Time Machine Stopped Backups

I have been using Time Machine on a 500 GB Time Capsule for several years. Recently I got error messages indicating that TM could no longer make backups because there is insufficent space on the hard drive. I switched to another backup drive, and it seems to be making backups again, but I wouldlike to have my backups only in one place (on the Time Capsule drive). I thought TM was supposed to continually delete older backups to make room for newer ones, so it would never run out of space. How do I get it to do that so I can swich back to the TC drive? Thanks!

A clue may be lurking in your logs. Use the widget in #A1 of Time Machine - Troubleshooting to display the backup messages from your logs. Locate the backup in question, then copy and post all the messages here.
Also see #C4 there.

Similar Messages

Time machine stops backup

Time machine reports that I do not have enough room on my backup disk. There is enough and it will not delete older items. I am using LIon.

First, are you running Leopard or Snow Leopard? You've posted in the Leopard forum, your first post says you're running +Snow Leopard,+ and your second doesn't specify anything. (Please click +My Settings+ at the right of this page and fill-in the info, so it will appear automatically on each post.)
So you saw "Copying xxx GB of yyy GB," and the "xxx" stopped changing? If so, see #D2 in [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).

Time Machine stopped backup

Time Machine has stopped the backup procedure and claims that there is not sufficient space. The disk has 750 GB out of which 580 GB are used and 169 GB free. The error message claims 48,76 GB would be needed, but only 30,02 are available. I am really puzzled. Please help!
Thanks

Download the +Time Machine Buddy+ widget from: http://www.apple.com/downloads/dashboard/status/timemachinebuddy.html. It shows the messages from your logs for one TM backup run at a time, in a small window.
If you only have one user account, create another one temporarily, with normal privileges.
Then make some changes in your Home Folder and do a +Back Up Now+ from the TM icon in the menubar.
Then log out. Wait for a few seconds, and log back in, as the other user.
Check the widget. If TM hasn't done another backup, do another +Back Up Now+ (from the non-FileVault user account) and check again.
If TM hasn't backed-up the main user's Home Folder, or you see something there that seems suspicious, copy and post the messages here (be sure to get them all, as sometimes they overflow the small window).
If you're not sure what it actually backed-up, you might want to download the TimeTracker app, from www.charlessoft.com.
It shows most of the files saved by TM for each backup (excluding some hidden/system files, etc.). I'm not sure whether it will show the details of the encrypted home folder, or just a big disk image, but something should appear.

Time Machine stops backup before finished

Time Machine has stopped backing up automatically. On manual backups, it stops after backing up only part of my data. I have since reformatted my backup disk and reconfigured Time Machine, but it still does not complete the backup HELP!!!!

First, are you running Leopard or Snow Leopard? You've posted in the Leopard forum, your first post says you're running +Snow Leopard,+ and your second doesn't specify anything. (Please click +My Settings+ at the right of this page and fill-in the info, so it will appear automatically on each post.)
So you saw "Copying xxx GB of yyy GB," and the "xxx" stopped changing? If so, see #D2 in [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).

Time machine "stop backup now"?

I was researching on what would happen if i stopped the backup mid-backup. the help notes for time machine say that if you hit "stop backup now" it'll stop, but then if you hit "back up now" after that it'll pick up right where it left off...
i'm doing my intial backup and was at the 20GB mark and hit "stop back up now" to test it out. left it for 5 mins and then hit "back up now" and it restarted back at 0. all of this was done from the menu bar.
can anyone tell me if this is how it will be? have i set it up wrong?

This has been answered here so may times (especially by pondini, e.g. in this thread Time Machine stuck in repeating "preparing files" cycle), so please search this forum the next time before asking such a question.

Time Machine stopped backup of FileVault account at logout

Suddenly TM stopped backup of my FileVault account. Usually the backup was initiated after logout, but for a couple of weeks nothing like that has happened. It could be a little bit correlated to the time of upgrade to 10.5.6, which I did...
Has anybody faced similar problem? Rgds, Artur
Remark: I use officially not supported configuration for TM - with external drive on network SMB drive.

Download the +Time Machine Buddy+ widget from: http://www.apple.com/downloads/dashboard/status/timemachinebuddy.html. It shows the messages from your logs for one TM backup run at a time, in a small window.
If you only have one user account, create another one temporarily, with normal privileges.
Then make some changes in your Home Folder and do a +Back Up Now+ from the TM icon in the menubar.
Then log out. Wait for a few seconds, and log back in, as the other user.
Check the widget. If TM hasn't done another backup, do another +Back Up Now+ (from the non-FileVault user account) and check again.
If TM hasn't backed-up the main user's Home Folder, or you see something there that seems suspicious, copy and post the messages here (be sure to get them all, as sometimes they overflow the small window).
If you're not sure what it actually backed-up, you might want to download the TimeTracker app, from www.charlessoft.com.
It shows most of the files saved by TM for each backup (excluding some hidden/system files, etc.). I'm not sure whether it will show the details of the encrypted home folder, or just a big disk image, but something should appear.

HT4522 Time Machine's backup to Time Capsule has stopped working

TM reports "an error". The Time Capsule is visible in the "shared" tab of the Finder window, but is listed as "Not connected". It is visible and connected to another Mac on the net. Is there a solution short of using the Airport Utility to erase the drive?

Hi there Cinclus,
You may find the troubleshooting steps in the article below helpful.
Time Machine: Troubleshooting backup issues
http://support.apple.com/kb/ht3275
-Griff W.

Time Machine stopped backing up but doesn't give warning/error

Hi,
by chance I noticed, that Time Machine doesn't backup up any more, but still doesn't give errors. In Console I see the following for a now typical run:
21.04.15 09:58:11,493 com.apple.backupd: Starting standard backup
21.04.15 09:58:12,043 com.apple.backupd: Backing up to: /Volumes/drosera-backup-02/Backups.backupdb
21.04.15 09:58:41,729 com.apple.backupd: 5.18 GB required (including padding), 96.84 GB available
21.04.15 09:58:55,149 com.apple.backupd: Copied 23 files (93 bytes) from volume Macintosh HD.
21.04.15 09:59:04,385 com.apple.backupd: Copied 36 files (93 bytes) from volume DATA.
21.04.15 09:59:06,100 mds: (Error) Volume: Could not find requested backup type:2 for volume
21.04.15 09:59:06,102 com.apple.backupd: Starting post-backup thinning
21.04.15 09:59:07,668 com.apple.backupd: Deleted /Volumes/drosera-backup-02/Backups.backupdb/drosera/2015-04-20-183344 (24.0 KB)
21.04.15 09:59:07,668 com.apple.backupd: Post-back up thinning complete: 1 expired backups removed
21.04.15 09:59:07,762 com.apple.backupd: Backup completed successfully.
The 5.18 GB are never backed up. The backup drive (drosera-backup-02) is attached by FireWire. I have checked the disk with First Aid, I have disconnected and reconnected it. I removed the backup disk from Time Machine, stopped TM and reconfigured. I stopped mds, ran backups and reenabled mds. All to no avail.
I am at a complete loss and I'd appreciate to get this running w/o having to remove all existing backups. Any ideas or pointers?
I'm running Mac OS X 10.7.5 on a Mac mini
Cheers
Frank

Thx. I had already tried the hints from mds: (Error) Volume: Could not find requested backup type:2 for volume to no avail. Your tip to rebuild the Spotlight index would probably helped, too. But just before getting yout comment and after reading http://pondini.org/TM/Works.html and http://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/69054/force-time-machine-to-perform-a-d eep-traversal I had simply removed /.fseventsd and reran a backup. That seems to have fixed the problem (at least for the time being).
Interesting side note: During the non-backup phase I created a new account on the Mac and ran TM. This triggered a one-time working backup of the whole system, but all subsequent backups again failed silently. Additionally the externally attached FireWire harddrive was always backed up correctly, only backups of the local drive failed.

Time Machine stops due to computer going into Sleep/Hibernation Mode

Time Machine stops due to computer going into Sleep/Hibernation Mode then restarts to try to start the Back up process again and again vicious cycle. I have made sure all settings are turned off. I have done one or two backups since the initial first backup. My HDD is almost full and I want it backed up before I try to clone/mirror the drive to upgrade it to a 1TB HDD. Thank you in advance.

Set the Energy Saver (in System Preferences) to Never. Then reset the NVRAM, as follows:
Shut down your Mac.
Locate the following keys on the keyboard: Command (⌘), Option, P, and R. You will need to hold these keys down simultaneously in step 4.
Turn on the computer.
Press and hold the Command-Option-P-R keys before the gray screen appears.
Hold the keys down until the computer restarts and you hear the startup sound for the third time.
Release the keys.

After upgrading to OS X Mavericks Time machine stops working

After upgrading to OS X Mavericks Time machine stops backing up and sometimes hangs on ,,preparing,, for o days and sometimes stops inmediatly. Report says:
Backing up to /dev/disk1s2: /Volumes/Backup/Backups.backupdb
Event store UUIDs don't match for volume: Macintosh HD
*** Terminating app due to uncaught exception 'NSRangeException', reason: '*** -[__NSArrayM objectAtIndex:]: index 0 beyond bounds for empty array'

Is this a Firewire or Thunderbolt connected disk? There are know issues with that in Mavericks. If so try connecting the drive by USB as you continue.
Is it a WD drive? There appear to be issues with those drive on Mavericks.
Time Machine Troubleshooting
http://pondini.org/TM/Troubleshooting.html
A4 - Full Reset of TIme Machine

Time Machine hourly backup seems a tad large

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

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

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

Time Machine Stopped Working After Update

I updated the most recent OSX 10.6.3 and disk utility etc. then suddenly my time machine stopped backing up to external disk attached to Airport Extreme. I have a Seagate drive attached to the AE. I can see the drive and I can see the time machine folders. If i go to TM preferences I can select the drive. But when it goes to back up error message says "backup disk not available." Itunes library is also on same disk (partitioned) and works fine.
Any help would be very, very appreciated!

EnergyExec wrote:
I updated the most recent OSX 10.6.3 and disk utility etc. then suddenly my time machine stopped backing up to external disk attached to Airport Extreme.
As Jolly Giant says, this is +*not supported by Apple.+* It does work, sometimes, for some folks (including me), but is not especially reliable. I cannot recommend strongly enough that you keep secondary backups, probably to an external HD, via CarbonCopyCloner, SuperDuper, or the like. Also note that your iTunes library on that disk is not being backed-up by Time Machine.
It's possible your backups are corrupted (that happens on occasion via an Airport, and may be why Apple doesn't support it). Try repairing them, per #A5 in the Time Machine - Troubleshooting *User Tip,* also at the top of the +Time Machine+ forum.
If Disk Utility can't repair them, it's possible +Disk Warrior+ or a similar app can. DW costs about $100, and is probably a good investment for the future, but there's no guarantee.
Otherwise, your only choices are to delete the sparse bundle or erase the partition and start over, or back up to a directly-attached disk (a much better solution).

Time machine looking backup disk

I upgraded my macpro to OSX Lion a few weeks ago. Since that change, my time machine stopped working. I am able to assign a hard drive as the time machine back up drive (I formated it using Mac OS extended). the drive shows up on my desktop with the time machine logo. when I try to make TM run a backup, I keep getting a message "looking for backup disk." The drive I am using is an internal eSATA drive.
Any help would be appreciated.

I am having the same problem. My Time Capsule suddenly cannot be found, and the Time Machine menu seems endlessly trapped in the "Looking for Backup Disk" phase, despite being directly connected via Ethernet. I can see the Time Capsule in the Finder sidebar but cannot connect to it. I *can* connect to an external HD connected to the Time Capsule by USB though.
This problem cropped up for me after upgrading to 10.7.1.
Oddly, I tried connecting to the Time Capsule with a friend's MacBook Pro running 10.5.8 Leopard, and that worked (I could connect and view the data).

Time machine stop working suddenly

not sure if it's related 10.5.6 upgrade but recently, I realize that the Time Machine stops working. I'm using a USB hard disc the backup drive. It's been working perfectly for a few months. But in the past 1 or 2 weeks, it doesn't back up anything at all. It always show "Preparing Backup..."... and that's it
I don't even know how to trouble-shoot! any help?

Did you find this:
http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1516
Assuming you did, how much of your HD is used, and how long did the initial TM backup take?
Since the initial backup succeeded, have you disconnected and reconnected your drive, or powered-down, or anything?
And how long has it said "preparing"?
Also, it's possible you might find something in the system log.
Use the Console app, in your Applications/Utilities folder. Click on Show Log List at the upper left, then navigate in the sidebar to your system.log (current) or system.log.0.bz2, etc (previous).
Most of what's in there is just info, and not intelligible to us mere mortals.
You're looking for messages from backupd, and/or backupd.helper. Copy anything suspicions and post them here. Maybe somebody can decipher them.

Time Machine Stopped Backups

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