideas, but nothing which pulls it all together.
My thoughts so far have been:
1. Time Machine doesn’t work well with Entourage as Entourage uses a monolithic single file (which in my case is several GB big) – backing this up every hour will bring my machine to its knees, fill up the backup disk and will possibly give a corrupt backup as the file could be accessed by Entourage or the MS daemon process during the backup.
2. I thought of turning FileVault on which would automatically contain the Entourage file. This would mean:
a) the sparse bundle format (8 MB bands) of FileVault would limit the volume of changed Entourage data which would be backed up each time by Time Machine and
b) the backup would only occur during logout (which is fine with me) when Entourage and the MS daemon are not running so that the backup won’t be corrupt.
3. However I am not hearing good things about the reliability of FileVault (comments?) and don’t want all the data in my Home folders lost – I don’t need that much encryption anyway.
4. So I thought about setting up a couple of encrypted disk images made of sparse bundles – one for the Entourage data (symbolically linked to the right place for Entourage to pick the folder up) and the other for the other small number of files I need encrypted. This could be auto-mounted at login.
5. However I think that using disk images rather than FileVault loses the automatic backup by Time Machine at logout. Maybe there is a way to get Time Machine to automatically backup these disk images during logout.
6. Perhaps there is another way to get the disk images backed up at logout other than using Time Machine.
So my questions are:
A. What is the best overall approach to providing a low-maintenance reliable backup which deals appropriately with Entourage and provides a small amount of encrypted space?
B. Can Time Machine be made to backup disk images other than FileVault disk images at logout? (for example is there a particular location / filename format for FileVault images which I could emulate with the other disk images to fool Time Machine into backing them up?)
C. When Time Machine runs at logout, have MS Entourage and the daemon process already been shut down and the disks unmounted, to prevent corruption?
D. Is there another way of backing up the sparse image disks at logout?
C. Is this all going to get magically fixed in Snow Leopard?
D. Will MS come up with a sensible storage format for Entourage?
Any thoughts greatly appreciated.

I don't know if there is a complete solution, but here are some things you could consider.
1. TM does not run automatically at logout unless FileVault is enabled.
2. You can change the backup period using third-party utilities like TimeMachineEditor - VersionTracker or MacUpdate.
3. You can exclude the Microsoft User Data folder from the TM backup and back it up separately using third-party backup software.
4. You can use third-party backup software instead of TM, such as:
1. Retrospect Desktop (Commercial - not yet universal binary)
2. Synchronize! Pro X (Commercial)
3. Synk (Backup, Standard, or Pro)
4. Deja Vu (Shareware)
5. Carbon Copy Cloner (Donationware)
6. SuperDuper! (Commercial)
7. Intego Personal Backup (Commercial)
8. Data Backup (Commercial)
9. SilverKeeper 2.0 (Freeware)
10. Tri-Backup (Commercial)
11. Apple Backup (requires a .Mac account with Apple both to get the software and to use it.)
Apple's Backup is a full backup tool capable of backing up across multiple media such as CD/DVD. However, it cannot create bootable backups. It is primarily an "archiving" utility.
Visit The XLab FAQs and read the FAQ on backup and restore. Also read How to Back Up and Restore Your Files.
Third-party backup utilities can run backups on schedules you set up. Thus, you can schedule your backups to occur at a time when you do not use the machine such as early in the AM for example.

Time Machine Creates New Sparse Bundle

I have a 1TB hard disk connected to a Mac Mini over USB. That disk is shared on the network. My laptop and my wife's laptop are both set up to use that shared disk for Time Machine backups. Generally, things have worked fine.
This morning, I discovered a message from Time Machine on my laptop stating that there wasn't enough space on the drive to complete the backup. That didn't make sense - too few files had changed. When I investigated, I discovered that Time Machine had, after a successful backup at 21:29 last night, started creating a new sparse bundle for its backups.
I restarted my laptop and ran Disk Utility's Repair function on the shared drive (using the Mac Mini to run the repair). I've toggled Time Machine off and back on in System Preferences. The behavior remains: even though there is an existing sparse bundle (machinename.sparsebundle) on that share, when I tell Time Machine to do a backup, it creates a new sparse image: machinename-1.sparsebundle and starts backup up all of my files to it.
Also, if I "Enter Time Machine," Time Machine informs me that it can't find the disk. But it does offer for me to "Use Previous Disk..." if I first mount the "old" disk image (machinename.sparsebundle). Having the old disk image mounted does not prevent Time Machine from making machinename-1.sparsebundle when I tell it to do a backup, however.
I'm at a loss. I've checked the console logs and there's nothing useful there. Is there some hidden setting something that "forces" Time Machine to write to a specific sparse bundle?
I'm rapidly reaching the conclusion that these "over the air backups" aren't worth the bother: a directly-attached disk seems much simpler and more reliable.
Thanks in advance for any helpful hints,
Tony

Pondini wrote:
When you do a +*Repair Disk+* on a directly-connected volume that contains a sparse bundle, the sparse bundle itself may not be repaired. Drag it into the Disk Utility sidebar via the Finder, then select it and try +*Repair Disk+* again.
Okay. I did this - but it told me that the disk appeared to be okay. Which jives with my intuition, since Time Machine is able to use that image +for recovering files+ if I manually mount it and inform Time Machine that it should use it.
Pondini wrote:
Try the widget in #A1 of [Time Machine - Troubleshooting|http://web.me.com/pondini/Time_Machine/Troubleshooting.html] (or use the link in *User Tips* at the top of this forum).
Does the widget source a different set of logs than the Console app? When I select "All Messages" in Console, I get the following when I attempt to do a backup:
11/12/10 2:35:23 PM com.apple.backupd[9404] Starting standard backup
11/12/10 2:35:23 PM com.apple.backupd[9404] Attempting to mount network destination using URL: afp://media@Media%20Center.afpovertcp.tcp.local/Terrabyte
11/12/10 2:35:25 PM com.apple.backupd[9404] Mounted network destination using URL: afp://media@Media%20Center.afpovertcp.tcp.local/Terrabyte
11/12/10 2:35:26 PM com.apple.backupd[9404] Creating disk image /Volumes/Terrabyte/transient 1.sparsebundle
11/12/10 2:35:26 PM kernel AFP_VFS afpfs_mount: /Volumes/Terrabyte, pid 9405
11/12/10 2:35:28 PM hdiejectd[9413] running
11/12/10 2:35:38 PM hdiejectd[9413] quitCheck: calling exit(0)
I read this as "Time Machine didn't even bother trying to use my 'transient.sparsebundle' that exists on that disk."
A couple of notes:
* My wife has no difficulty backing up to her image on that same AFP share.
* Between my initial post and this one, I updated to 10.6.5 - with no change in behavior.

Time Machine creates new disk image when backing up but files not visible

When I back up my files (daily) to tan external drive TM creates a new disk image (named laptop) on my desktop (in addition to the image for the external drive named TIme Machine Backups). When I click on the new disk image while it's backing up I see a list of recent backups. However the disk image disappears after completing the back up and the files do not appear in the Star Wars screen - only old back-ups from 2009. How can I access the newest backups?

alanol wrote:
A disk image labeled Time Machine Backups resides permanently on the desktop
Right-click it, and select +Get Info.+ See what the path is (after +Disk image+ near the top of the General section).
Also the amounts for Capacity and Used.
as a consequence of the repair a sparse bundle (Zero KB) folder was created.
No. That may have been created by the new backup, though.
Also a new "lost +found" folder was created containing several ".emix" files.
Those are email files.
Net, net - same basic problem, can't see the newest backups in the Star Wars screen.
I suspect they're in the disk image.
Do you have any external HDs connected?
Try a "full reset" of Time Machine, per #A4 of Time Machine - Troubleshooting (or use the link in *User Tips* at the top of this forum).

Does Time Machine handle open DMG images?

System config:
- MacBook Pro w/10.6.8
- Time Machine backing up to external Firewire-connected 1TB drive.
To help protect some sensitive files, I have an encrypted and password-protected disk image on my MacBook in which I keep various files (mostly Word documents) containing private information. The DMG is named private.dmg, and is normally mounted r/w on my desktop so I can access the files and folders stored in its volume as required. (I mount it manually after logging on). Throughout the day, I may create new files or edit existing files that are stored in the private volume, which in turn is contained within the private.dmg file.
Recently, I needed to go back in time and recover an earlier version of one of the confidential files. Time Machine couldn't find the file with the date that that I needed (3 days ago). It appears that the files in the private volume are not getting backed up reliably to my external drive hourly/daily/weekly as per the Time Machine regimen. I would have expected the private.dmg file to get backed up by TM if/when any changes have been made to the files stored in its contained volume, but that seems not to be the case. If I enter Time Machine and go back in time, I find old versions of the private.dmg file as expected, but if I mount an older version and examine the contents, I don't see corresponding old versions of the files within.
Are there known limitations with this configuration? I know that TM can have problems with dealing with some open files, notably the Entourage database file. Perhaps TM fails to handle an open dmg image? Since the dmg file is essentially open all day (having been mounted), is it plausible that TM never backs it up Is there any way that I can ensure that Time Machine properly backs up the sensitive files in the mounted volume?
Thanks.

@ Kiraly,
Thanks, I'm aware of that. I have been pursuing my TM archives by directly accessing the file structure on the TM volume (within the Backups.backupdb folder), locating the .dmg file with appropriate date, mounting it, and then looking on the mounted volume for the file I need to recover. (that's a lot faster than restoring each private.dmg file from within the TM application.
It appears to me that TM is not properly saving the state of the open .dmg file when it does its hourly backup. Perhaps it doesn't see changes made to files within the volume. Perhaps it just wasn't designed to handle .dmg files that OS X has open for R/W access.
I should mention that my dmg volume is a sparse image. I wonder if that complexity is sufficient to mess up TM.

Time Machine on NAS, sparse image bundles, etc

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