Time Machine stuck in repeating "preparing files" cycle

I'm seeing some very strange Time Capsule behavior. My old hard drive failed so I had a new one installed. I successfully restored all files from Time Capsule and everything is working fine.
Except, I set up Time Capsule to do the regular hourly backups and clicked "backup now". But instead of backing up, Time Capsule has been running continuously (for almost 24 hours now) and shows a continually repeating cycle of status as "Scanning (600,000) items", "Preparing (600,000) items", "Deleting Old Backups", and then "Cleaning Up". Once it finishes "Cleaning Up", it simply starts the cycle all over again. The Time Capsule arrow in my menu bar keeps turning constantly.
When I check the most recent backup, it still shows March 21, which was before the new hard drive was installed, so it doesn't seem to be backing up -- just running this continuous cycle.
Any ideas on what is wrong? All Time Machine preferences appear to be set properly.

Yes, that's caused by an unfortunate combinations of things.
First, since you have a new internal HD, Time Machine must back it up entirely. That, of course, will take a lot of space.
Since there isn't room for that, Time Machine is deleting old backups trying to make enough space. Because network backups are kept in a rather odd container called a +sparse bundle disk image,+ that doesn't shrink automatically when things are deleted, Time Machine has to mount it, delete the oldest backup, dismount the sparse bundle, "compact" it, then mount it again to see if it's made enough room. If not, repeat, repeat, repeat.
Unfortunately, it also repeats the "deep traversal" process (scanning everything) each time, too.
And everything is much slower via WIFI.
Whatever you do next, connect via Ethernet. It won't be fast, but it will be 2-3 times faster than WIFI.
How much data is on your Mac, and how large is your Time Capsule?
If the TC isn't well over twice the size of the data it's backing-up, there won't be room for a new, full backup. Erase it, via +*Airport Utility.+* Select your Time Capsule, then +*Manual Set-Up,+* then Disks in the tool Bar, then the Disks tab below it, then Erase. The "Quick Erase" option will only take a moment. Then let Time Machine start over.
If there is enough room, and you don't want to erase and start over, see #A1 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). Use the widget there to look at the messages; they'll show how much space TM needs, and how much is available.
Then you can manually delete some old backups, and "compact" the sparse bundle, per #12 in [Time Machine - Frequently Asked Questions|http://web.me.com/pondini/Time_Machine/FAQ.html] (or use the link in *User Tips* at the top of this forum).

Similar Messages

Time Machine stuck in Preparing Data Mode

In the past two days my time Machine has not made a successful back up. It seems to be stuck in "preparing data" and will stay like this all day. Even when I click the time machine preferences and stop it, it never changes. Does anyone have any solutions to this or has experienced it.Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks!!

Judith,
The following might contain an explanation for what you are experiencing.
*_Time Machine May Report "Preparing..." For a Long Time_*
First, it’s good to determine WHY Time Machine is "Preparing..." for an extended period of time. Examining the Console logs during this event can reveal what is actually going on behind the scenes. It may be “Preparing…” for a genuinely good reason. How long is 'too long' to wait for Time Machine to finish "Preparing..."? Some times, "Preparing..." is required to perform the normal housekeeping that Time Machine does periodically. Other times, it really is "stuck" and never proceeds after more than 24 hours.
*”Deep Traversal” (Recent Crash / Forced Restart / System Update / Extended Period Between Backups)*
According to the following KB article it can sometimes take quite a long time if Time Machine begins a “deep traversal” and has to compare data inventories. This may apply to your situation, particularly if many Gigs of data are involved. [http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1516]
You see, Time Machine *+does not+* ordinarily perform file-by-file comparisons to determine what has changed and thus determine what needs to be backed up. Rather, Time Machine relies on FSEvents notifications. This is a log that the system uses to keep track of changes to directories. Rather than scan tens of thousands of files for changes each time, Time Machine simply looks at this log and narrows its’ scan to only the directories that have experienced changes since the last backup. Otherwise, Time Machine would have to be running constantly just to catch every change on its own and thus eat up precious CPU.
Every event that FSEvents records has its’ own ID which includes a time stamp. At the end of every backup, Time Machine stores the last event ID that it processes. When the next backup is initiated, Time Machine looks at this stored ID and determines that it only needs to backup events that have occurred after the time stamp on this last event ID.
If, due to a system crash, power failure, forced restart, or some other major system event, Time Machine cannot find this last event ID in the system logs then it will consider the FSEvents log “untrustable” and it will go into what’s called “deep traversal”. The Console logs may report +“Event store UUIDs don't match”.+ In this event, Time Machine will by-pass the system log entirely and perform its’ own file-by-file comparison to determine what has changed since its’ last backup. Obviously, if tens or hundreds of Gigs are involved, then this process can take quite some time and should be allowed to proceed.
Additionally, it appears that if Time Machine has to go back too far to find the last event ID, then it will give up and simply go into “deep traversal” and do the file-by-file scan on its’ own. This can occur if Time Machine has not been able to perform its’ hourly backups for some time, as is the case for users who only backup once a week or so. This is also the case with major Mac OS system updates that change thousands of files at one time. There are simply too many events logged by the system for Time Machine to bother looking for the last known event ID.
*Consolidation / “Thinning”*
At the beginning, when Time Machine is first used, incremental backups are relatively quick events. But as time goes on, and backup files grow, Time Machine requires time to perform house-keeping on the backed up data. This maintenance is referred to in the Console logs as "thinning". The larger the backup files become, the more time Time Machine requires.
To prevent the backup drive from filling up too fast, Time Machine will periodically consolidate, or 'thin', backups to free up space for new data. After a certain period of time, each hourly backup becomes "expired". This occurs about 24-48 hours after the hourly backup took place. At that point Time Machine begins consolidating, or "thinning", all the hourly backups of a given day into one daily backup. Then, after about a month all daily backups for a given week “expire” and are consolidated into a single weekly backup.
Obviously, since the Time Machine process (backupd) does not run continuously, it has to do this "thinning" during routine backups. That is where "Preparing Backup..." and "Finishing Backup..." come in. It is during these initial and closing phases of a backup that "thinning" occurs. As a result, while not every backup will be accompanied by extended periods of "Preparing..." and "Finishing...", periodically Time Machine will require extra time to perform these space-saving consolidations.
*Anti-Virus Software*
Running anti-virus software can interfere with the backup process. Either disable it altogether, or try the suggestion outlined here, “If you use third-party anti-virus scanning software and have issues, make sure your Time Machine back up folder (Backups.backupdb on the Time Machine disk) is excluded from virus scanning.” (http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1516)
*Software Updates* #
Installing new software, upgrading existing software, or updating Mac OS X system software can create major changes in the structure of your Macs directories. Time Machine will backup every file that has changed since the installation.
After an OS update (like 10.5.5) Time Machine realizes the system no longer matches what it looked like during the previous backup. So it has determined that it's earlier catalogue of what-should-be-where is “untrustable”. So it is going to go item-by-item comparing the before and after of your system.
*Spotlight Keeps Indexing Backup Drive* #
It may be that Time Machine can’t proceed or complete a backup due to Spotlight indexing. During this period, take a look at the Spotlight icon in the upper right corner of your screen. Is there a tiny dot pulsating in the center of the spyglass? Click on the icon. Is there a progress bar displayed? Generally, Spotlight indexing is a good thing. If it has only been a couple of hours then, stop the backup, turn Time Machine OFF, and let the indexing continue.
However, at times Spotlight may hang and never progress after many hours, preventing further backups from taking place.
Go to System Preferences --> Time Machine.
Using the slider on the left, turn OFF Time Machine backups for now.
Next, click “Show All” in the toolbar.
Select the Spotlight Preferences.
Click the Privacy Tab.
First, drag your Macs’ internal hard disk from the desktop to the Privacy list.
Wait 10 seconds, then highlight the Macs’ hard disk in the list and click the tiny “-” button at the bottom to remove it from the list.
Spotlight will initiate a reindex of the hard disk. If you click on the Spotlight menu icon you may see the message:
+“Spotlight helps you quickly find things on your computer. Spotlight will be available as soon as the contents of your computer have been indexed.”+
...and a progress bar will indicate the time remaining.
Once completed, drag your Time Machine backup disk into the Privacy list of the Spotlight Preferences.
Wait 10 seconds, then highlight the Time Machine backup disk in the list and click the tiny “-” button at the bottom to remove it from the list.
Spotlight will now initiate a reindex of the hard disk.
Once completed, if you have any other hard disks attached to your Mac that are also being backed using Time Machine, then force a reindex as well using the procedure outlined above.
Then turn Time Machine back ON and initiate a backup.
*Run Away System Process*
It’s possible that Time Machine is stuck “Preparing…” because another process is monopolizing your Macs’ CPU. Launch Activity Monitor and sort the items by “CPU”. Is there a process that is at or near 100% that might be preventing the backupd process from moving forward?
One poster stated, “I took it to my local Genius Bar and they found a Syslogd daemon running, taking up 100% of my CPU….This resulted in the "Preparing..." mode running forever.” [http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1755600&tstart=15]
You may be able use Activity Monitor to “kill” the offending process. Or you may be able to resolve it simply by rebooting your Mac. Then try backing up again.
*Verify/Repair Mac Hard Disk & Permissions*
It may be that your Macs’ internal hard disk has so many file/directory issues that Time Machine simply has trouble making sense of it. Some users have had success using Disk Utility on their Macs’ hard drive.
Launch Disk Utility and click “Repair Disk Permissions”.
Once complete, attempt a backup.
If Time Machine appears to hang at “Preparing…” again, then do the following:
Insert your Macs’ original install DVD and reboot holding down the “C” key.
At the Welcome screen go up to the “Utilities” menu and select Disk Utility.
Select your Macs’ hard disk on the left and click “Verify Disk” on the right.
If problems are found click “Repair Disk”.
Reboot to your normal desktop and try backing up again.
*For Time Capsule Users* #
If, though, none of the options above have helped and it has been 12 hours or more of “Preparing…”, then the Time Capsule may need to be restarted.
Stop the backup from the Time Machine menu. (Give if a few minutes while it says “Stopping backup…”)
When the Time Machine icon stops spinning, unplug the TC from the wall outlet.
Wait 10-15 seconds.
Re-plug it in again.
After it has restarted (30-60 seconds), attempt another backup.
Time Machine will report “Preparing…” again, but it shouldn’t be lasting more than a couple of hours.
Let us know if any of the above was helpful in resolving your issue.
Cheers!

Time Machine stuck during backup

From December 28 to January 13 my Time Machine functioned without issue, using an external Seagate Free Agent Drive (300 GB) with a 150 GB partition devoted to TM. For whatever reason I didn't happen to connect the drive from the 13th to the 16th, and now it appears to be freezing during the preparation process or very early in the backup.
I've looked at some of the non-complete packages to try and ascertain the problem - so far it appears to always hang while backing up the Applications folder. Why it is re-backing up this whole folder at once is beyond me, as I'm only aware of one program I've recently updated - Flip4Mac. Incidentally, this was the program is was halting on initially - so I added that to the exclude list. Next go at it, and its stuck on a different program. Then another. Then another.
Do I really need to exclude my whole Applications folder? That seems a bit counterintuitive to me.

I've discovered the culprit after some additional searching here. Apparently Time Machine does not function correctly while the iSight is enabled. In the past I've had no trouble with Time Machine running in the background with a variety of other processes ongoing, but apparently this one is problematic. After quitting Skype I've found that backups completed quickly and painlessly. Hopefully this post is helpful to others as well, and hopefully Apple addresses this - at least through improving Time Machine's dreadfully horrible Help files.

How can I use time machine to recover my iWeb09 files?

I read that iWeb stores one's website pages in the domain folder which can be located at ~/Library/Application Support/iWeb. Can I use time machine to recover my iWeb09 files? If so, how? -I tried. I entered my Time Machine back up, and went back in time and brought the domain file forward but it opened only my current site pages, not the ones I am trying to recover. And it says the Domain file was last modified in October 2007 which is crazy because I've been using iWeb a lot and have published many pages. It seems like the uncorrupted pages, which I am trying to recover, existed somewhere on my computer at one point in time and space, less than a week ago, becuse I just published my site to a new hosting service since Apple will soon stop web hosting. So why can I not find them using time machine?

I continued searching and read another person's advise to down load an app named "Find File," then search for .sites. She said spotlight doesn't always find all files. So I did and sure enough, when I searched for .sites I found another Domain package, which I have no idea how it was created but which, it ends up, was the one actually being used by iWeb. So I went to that package then did the time machine and went back to before my web pages became corrupted. I had to delete corrupt blog pages out of my website menu to get iWeb to upload the other page changes even to a local folder.
So I went to that newly found Domain, went back in time, then brought that forward and as you pointed out the domain package had the parts of the pages, the files and jpegs, but not the structure/layout of the pages. So, I guess I gave up on finding the old pages.
Those pages still exist on the Apple hosting server but iWeb doesn't not reverse publication. Cyberduck would bring back the files and bits and peices but again not the pages as a total entity. I'm preparing for the end of Apple website hosting (next month?) and am republishing my old site. I decided to use a new domain name. So my entire original site is still totally intact on the web under the original domain name, on my mobile me site, I guess it will be there till sometime in June?
My problems started when I tried to publish my website to the new server. It just would not publish the whole website in one session. So I decided to do it a few pages at a time. Some pages went up, but as I added more, for some unknown reason the, blog pages, (about 70 subpages), which had aleardy uploaded just fine to the new server, became corrupt and locked up iWeb. Of course once I deleted the corrupt pages I didn't want to continue publishing the site to the host until I found and reinserted uncorrupted pages, knowing publishing changes would delete the already published pages.
At first I thought it was the hosting server's fault, but when I discovered that it wouldn't publish even to a local fold I was able to locate the cause within iWeb, deleted those pages then tested by publishing to a local folder. iWeb worked locally, so I knew I had found the problem pages. Well this is way more than you wanted to know. Thanks for your advise but I'll just start the blogging pages over.

Time Machine stopped backing up, "preparing"

Hi,
I recently moved and backed up an imac I left behind as well as my macbook using Time Machine.
Everything was fine until Feb 27 when I was hit by a car and spent the next several weeks away from the computer. When I did get the laptop back, I didn't have the backup drive. Until a few days ago.
So I reconnect and the backup starts with no problem until it finally tells me that I am out of space on the drive. I decided that I should just dump the imac time machine folder since I had a duplicate on another drive. That was much more complicated than I expected but I finally reclaimed a lot of space.
The problem is that now when I connect time machine, it just says preparing backup. I can enter time machine and see my last date before the accident, even going back into last year. But it won't back up any more.
I've looked at the forums and on one suggestion deleted the com.apple.TimeMachine.plist file after disconnecting the drive and then reconnecting everything but to no avail.
Here is the message on the Time Machine Widget buddy
Starting standard backup
Backup requested by user
Backing up to: /Volumes/2TB BB/Backups.backupdb
Event store UUIDs don't match for volume: Macintosh HD
Node requires deep traversal:/ reason:kFSEDBEventFlagMustScanSubDirs|kFSEDBEventFlagReasonEventDBUntrustable|
My first thought would be that the backup I trashed was the one for the macbook and not the imac but the last saved dates would all be wrong and it wouldn't explain my ability to enter time machine and look back at my computer's history.
Anyway, At this point I really want to just have a complete back up that I can use to wipe my drive and reinstall everything. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks
bb

Bruce Bridges wrote:
Starting standard backup
Backup requested by user
Backing up to: /Volumes/2TB BB/Backups.backupdb
Event store UUIDs don't match for volume: Macintosh HD
Node requires deep traversal:/ reason:kFSEDBEventFlagMustScanSubDirs|kFSEDBEventFlagReasonEventDBUntrustable|
Those are all normal. The last two mean that TM has to compare everything on your Mac to the backups, to figure out what's changed and needs to be backed-up. That takes longer than a normal backup, but shouldn't take hours, unelss there's a problem with one of the drives, or the port, cable, etc.
I'd recommend Verifying the internal HD, and Repairing the TM drive, per #6 in Using Disk Utility.

My Time Capsule/Time Machine has been showing Preparing Backup for past 48 hours continuously!

My Time Capsule reported Full the other day. I now have only 26.8MB of 497.96 GB available. Since then it seems to backing up continuously. The Time machine preferences window shows "Preparing Backup" andnothing else, and it has been doing so for at least past 48 hours. Any ideas as to the problem?
Stuartyboy

Yes, the problem is the drive is full.
If you have other files or TM back from other computers, TM on your computer having issues will not be able to delete enough to get sufficient space to backup.
Read how to clean up and delete parts of backups.. http://pondini.org/TM/FAQ.html
Not a good idea though.
Solution.
1. Buy a new bigger TC.. cheaper (Than the original 500GB at least), faster and now the smallest is 2TB.
2. Plug in a USB drive.. archive the TC.. then erase it and start a fresh set of backups.. April 1st great day to do it.
3. Open up your old TC.. remove the 500GB drive and install a 2TB (if Gen1 a 3TB might even work). Google for how to do a hard disk upgrade.
Problem.. old power supply could die the day after and then the total cost would approach 1. Better to backup, wipe the 500GB and sell it on ebay and buy a new TC with 2 or even 3TB (2TB is better value IMHO).
4. Plug in a USB drive .. formatted to HFS+ and use that as the target.
Very slow. much slower than the same drive plugged into your computer.

Time Machine Stuck at "Backing up XXmb of XXgb"

For a week now, time machine gets stuck at "Backing up 901.8MB of 29.14GB." I can let it run all day and it wilPre backup directory and delete the inProgress file, and eject the drive. The next day, it happens all over again. I haven't had a successful backup in six days.
What can I do about this?

jayb3369 wrote:
Yeah, that was one of the first things I tried. Neither disk has any problems that Repair Disk could find or repair. Still not working. Today it's stuck at "Backing up 86 MB of 88.1 MB" for about four hours now.
Is there a Time Machine log that shows what files have been backed up? That might yield some insight.
No, unfortunately. There are a couple of 3rd-party apps that show what was backed-up, but only for successful backups.
A clue might be lurking in your logs. See #A1 in Time Machine - Troubleshooting. The widget messages probably won't have anything, but see the pink box to look in your system.log, but without filtering for backupd. There may be some other messages sent by other processes during the backup.
You might be able to figure out what's hanging it by excluding things. Or, look inside the in.Progress package.

Time machine stuck at x of y

Time machine backup is stuck at x of y on all disks –> backup disk goes to sleep.
Checked all disks – backup and host – no errors found.
Is there a way for tmutil to be verbose like in tmutil compare to see where it gets stuck?

jayb3369 wrote:
Yeah, that was one of the first things I tried. Neither disk has any problems that Repair Disk could find or repair. Still not working. Today it's stuck at "Backing up 86 MB of 88.1 MB" for about four hours now.
Is there a Time Machine log that shows what files have been backed up? That might yield some insight.
No, unfortunately. There are a couple of 3rd-party apps that show what was backed-up, but only for successful backups.
A clue might be lurking in your logs. See #A1 in Time Machine - Troubleshooting. The widget messages probably won't have anything, but see the pink box to look in your system.log, but without filtering for backupd. There may be some other messages sent by other processes during the backup.
You might be able to figure out what's hanging it by excluding things. Or, look inside the in.Progress package.

I am trying to get space on an external hard drive which has some old time machine back up files that I do not need but can not eliminate, even by going into the time machine, clicking on the backup file to be eliminated and using the drop down eliminate

I am trying to get space on an external hard drive which has some old time machine back up files that I do not need but can not eliminate, even by going into the time machine, clicking on the backup file to be eliminated and using the drop down menu with the gear box symbol to eliminate

I cannot find this 300GB "Backup" in the Finder, only in the Storage info when I check "About This Mac".
You are probably using Time Machine to backup your MacBook Pro, right? Then the additional 300 GB could be local Time Machine snapshots. Time Machine will write the hourly backups to the free space on your hard disk, if the backup drive is temporarily not connected. You do not see these local backups in the Finder, and MacOS will delete them, when you make a regular backup to Time Machine, or when you need the space for other data.
See Pondini's page for more explanation: What are Local Snapshots? http://pondini.org/TM/FAQ.html
I have restarted my computer, but the information remains the same. How do I reclaim the use of the 300GB? Why is it showing up as "Backups" when it used to indicate "Photos"? Are my photos safe on the external drive?
You have tested the library on the external drive, and so your photos are save there.
The local TimeMachine snapshot probably now contains a backup of the moved library. Try, if connecting your Time Machine drive will reduce the size of your local Time Machine snapshots.

Time Machine no longer recognizes backup file

Hi:
My Time Capsule was malfunctioning, and I lost my internet connection. I rebooted the Time Capsule, and had to reset the internet connection via the Time Capsule software that's part of System Preferences. When I got my internet connection back up and running, Time Machine can no longer connect to Time Capsule. When it tries to back up, I get this error message...
"The backup disk image “/Volumes/Aquaria-2/JHitch’s Computer_0017f2ce01da.sparsebundle” is already in use.
It's like Time Machine thinks that my backup file on my Time Capsule belongs to somebody else. How can I get Time Machine to go back to using my old backup file on my Time Machine?

I have had this exact problem occur when I logged off while Mail was in TM restore state. I guess the backup is locked somehow because it was cut off while in use. I wish I could help, but I am in the same boat and I will watch this post for help.

Does Time Machine use a differential/delta file compression when copying files ?

Hello,
I would like to use Time Machine to backup to a MacBook Air but that computer is using a Virtual Machines store in a single file of 50 GBytes.
Once the initial backup will be done, does Time Machine will only copy the changes in this large file or will everyday copy the full 50 Bytes?
In other word does Time Machine use a differential/dela file compression algorithm (like un rsync)?
If it is not yet the case, can you please file for me an application request to the development team internally?
If others are also interested in such a feature, you’re welcome to vote for it.
Kind regards,
Olivier

Ok, it looks like the current version of Time Machine cannot handle efficiently in network terms large files like Virtual Machine files and this a real issue today.
Is anybody here able to file an official feature request to Apple to be able to use Time Machine efficiently also with large files (let's stay > 5 GBytes) ?
I should propably mean using a differential compression algorythm over the network like the examples below:
http://rsync.samba.org/tech_report/tech_report.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remote_Differential_Compression

IMac 20-inch on OSX 10.7.4 running iphoto 11, my photos from my iphoto library have been deleted. I have time machine but the iphoto library file is missing when I access time machine, help please.

I have an imac 20-inch Late 2006 model on OSX 10.7.4 running iphoto 11, somehow the application ccleaner has deleted my photos from my iphoto library. I have time machine but the iphoto library file is missing when I access time machine.
To restore photos I have followed the steps below
Quit iPhoto.
Connect your Time Machine drive.
In the Finder, open the folder containing your iPhoto Library. Unless you've moved your iPhoto Library, it can be found in Home/Pictures/iPhoto Library.
Enter Time Machine. (Time Machine can be found in the Dock or in the /Applications folder.)
Choose your desired backup. The timeline on the right side of the screen displays a purple tick mark for each of the backups stored on your Time Machine drive.
Select the iPhoto library you would like to restore, and click the Restore button.
I dont get the option in step 6 as I dont have an iphoto library file to choose? Does anyone know why?

Hi Barry
Thanks but as mentioned all is intact, even at step 3 I can see the current library in Home/Pictures/iPhoto Library which has no photos, but when I access time machine any point before the NOW option the iphoto library in Home/Pictures/iPhoto Library is missing from the finder window.
As you can see here it is
and now its gone. I have no explanantion.
How do I go about moving this question as you suggested.

Can you use an external hard drive (G-Tech 1 TB) as both a time machine and for storing extra files?

I just got a new external hard drive and will be getting my macbook pro next week. I was wondering if the external hard drive could be used as both a time machine and to have extra files on it? And if so how would you do that?

Time Machine requires a drive that is formatted in Mac OS Extended (Journaled), so you will need to check to make sure that this requirement is met.
A drive that the manufacturer says will work with both Mac and Windows will not work with Time Machine.

After clean install of Snow Leopard, Time Machine did not restore all files. When I try to restore these files I get "Not enough disk space" error. What do I need to do to get these important files back onto my Mac from my external hard drive??

After clean install of Snow Leopard, Time Machine did not restore all files. When I try to restore these files I get "Not enough disk space" error. What do I need to do to get these important files back onto my Mac from my external hard drive??

Janet.b wrote:
About 3 years old...pretty dated now I guess. Am thinking I may just need to have it upgraded by a Mac tech.
For what the Apple Store's charge you can buy almost buy a new computer.
Just for giggles I brought my old laptop in for a drive upgrade and asked, they wanted $600 for a drive that only cost $120 at the time and it was a slow 5,400 RPM drive. The new Mac's of a similar make were going for $1000.
I did the drive replacement myself, got a faster drive of better quality for $300 instead.
Then another time I asked for a RAM upgrade from 4GB to 8GB, they wanted to charge $400 + $35 for the labor.
The same RAM is on Crucial.com for $90 and all I need is a 00 micro phillips screwdriver.
So you see what's going on here.
I think what you should do, if your out of warranty/AppleCare, is to call up the local PC tech guy who also does Mac's and have them fix you right up.
They can offer more personalized care which you need. Clone your old drive to the new and everything.
With Apple they are overworked at the Genius Bar and just place roadblocks so you buy a new machine instead.
For instance, all new iMac's now have proprietary drive software installed on the hard drives for heat monitoring. So now the only choice a user has is to bring their iMac into a Apple Store for a very expensive drive upgrade, which a person then decides the money is better spent buying a new machine.

How does one get Time Machine out of a "Preparing to Backup" loop to actually doing a backup? thanks, AR

How does one get Time Machine out of a "Preparing to Backup" loop to actually doing a backup? thanks, AR

Hi..
Thanks for the reply..
My original I Phone 5 was running IOS 6.12
My I phone 5S currently runs IOS 8..When I upgraded it, it had IOS 7 on it which made the I Photo app compatible with everything below IOS 8...( which the photo app is not compatible with ) so I just connected the I Phone 5S to my computer and thinking the new phone had IOS 7 on it that these was nothing to worry about..I thought all 900 + pictures in the photo stream would transfer but somewhere in the process, I Tunes decides to just go and install IOS 8 which requires that you run a " Photo Migration App" to transfer photos from IOS 7 & below. The problem was is that I didn't want IOS 8 on my new 5S so I thought I wouldn't have to do that part..
Anyway the phone emerged with IOS 8 on it and the only photos that remained were the ones that were actually on the phone..The 900 + I had in the stream didn't transfer because the Photos that works on IOS 7 and below isn't compatible with IOS 8..I guess you have to use the photo migration app that comes with IOS 8 & I phone 6..But I didn't ask to upgrade to IOS 8...It just did it on it's own!
I still have the I Phone 5 Back up that I did just before giving it back to Verizon but if I try to restore the I Phone 5S running IOS 8 those photos in the stream will not go back on the phone because IOS 8 isn't compatible with the I Photos" that ran on IOS 7 and below..
So I have an I Pad mini that runs IOS 7..should I try and erase it...and put that I Phone 5 backup on it and pray the photos that were in the stream come back on it so I can transfer them back to my computer...then erase the I pad mini again and restore it using it's original backup that I have on the computer and the in the cloud?
I know this sounds confusing but I'm at a loss as to what to do..This is what I found ...http://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201386
but it doesn't help me..
Steve

Time Machine stuck in repeating "preparing files" cycle

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