Time Machine size discrepancy / backup fail

Hi! For a few weeks now my Time Machine backups have ceased to work, with an error that they are too big for the drive. While I only have a 500GB drive, my total size of the backup has always been well within that (thanks to the exclusions I have set up, mostly for my video projects).
I've finally had a chance to look through my files and determine that the only truly gargantuan folder was indeed my Videos folder, but it is excluded.
Here's the nub of my problem / question:
My Time Machine panel under Options says the estimated size of the full backup is 274 GB. But backups fail with a message that the backup requires 849GB! That's way more than the 20% overhead I know TM requires in addition to the backup size.
This seems to be the key to why my backups are failing.
Can anyone suggest a course of action?
Thanks!
Adam

ARGH! Would you believe that - only days after I fixed it with the combo update - it happened again?
Well, it did. "The backup requires 847.90 GB but only 93.79 GB are available."
847 GB? The "Estimated size of full backup" in the exceptions window is 276.88 GB.
Just like before.
I did run a Repair Permissions after the combo update as suggested... just to rule that out...
Just in case it's at all helpful, I'm including the info from the Dashboard widget that reveals Time Machine log info - first for the last successful backup, then for the first one to fail.
Sigh...
Last successful backup:
Starting standard backup
Network destination already mounted at: /Volumes/Data
QUICKCHECK ONLY; FILESYSTEM CLEAN
Disk image /Volumes/Data/Adam’s iMac.sparsebundle mounted at: /Volumes/Time Machine Backups
Backing up to: /Volumes/Time Machine Backups/Backups.backupdb
Starting pre-backup thinning: 789.60 GB requested (including padding), 83.52 GB available
No expired backups exist - deleting oldest backups to make room
Deleted backup /Volumes/Time Machine Backups/Backups.backupdb/Adam’s iMac/2011-07-02-021404: 83.52 GB now available
Deleted 1 backups: oldest backup is now Jul 3, 2011
Stopping backup.
Backup canceled.
Ejected Time Machine disk image.
Compacting backup disk image to recover free space
Compl
(and yes, the incomplete last line is just as it appeared in the log.)
Failed backup:
Starting standard backup
Network destination already mounted at: /Volumes/Data
QUICKCHECK ONLY; FILESYSTEM CLEAN
Disk image /Volumes/Data/Adam’s iMac.sparsebundle mounted at: /Volumes/Time Machine Backups
Backing up to: /Volumes/Time Machine Backups/Backups.backupdb
Starting pre-backup thinning: 789.67 GB requested (including padding), 87.35 GB available
No expired backups exist - deleting oldest backups to make room
Error: backup disk is full - all 0 possible backups were removed, but space is still needed.
Backup Failed: unable to free 789.67 GB needed space
Backup failed with error: Not enough available disk space on the target volume.
Ejected Time Machine disk image.
Ejected Time Machine network volume.

Similar Messages

Time Machine error message: Backup Failed!! ???

I've been using Time Machine with an external 500GB Western Digital HD, and everything was going well, including TM deleting old files to make room for new ones. Then a few days ago, I started getting error messages, saying that the TM backup failed. Of course, it didn't say "WHY" or "WHAT" happened. I guess it's a new TM game - Guess why it didn't work?
No remedies were suggested - just the bad news - and now it's every time TM does its hourly backup!
Any suggestions or help is appreciated.
Thanks!
Ron...

Go into TM preferences and select the Change Disk button. Select None as the disk. Close the TM Preference and then open them again and reselect your original back up disk. TM should find it again and should do a valid backup.
Hope this helps.
David

Why does time machine show the backup failed

The time machine icon in the menu bar keeps showing up with a "!" in the middle of it, which is suppose to mean the back up failed.
Yet when I go to System Preference, it shows the backup succeeded.
The menu bar shows the last successful back up was on Sept 13.
System Preferences shows the last successful backup was an hour ago. (15 Sept.)
How do I get these two to agree with each other?
Rebooting the computer doesn't seem to help.
I'm running 10.9.4 now.

LonerT:
Thanks for looking at the HomeSharing problem
I have three discussions open that are related. The first one shows that the ATV appears to open the extra DAAP connections, which in turn appears to be related to Homesharing problem.
Airport opens multiple DAAP connections
Numerous ATV DAAP ports to MacBook Pro
Cannot turn off Homesharing to AppleTV: IPv6 connections remain
This one (not mine) points at the Bonjour Sleep Proxy Service as being involved in the DAAP problem.
DHCP conflicts between AppleTV and Airport Extreme repeater
And this is the "other side" of the problem, which I have also experienced
Apple TV homesharing keeps dropping out ...
I note that my AppleTV started out with a DHCP address of 10.0.1.16, it jumped to 10.0.1.20 and then migrated up, one address at a time, to 10.0.1.25.
Given the number of systems I have on my subnet, if they are handed out in order, and given that I just moved from 192.168.1.0/24 private space, the highest address should be around 12.
I have two Apple TVs. One on Wireless remote from the ATX and connected to an Airport Express and one connected via ethernet directly to the AEX. I don't use the remote one. It should not have been turned on (activated) for at least two weeks, yet the AEX is still sending out ARP requests for the last IP address that it had and my laptop still associates the AEX MAC with the last address assigned to the remote ATV.

Time machine reports erroneous backup size

I had my TM disk disconnected for about a week and now when I reconnect it, I get:
Time Machine Error
This backup is too large for the backup disk. The backup requires 499.48 GB but only 492.29 GB are available.
However, my get info reports that only 223.73 GB are currently in use. Any ideas? I'm repairing permissions now and, if that doesn't work, I was thinking to try rebooting and repairing the disk, but if anyone has an alternative suggestion, I'd be grateful. I've actually just gone ahead and removed all my old backups, and emptied the trash, so the backup disk should be entirely open for anything.
Any help would be much appreciated!

That has nothing to do with the backup drive. That's what Time Machine thinks is everything that's subject to being backed-up on your internal HD (and any others being backed-up).
For some reason, it's trying to do a full backup of that (and it adds 20% to the estimated size, for workspace, etc., so it gets the 499 GB in the message).
Try the Verify Disk (not permissions) on your internal HD again, per #A5 in Time Machine - Troubleshooting.
It's also possible the preferences file (where the exclusions, etc., are kept) is somehow corrupted. Try a "full reset" of Time Machine, per #A4 in that same link.
Also see #D3 there, for possible causes of a full backup.

Time machine makes 30 backups for the last two days, no backups for any earlier times: is there a way to control it?

I've been running Time Machine in the background for as long as I've owned my current Mac--- a few months. It is a completely generic set-up: it's a desktop (rarely shut off or asleep) connected to an external hard drive that is much larger (1 TB) than my internal hard drive (0.5 TB), and Time Machine is configured to save backups of my whole internal drive to the external drive. The external is half-full, and the internal is a little more than half-full. I often hear my external crunching away, working on something.
I recently needed to access an old file, so I went into Time Machine mode on the folder where it had been deleted a few weeks ago. While I'm not upset that it isn't available (it's my own fault for deleting it), I didn't expect the Time Machine to have such a bad distribution of saved backups. There are 30 backup snapshots of the past two days, and nothing earlier. I was expecting something more like a few from today, a few from this week, a few from this month, and a few going all the way back in time--- a broader distribution.
I don't see any way to control this in the Time Machine Preferences (in fact, very little control at all). Is there a secret way to control it, or some tip to ensure a more useful distribution of saved snapshots?
Thanks,
-- Jim

Thanks, but it doesn't exactly address my question. TimeMachineEditor allows me to set the intervals or times when backups occur, but it doesn't control the algorithm that decides which snapshots should be deleted. My problem was that Time Machine chose to delete all of the old snapshots and keep only the most recent ones: I'd like it to keep more of the recent ones than the old ones, but still keep some old ones.
In fact, the (unmodifyable) text on the Time Machine control panel says that it keeps:
hourly backups for the past 24 hours
daily backups for the past month
weekly backups for all previous months
That would be perfect if it were true.
Perhaps the algorithm did the wrong thing because the size of my internal hard drive varied quite a lot a few days ago: a process got out of control and used up all of my internal disk space. I killed the process and deleted its output (several times), so my internal disk eventually went back down to normal. Perhaps in the intervening hours, Time Machine made a backup, once an hour, and used up all of the external drive space. When it had to choose between keeping "weekly backups of previous months" and "hourly backups of the past 24 hours", it chose to keep hourly backups of the past 24 hours. This was the wrong choice in my case (it was the unwanted output) and is probably the wrong choice in most cases.
Is there a way to control the algorithm that decides which backups to keep and which to delete? I would have it delete the hourly, daily, and weekly backups in a way that preserves their relative distribution.
By the way, while I have made it sound like my problem was a runaway log file (something that would be easy to put in an excluded directory with Time Machine's "Options" button), it was a VirtualBox snapshot merge. The data in question are precious, but were unnecessarily copied many times while VirtualBox failed to merge them properly. I can't simply exclude a directory: I'm talking about a more general problem.
Thanks!
-- Jim

Time Machine Error This backup is too large for the backup disk

Hi, I have a 1TB Time Capsule which backs up my Mac. I was having some issues with my mac so I decided to perform an erase and install and then use Migration Assistant to transfer everything back to my Mac.
After I reinstalled Snow Leopard and restored my Mac using Migration Assistant, Time Machine says that the backup has failed. It says " Time Machine Error This backup is too large for the backup disk. The Backup requires 663 GB but only 255 GB are available.
What do I do? Is my only option to erase my Time Capsule and have it back everything up from scratch?

Hi, thanks for the help. I erased everything off of the Time Capsule and it's backing up my Mac from scratch. It's almost finished backing up my whole mac. It's now at 641.86gb of 646.54gb but it's now backing up very slowly. It's backing up .1 every few minutes. Is this normal?
Here's the log from Time Machine Buddy:
Starting standard backup
Attempting to mount network destination using URL: afp://Stuart%[email protected]/Time%20Capsule
Mounted network destination using URL: afp://Stuart%[email protected]/Time%20Capsule
Creating disk image /Volumes/Time Capsule/StuartsMacPro.sparsebundle
QUICKCHECK ONLY; FILESYSTEM CLEAN
Disk image /Volumes/Time Capsule/StuartsMacPro.sparsebundle mounted at: /Volumes/Time Machine Backups
Backing up to: /Volumes/Time Machine Backups/Backups.backupdb
Ownership is disabled on the backup destination volume. Enabling.
Detected system migration from: /Volumes/My Book
Backup content size: 850.0 GB excluded items size: 606.5 GB for volume Stuart's Drive
Backup content size: 425.9 GB excluded items size: 67.3 GB for volume Macintosh HD
No pre-backup thinning needed: 722.56 GB requested (including padding), 928.68 GB available
Waiting for index to be ready (101)
Copied 28.3 GB of 602.1 GB, 29340 of 1478089 items
Copied 55.0 GB of 602.1 GB, 41596 of 1478089 items
Copied 82.9 GB of 602.1 GB, 55899 of 1478089 items
Copied 110.7 GB of 602.1 GB, 63347 of 1478089 items
Copied 138.8 GB of 602.1 GB, 83831 of 1478089 items
Copied 166.8 GB of 602.1 GB, 94574 of 1478089 items
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Copied 129159 files (242.5 GB) from volume Stuart's Drive.
Copied 248.4 GB of 602.1 GB, 130414 of 1478089 items
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Copied 378.3 GB of 602.1 GB, 399358 of 1478089 items
Copied 406.9 GB of 602.1 GB, 399441 of 1478089 items
Copied 434.5 GB of 602.1 GB, 415817 of 1478089 items
Copied 461.5 GB of 602.1 GB, 471528 of 1478089 items
Copied 488.2 GB of 602.1 GB, 537277 of 1478089 items
Copied 515.1 GB of 602.1 GB, 580446 of 1478089 items
Copied 541.3 GB of 602.1 GB, 590386 of 1478089 items
Copied 566.8 GB of 602.1 GB, 602496 of 1478089 items
Copied 593.3 GB of 602.1 GB, 649575 of 1
Message was edited by: Stuart Lawrence
Message was edited by: Stuart Lawrence

Time Machine does not backup home/user directory (on separate drive)

I recently installed a SSD into my Mini. Due to size restrictions, my home/user directory has to be kept on another drive. I retained the stock 1TB drive that came with the Mini for this.
Ok, installed the SSD, restored a Time Machine backups (sans user data). Used a different admin user and configured my user to use the 1TB drive for it's home directory (/Volumes/1TB/home/<user>). Restart, log in as my user, all is good. All data, settings, etc is there. Everything looks normal.
Time Machine REFUSES to backup this directory. It will backup the 1TB drive and anyting else I create in it, but not the home directory. I tried every permission trick I could think of or found online. I even tested it further by formatting the 1TB drive fresh, adding a new user, configuring the user to use the 1TB for their home directory and it still won't back it up (this was a test of permissions the OS set, to make sure I didn't change my data perms somewhere along the way). Time Machine would not backup the new user's home directory on the 1TB drive.
Any thoughts? I can't be the first person to have their home directory on a non-OS drive.
If I were to create a folder/file in /Volumes/1TB/<test file> ... Time Machine gets it perfect. It just will NOT touch /Volumes/1TB/home/<anything here>
Thanks!

Open the Time Machine preference pane and unlock the settings, if necessary. Click the Options button. If there is one particular folder with items that are not being backed up reliably, add it to the list of excluded items. If there are many such folders, add your home folder to the list, or add a whole volume (i.e., what Apple calls a "disk.") Save the changes.
Start a backup, or wait for one to happen automatically. When it's done, open the preference pane again and remove the exclusion(s) you made earlier. Back up again and see whether there's a change.

Doesn't Time Machine delete old backups when it needs more space?

I've had time machine running for a long time now. It worked flawlessly for quite some time.
Today it gave me the error that there was not enough free space on the disk to complete the backup (the error message says something like there is 360 GB of data on the Time Machine drive already, 140 GB of free space and it would require more than that to complete my backup). I have a 500 GB Time Machine disk and my Mac has a 500 GB hard drive, so I should technically never run out of space.
The Time Machine almost acts like this is the first time I've ever backed up, which is not true. Shouldn't Time Machine delete old backups to make space for the new? What's even weirder is that if I open the "Star Wars" window of Time Machine I only see one backup from March 31, 2011, but I have been running Time Machine for well over a year now. I'm totally confused as to what happened. Any advice on how to get my Time Machine back up and running (without buying a new drive) would help!

You see only one backup in the Time Machine window because Time Machine has deleted the older backups to make space to do the current backup.
Time machine needs some working space to do its backups, and so backing up a 500GB drive onto a 500GB time machine volume is not ideal.
However, I do essentially the same thing, and what I do, when I have this problem, is exclude things from the backup.
First off, figure out what you changed. If you moved things from one partition to another, then that will cause a backup of the size of the thing that was moved. This may be why you have a large backup.
When I have this problem, I exclude large things that have changed recently from the backup. This makes the backup smaller, and means that there is less working space needed. I do this until I get a successful backup. Then I remove things, one by one, from the exclusion list, and back up after each one.
So, for instance if you just put 4 new folders on your drive, each of which s 20GB of data and they are named A, B, C and D, add all four to the exclusion list, do a backup, then remove A from the exclusion list (leaving B, C & D on it) and do a backup, and continue like this, adding 20GB of backup data each time until none of the new data is on the exclusion list and you get a completed backup.
Another possible issue, if you use multiple partitions, is that Time Machine may be keeping an obsolete backup of a partition that you previously reformatted. To see if this is the case, go into time machine (The universe interface) and go back to the most recent backup it shows. Click on your computer and see what partitions show up-- are any of them old ones that have been reformatted and renamed? You may be storing a duplicate backup because Time Machine does not realize that the disk that went away isn't coming back (because it has been reformatted as a different partition)
You can right-click on these items and remove them from your backup by sleecting "Delete all backups of...." This will free up space as well.

Time Machine: "Partially Deleted Backup"

Last night, after Time Machine performed a backup and began its post-backup thinning, it got stalled on "Finishing backup... ." The system log showed that it was attempting to delete a previously partially deleted backup:
Starting standard backup
Starting post-backup thinning
Found partially deleted backup - trying again to delete: 2009-09-30-110803
The backup it was trying to delete was the last one on its list (i.e., the oldest one on that TM volume). And when I opened it up, it indeed appeared to be a partially deleted folder. So I let TM run. However, it never finished "Finishing backup... ," so after letting it run all night and all day, I simply told TM to stop. It did, and the system then added two more messages to the log, acknowledging my cancelation as well as TM's current success:
Starting standard backup
Starting post-backup thinning
Found partially deleted backup - trying again to delete: 2009-09-30-110803
Backup deletion was canceled by user
Backup completed successfully.
However, the next time TM ran, it began all over again:
Starting standard backup
Starting post-backup thinning
Found partially deleted backup - trying again to delete: 2009-09-30-110803
It's still sitting there in its "Finishing backup..." mode.
I was thinking about entering Time Machine, selecting that backup, and telling Time Machine to delete that backup—and only that backup. But I'm (a) not sure that will address the actual problem, and (b) wondering if deleting that particular backup (i.e., the oldest one on the list) is advisable.
Suggestions?

Pondini wrote:
Maxwell’s Demon wrote:
I'm aware of the multilink nature of TM's backups. What I don't understand is how you immediately concluded that the backups were corrupted.
TM finding partially deleted backups, trying repeatedly to deleted them, and failing to.
(And yes, I though you meant that you'd tried to delete the backup yourself.)
It took forever. I ran TechTool Pro, and it "choked" (i.e., ran out of memory) trying to rebuild the directory. When I asked Disk Warrior to graph the directory, it revealed that it was more than 40% fragmented!
I'm not sure fragmentation is a problem, or even applies, given the structure of TM backups.
So I ran Disk Warrior. It ran without incident. When I then looked inside the TM drive, I discovered that along with rebuilding the directory—which is what I understood its job to be—DW apparently removed/deleted the offending (partially deleted) backup. The next time Time Machine ran, everything went smoothly. It's been running fine ever since.
Great! And yes, there are times it can repair/rebuild TM backups that nothing else can (I guess that's why it costs $100!).
I'm obviously quite pleased with the results: Not only did DW perform an incredible directory rebuild (fragmentation went from more than 40% to less than 1% !!) but it cleared out the partially deleted backup that was causing TM to stumble. But I remain awfully curious: Had I simply gone into Time Machine and deleted the partially deleted backup myself, wouldn't that have fixed the problem? (Granted, DW not only got TM back on track, but it also rebuilt its directory, which is a definite plus in my mind...I'm just trying to understand.)
It's possible you couldn't have deleted it completely, any more than TM was able to. Remember, a single backup folder has hard links to hundreds, thousands, or hundreds of thousands of other items. Just one of those being screwy can have a ripple effect through the whole structure.
And if you could have, it might well have left some of the actual backup files "abandoned" -- some or all of the hard links to them deleted, but still somewhere in the disk directory, so still taking up space.
I got the idea from
http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20090515063602219
which provided a link to the "solution" when partial backups remain that result in TM "error: 11" failures:
http://www.bytebot.net/blog/archives/2008/08/13/fixing-time-machine-backup-faile d-with-error-11
Admittedly, mine wasn't an "error: 11" problem, but it sure seemed similar. My hesitation/concern was due to the fact that the partially deleted backup was the last one (i.e., the "oldest") in my TM volume: I wasn't sure if deleting it would screw up all of the links used by the remaining backups. However, since DW removed it without causing any problems, it seems like I may have been able to accomplish the same result by removing it "manually" from within TM. If that is the case, then it suggests that there may not have been any actual "corruption."
Again, I am very happy with the result, and likely will resort to DW again the next time I have similar problems. The only reason I'm harping on it is simply to try to gain a deeper understanding of how to determine when such problems are indeed due to corruption as opposed to simply an errant file that causes TM to stumble. (Had TM indicated that it stumbled and was unable to successfully perform the backup, then I would have little doubt that there was actual corruption.)

Carbon Clone and Time Machine: developing a backup plan

Howdy all!
This is a second post that sort of flows on from another I have written today
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/4649740
I initally put them all together, but they were too rambling and disconnected, so it seemed better to seperate them. The question I have here is how best to organise my backup plan? I have a few ideas, but, basically, want to make sure I get the whole setup right the first time and would appreciate any advice from others that have been down the path before. As I am still waiting for some parts to arrive in the mail, I have a little time to think about how to go about setting up my Mac.
Basically the setup is:
Mac Mini 2012, boot drive is a Samsung 256GB 830 series SSD, seconday drive for data is a 1TB mechanical disk. I plan on having all my data on the seconday mechanical disk (photos, movies, music etc) and only the OS and Applications on the SSD. To this end, I understand I only have to move /Users to the mechanical disk to achieve this. I then also have 2x 2TB Western Digital MyBook Essential USB 3 disks for Time Machine backups. I plan on rotating them on a weekly basis (storing the disk not in use in a safe or offsite), and then, depending on costs a cloud backup service for some data (music, photos etc) which I might want to access when im not at home.
So I have been thinking for a few days now on the benefit of having a Carbon Clone bootable recovery drive. The thinking goes along these lines. As my data is on a seperate drive, and is backed up to Time Machine, in the event of an OS disk failure, I can replace the disk and then point /Users to the new drive, and I can be up and running once I have reinstalled the apps i need. Now, I understand the idea of the Carbon Clone backup is such that it speeds up the time to rebuild the OS disk, but I have to question, how useful is this in reality?
Consider, I can sit down now and write down all the apps I have needed in the past, install Mac OS, set it up (possibly with a generic admin password), install the apps I need from the App store and DVDs etc and then take a Carbon Clone at this point before any setup of Apps are done. If the apps configuration is backed up in the Time Machine backup (i.e.: the config files exist under /Users) then this is almost workable - in a recovery situation, the CC clone is used to rebuild the OS drive, the config files are pulled from the TM backups, and we're back up and running. Where this fails, is if I have installed (or removed) apps since the CC clone was made. At this point then, is it best to (a) make a new clone when a new app is added/removed or (b) make a note of apps added/removed, which will then have to be reinstalled if a recovery is required. I tend to think the (b) method is best here, as it preserves the integrity of the clone. If the machine has been compromised (malware etc) then remaking the clone, causes the clone to be compromised and hence the reinstalled machine as well. Though this method could be a pain if the machine state has changed somewhat over time. Also, it means that the reinstalled system will be missing updates etc which could be time consuming to apply anyway, so the usefulness of a clone is slightly reduced anyway.
Does anyone have any thoughts on this? Some days I think having a clone will be useful esp. as most of my software was delivered on CD (Adobe Creative Suite, Office) or are large install bases (XCode), but other days I think, "its not a mission critical machine", i can survive a day without it while I rebuild the install, and so I dont achieve much by having a clone which is likely out-of-date by the time I go to use it.
Also, in this backup plan, is it best to rely on TM for things like email backup or a dedicated mail backup utility? can a Carbon Clone exist on the same disk as Time Machine uses, or do I need to invest in a new disk or two for the CC clones?
As I say, I want to make sure I have this machine setup right from the start, and would really appreciate any pointers, tips or advice.

There is one big advantage of a clone. You can immediately reboot
to it and continue working and deal with the regular boot drive faiure,
what ever it may be, later. Especially since all your data and such
is on another drive. If you use your computer for work and time
critical projects, this is a major plus!
In the case of a hard drive failure/replacement, copying the clone
to the drive is the fastest way to get the system and all your settings
back.
Time Machine and incremental backups have a place as well. It is best
suited for "incremental" problems. Examples are installing an upgrade to
software that doesn't work or just don't plain like. With Time Machine it
is easy to just restore back to the point before the install.
Something else I do is backup current project files to USB memory sticks.
If you are using your computer for business, you can never have too many
backups. Coralllary 456 of Murphy's Law is the "number of backups that
you need will be one more than what you have!"

Time machine does not backup anymore

Hello all,
I've been using my time machine for a month now, I kept it turned off and only connected the disk when I wanted to make a backup. Then I just hit Back Up Now from the menu and it always backed up everything (I used to check it afterwards). FYI, I've got a 500GB drive and for backups I use a 500GB partition on an external disk, where about 100GB is still free. All of a sudden, my time machine does not backup anymore. It does its run, whether a scheduled hourly one when turned on, or an on-demand one, but it only lasts a split second as though there is nothing to backup and when I enter the time machine, the files are really missing. I can't make it backup anything anymore. What is going on?
thanks everyone

cukerko wrote:
Hello all,
I've been using my time machine for a month now, I kept it turned off and only connected the disk when I wanted to make a backup. Then I just hit Back Up Now from the menu and it always backed up everything (I used to check it afterwards). FYI, I've got a 500GB drive and for backups I use a 500GB partition on an external disk, where about 100GB is still free.
It's not related to this problem, but that may not be large enough. What's important is not the size of your internal HD, but how much is on it (or is expected to be on it in the next year or so). It varies widely, of course, depending on how you use your Mac, but Time Machine usually needs 2-3 times the space of the data it's backing-up.
. . . it only lasts a split second as though there is nothing to backup and when I enter the time machine, the files are really missing.
That sounds like the year-old unfixed bug detailed in red in #D5 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).

Leopard applications all hang while Time Machine prepares for backup

I'm sure others have posted about this but I can't find a usable solution. I have the most recent version of Leopard, a 1TB external FireWire drive dedicated to Time Machine storage and about 400GB of backups on it. Every day at some point, Time Machine starts a backup, pauses while preparing, and the entire Mac grinds to a halt. New processes won't launch, open applications hang, Finder becomes unresponsive, menus and dock freeze in whatever position they were in at the point of launch, and I can't cancel the backup process.
The only solution is to turn off the backup drive while its running and wait for the Mac to wake up again (which it does in under a minute). I have no virus protection running. I have erased the drive and started fresh at least once to no avail.
Since I am effectively breaking a live connection every time I turn the drive off without unmounting it first (an obvious no-no), the data has great potential to be getting more and more screwed up. What can I do?

Message logs:
October 12, 2009, 1:43:25 AM
Volume at path /Volumes/Racer BU does not appear to be the correct backup volume for this computer. (Cookies do not match)
Backup failed with error: 18
October 12, 2009, 11:32:32 AM
Starting standard backup
Backing up to: /Volumes/Racer BU/Backups.backupdb
Event store UUIDs don't match for volume: Racer X
Node requires deep traversal:/ reason:kFSEDBEventFlagMustScanSubDirs|kFSEDBEventFlagReasonEventDBUntrustable|
No pre-backup thinning needed: 984.2 MB requested (including padding), 443.72 GB available
Copied 21948 files (368.1 MB) from volume Racer X.
No pre-backup thinning needed: 548.2 MB requested (including padding), 443.35 GB available
Copied 961 files (965 KB) from volume Racer X.
Starting post-backup thinning
Deleted backup /Volumes/Racer BU/Backups.backupdb/Eric’s Mac Pro/2009-10-10-215828: 443.35 GB now available
Deleted backup /Volumes/Racer BU/Backups.backupdb/Eric’s Mac Pro/2009-10-10-205855: 443.36 GB now available
Deleted backup /Volumes/Racer BU/Backups.backupdb/Eric’s Mac Pro/2009-10-10-195856: 443.40 GB now available
Deleted backup /Volumes/Racer BU/Backups.backupdb/Eric’s Mac Pro/2009-10-10-185908: 443.46 GB now available
Deleted backup /Volumes/Racer BU/Backups.backupdb/Eric’s Mac Pro/2009-10-10-175907: 443.51 GB now available
Post-back up thinning complete: 5 expired backups removed
Backup completed successfully.
October 12, 2009, 12:18:32 PM
Starting standard backup
Backing up to: /Volumes/Racer BU/Backups.backupdb
No pre-backup thinning needed: 954.4 MB requested (including padding), 443.51 GB available
Unable to rebuild path cache for source item. Partial source path:
Copied 16717 files (339.6 MB) from volume Racer X.
No pre-backup thinning needed: 569.5 MB requested (including padding), 443.17 GB available
Copied 634 files (18.7 MB) from volume Racer X.
Starting post-backup thinning
Deleted backup /Volumes/Racer BU/Backups.backupdb/Eric’s Mac Pro/2009-10-10-225832: 443.24 GB now available
Deleted backup /Volumes/Racer BU/Backups.backupdb/Eric’s Mac Pro/2009-10-10-165828: 443.25 GB now available
Deleted backup /Volumes/Racer BU/Backups.backupdb/Eric’s Mac Pro/2009-10-10-155855: 443.30 GB now available
Deleted backup /Volumes/Racer BU/Backups.backupdb/Eric’s Mac Pro/2009-10-10-145857: 443.36 GB now available
Deleted backup /Volumes/Racer BU/Backups.backupdb/Eric’s Mac Pro/2009-10-10-135852: 443.38 GB now available
Post-back up thinning complete: 5 expired backups removed
Backup completed successfully.
October 12, 2009, 4:46:51 PM
Starting standard backup
Volume at path /Volumes/Racer BU does not appear to be the correct backup volume for this computer. (Cookies do not match)
Backup failed with error: 18
etc...
The long periods between backups are when it is "preparing for backup" and nothing is happening. Sometimes this is while I'm not using it and the machine is asleep.

"Time Machine Error The backup volume is read only"

Lately, every time I try to backup to my Time Capsule using Time Machine it fails and I get a message saying "Time Machine Error The backup volume is read only. To select a different volume, open system preferences and choose Time Machine" So I do that and I see the Time capsule listed. I don't want to select anything but the Time Capsule, cuz what else do I have, right? Am I wrong in assuming the "backup volume" is the Time Capsule? Anyway, I have tried changing the permissions on the time capsule, but when I get the "get info" box for the time capsule, there is not an option to change those settings, they are grayed out. Every thing worked well for about a week and then this started. My backup volume must have been "Read & Write" at first, because I can see what was backed up when I open Time Machine. Anybody have a clue what's going on? How can I make the back up volume "Read & Write" again and why did it change to "Read Only?"

Nope, I am using the same passwords as ever, both users have the same password, BTW. The password I gave to the Time Capsule is different, tho, but that password is for the wireless aspect of the Time Capsule, so that wouldn't have anything to do with it, would it?
I also get a message box that says "Disk Repair The disk "Backup of XXX's Computer" was not repairable by this computer, it is being made available to you with limited functionality. You must back up your data and reformat the disk as soon as possible." This box appears in conjunction with the appearance of the Norton's virus scan box scanning the time capsule.

Time Machine size configuration

How do I manage my time machine backup sizes?
I need to be able to limit/quota the time machine size. I can quota per user per system, but that would impact their home directories. I've tried to modify the sparsebundle size, but that just horks up TIme Machine.

Shame nobody cared to describe this working solution... I am running Mavericks and struggling to find this setup/config

Time Machine cannot complete backup to MyBookLiveDuo

Time Machine cannot complete backup to MyBookLiveDuo
I am trying to use TimeMachine to setup a backup from a mid-2011 iMac running OSX 10.9.3 to a 4TB WD MyBook Live Duo drive on a network. I have 3 other MacBooks setup to use this shared drive using Time Machine as well as a PC using WD backup software.
The backup from the iMac is failing with a message “The backup disk image /Volumes/TimeMachine/PM’s iMac.sparsebundle could not be accessed (error(null)).”. After looking through Pondini I change the name of the iMac from "PM’s iMac" to "Family" but the problem is not fixed.
In fact the iMac seems to still uses the old machine name in the error message.
In the console I see the following messages
5/29/14 3:02:47.124 PM com.apple.backupd[220]: Failed to eject volume /Volumes/TimeMachine (FSVolumeRefNum: -106; status: -47; dissenting pid: 0)
5/29/14 3:02:47.125 PM com.apple.backupd[220]: Waiting 60 seconds and trying again.
5/29/14 3:03:22.547 PM spindump[427]: Saved hang report for Disk Utility version 13 (517) to /Library/Logs/DiagnosticReports/Disk Utility_2014-05-29-150322_Family-iMac.hang
5/29/14 3:03:29.854 PM mds[37]: (Normal) Volume: volume:0x7fcffb877000 ********** Bootstrapped Creating a default store:0 SpotLoc:(null) SpotVerLoc:(null) occlude:0 /Volumes/TimeMachine
5/29/14 3:03:53.026 PM com.apple.backupd[220]: Network destination already mounted at: /Volumes/TimeMachine
5/29/14 3:04:49.260 PM com.apple.backupd[220]: Failed to eject volume /Volumes/TimeMachine (FSVolumeRefNum: -106; status: -47; dissenting pid: 0)
5/29/14 3:04:49.261 PM com.apple.backupd[220]: Waiting 60 seconds and trying again.
5/29/14 3:05:32.882 PM mds[37]: (Normal) Volume: volume:0x7fcffb89d400 ********** Bootstrapped Creating a default store:0 SpotLoc:(null) SpotVerLoc:(null) occlude:0 /Volumes/TimeMachine
5/29/14 3:05:52.689 PM apsd[61]: Unrecognized leaf certificate
5/29/14 3:05:55.561 PM com.apple.backupd[220]: Network destination already mounted at: /Volumes/TimeMachine
5/29/14 3:06:44.339 PM mds[37]: (Warning) Volume: vsd:0x7fcffb82d600 Open failed. failureCount:6 {
DisabledRecycleCount = 6;
5/29/14 3:06:52.608 PM com.apple.backupd[220]: Failed to eject volume /Volumes/TimeMachine (FSVolumeRefNum: -106; status: -47; dissenting pid: 0)
5/29/14 3:06:52.609 PM com.apple.backupd[220]: Giving up after 3 retries.
5/29/14 3:06:52.814 PM com.apple.backupd[220]: Backup failed with error 21: 21
5/29/14 3:07:12.831 PM com.apple.backupd[220]: Failed to eject volume /Volumes/TimeMachine (FSVolumeRefNum: -106; status: -47; dissenting pid: 0)
Ha anyone seen this problem and been able to resolve it.
Thanks!

Time Machine cannot complete backup to MyBookLiveDuo
I am trying to use TimeMachine to setup a backup from a mid-2011 iMac running OSX 10.9.3 to a 4TB WD MyBook Live Duo drive on a network. I have 3 other MacBooks setup to use this shared drive using Time Machine as well as a PC using WD backup software.
The backup from the iMac is failing with a message “The backup disk image /Volumes/TimeMachine/PM’s iMac.sparsebundle could not be accessed (error(null)).”. After looking through Pondini I change the name of the iMac from "PM’s iMac" to "Family" but the problem is not fixed.
In fact the iMac seems to still uses the old machine name in the error message.
In the console I see the following messages
5/29/14 3:02:47.124 PM com.apple.backupd[220]: Failed to eject volume /Volumes/TimeMachine (FSVolumeRefNum: -106; status: -47; dissenting pid: 0)
5/29/14 3:02:47.125 PM com.apple.backupd[220]: Waiting 60 seconds and trying again.
5/29/14 3:03:22.547 PM spindump[427]: Saved hang report for Disk Utility version 13 (517) to /Library/Logs/DiagnosticReports/Disk Utility_2014-05-29-150322_Family-iMac.hang
5/29/14 3:03:29.854 PM mds[37]: (Normal) Volume: volume:0x7fcffb877000 ********** Bootstrapped Creating a default store:0 SpotLoc:(null) SpotVerLoc:(null) occlude:0 /Volumes/TimeMachine
5/29/14 3:03:53.026 PM com.apple.backupd[220]: Network destination already mounted at: /Volumes/TimeMachine
5/29/14 3:04:49.260 PM com.apple.backupd[220]: Failed to eject volume /Volumes/TimeMachine (FSVolumeRefNum: -106; status: -47; dissenting pid: 0)
5/29/14 3:04:49.261 PM com.apple.backupd[220]: Waiting 60 seconds and trying again.
5/29/14 3:05:32.882 PM mds[37]: (Normal) Volume: volume:0x7fcffb89d400 ********** Bootstrapped Creating a default store:0 SpotLoc:(null) SpotVerLoc:(null) occlude:0 /Volumes/TimeMachine
5/29/14 3:05:52.689 PM apsd[61]: Unrecognized leaf certificate
5/29/14 3:05:55.561 PM com.apple.backupd[220]: Network destination already mounted at: /Volumes/TimeMachine
5/29/14 3:06:44.339 PM mds[37]: (Warning) Volume: vsd:0x7fcffb82d600 Open failed. failureCount:6 {
DisabledRecycleCount = 6;
5/29/14 3:06:52.608 PM com.apple.backupd[220]: Failed to eject volume /Volumes/TimeMachine (FSVolumeRefNum: -106; status: -47; dissenting pid: 0)
5/29/14 3:06:52.609 PM com.apple.backupd[220]: Giving up after 3 retries.
5/29/14 3:06:52.814 PM com.apple.backupd[220]: Backup failed with error 21: 21
5/29/14 3:07:12.831 PM com.apple.backupd[220]: Failed to eject volume /Volumes/TimeMachine (FSVolumeRefNum: -106; status: -47; dissenting pid: 0)
Ha anyone seen this problem and been able to resolve it.
Thanks!

Time Machine size discrepancy / backup fail

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