Transfer time machine data (snow leopard) to new mb air (lion)

MB Pro died. How do I transfer external Time Machine backup (Snow Leopard) to new MB Air (Lion)?

Your best bet, by far, is to use Setup Assistant when your new Mac first starts up, to transfer your 3rd-party apps, user accounts, data, settings, etc. from the backups. See Using Setup Assistant on Lion for detailed instuctions.
If the backups are on a Time Capsule, get a USB-to-Ethernet connector, so you can do this via Ethernet -- it's 2-3 times faster, and much more reliable, than WIFIl.

Similar Messages

HT1277 Mail has gone crazy. Header's and messages are mixed up. New Mac Book Pro. Migrated files from Time machine running snow leopard. Reinstall or new computer needed?

Mail has gone crazy. Header's and messages are mixed up. New Mac Book Pro. Migrated files from Time machine running snow leopard. Reinstall or new computer needed?

Ok; I'm not sure what you're doing. 36 hours is rather long. Seems like a new migration. Not what I intended.
Here's what I intended: from the newly-migrated and apparently-corrupt environment, create a new user, not related to any existing user, nor any migration-created user, or any other user for that matter. That is, use  > System Preferences > Users and Groups, authenticate yourself by clicking on the padlock, and then click the + and create a wholly new user. Then log in under that user and establish the mail access.
36 hours? I'm wondering if there's an error or an exceedingly slow network here? Or a really, really slow disk? Or a sick backup? (WiFi isn't the path I'd usually choose, either.)
Failing the attempted second migration, I'd try a different tactic. Does your existing (old) system work? If so, I'd bypass the backup and connect an external (scratch) USB disk drive to the (old) sstem and then boot and use Disk Utility booted from the installer DVD disk or boot and use Disk Utility from the recovery partition or booted from a recovery partition created on some other external storage (details here vary by the OS X version and what hardware you have), and perform a full-disk backup of your original internal disk to (scratch) external storage. (Make sure you get the source and target disks chosen correctly here; copying the wrong way — from the scratch disk to your existing disk — will clobber your data!) In esssence, this will clone your existing boot disk. Then dismount the (formerly-scratch) external disk, transfer it over to the new system, and use it as the source of the migration, by performing a fresh OS X installation on the new system.
Target Disk Mode is also sometimes an option for accessing the disk for a migration, but that requires the right cable, and requires systems that have the same external connection; newer MacBook Pro systems use Thunderbolt for this, and older systems tend to use FireWire. And I'm guessing you don't have compatible hardware.
The details here can and do vary by your OS X versions and your particular Mac systems — if you'll identify the specific models and hardware, somebody might be able to better tailor the above (fairly generic) sequence to your particular configuration.

Backing up an encrypted drive with Time Machine under Snow Leopard

In a nutshell, my question is “Can I back up an encrypted drive using Time Machine under Snow Leopard, and if so, how do I access its data from a previous day?”
I have a 1Tb USB drive connected to my MacBook, which runs Snow Leopard. The drive is formatted as Mac OS Extended (Journaled). This drive is included in the drives that Time Machine backs up. I used Disk Utility to create an encrypted drive on the USB drive (998Gb), also formatted as Mac OS Extended (Journaled). The encrypted drive is not on TimeMachine’s list of excluded files/drives.
When I go into Time Machine, I can see the USB drive and the encrypted drive in the side bar. I can access the files on the encrypted drive as long as I’m looking at how it stands now. But if I move backward in time, the encrypted drive is grayed out and inaccessible. If I click on the USB drive, I get a window that tells me it is 75.9Gb in size, and nothing else is available to me.
When I open the back-up drive in Finder and navigate to Backups.backupdb > macbook name > some date and time, I see my MacBook’s hard drive and the USB drive. The encrypted drive is not shown. When I click on the USB drive, I see an entry for drivename.sparsebundle. When I click on that I’m prompted for the password for the encrypted drive. When I enter it, I get a warning telling me that the disk image could not be opened and that the encrypted drive has no mountable file systems.
Is my encrypted drive really be backed-up and if so, how do I access the backed-up data?

Having received a bunch of views but no replies over the last 5 days, I decided to venture into my local Apple store and ask this same question. The response I got from the geniuses was that you can't get a reliable back-up of an encrypted drive using Time Machine under Snow Leopard. So, my only alternative is to copy the encrypted drive's contents elsewhere, unencrypt the drive, and then copy the contents back. This is what I expected, but not what I wanted to hear.

Import contacts from old address book on MacBkPro Snow Leopard into new MacBk Pro Lion

How do I import my contacts from old address book on MacBkPro Snow Leopard into new MacBk Pro Lion (on MacBkPro Retina). I can see the "AddressBook" file on the old HD (extracted from old machine--which died) and have a copy of that file on to desktop of new machine. [Copied from old HD: Users/home/Library/Application Support/Address Book]. There is an Address Book in the same location on the "MacIntosh HD" of the new machine, but some of the files in that (new) folder have different names. Risky to simply over-ride this. What should I do?

My mistake - my groups are there! They transferred perfectly. Still getting used to my wonderful new machine. Sorry to bother you!

I am getting error "The disk is used for Time Machine Backup" when installing the new OSX Mountain Lion upgrade"

I am keep getting this error "The disk is used for Time Machine Backup" when installing the new OSX Mountain Lion" when doing the upgrade to newly OS.

The folder would be at the root of your hard drive. Double-click Macintosh HD and look there.
If it isn’t there, I’m not sure what it is seeing.

When I try to enter a time machine with Snow Leopard backups Lion I get an error code -6584 ... how to fix?

Hi.
I had a first gen time machine with backups all on Snow Leopard.
This died (power supply), and I bought a new time capsule, because to fix the old one would cost nearly the same amount.
Since, I have started using Lion, and backed up onto my new time capsule in Lion.
Unfortunately, there was a file I deleted that I really need for a Logic Audio project, that is only present on the old time capsule.
I got the old time capsule fixed, so it powers up. I even extended my current wireless network with it. I can see inside it -- all the data that I dragged onto its HD in the past is present, and the "Sparse Bundle" containing the data for the time capsule save-states is present too.
Now, when I try to "Enter" my old time capsule, I get this error message:
I tried entering the time machine via WiFi and via ethernet, to no avail.
Can anyone help me to access these old save states on my old "snow leopard" time capsule?
I was thinking maybe I need to try to access it from a machine with Snow Leopard?
Please help.
Thanks in advance.
JM

I have the same issue. Does anybody know why this has happened

Time Machine: Missing Snow Leopard backups after Lion Upgrade.

I regulary use Time Machine for backups to my WD drive through my network. After I upgraded to Lion I could not back up to my network drive I learned through various forums that my WD drive required a firmware update, to work with Lion. I upgraded the firmware and now I no longer have my Time Machine backups from Snow Leopard, only backups from Lion, any idea how I can locate my Snow Leopard backups?

Pondini wrote:
I'd be the first to agree that keeping two sets of backups, one a "clone," is prudent.
But if you have a Snow Leopard clone, then upgrade to Lion, the next time you update the clone you'll lose the Snow Leopard version entirely.
Yes, I was caught out early, so I have a selection of backup drives now to keep everything backed up as safely as possible. Although at the moment, I'm not seeing any reason to go back to Snow Leopard, and all my media is safe. Hopefully in the near future my SL backups can go and I can get ready for the next OS when it comes along.
Thanks

Old iMac with Snow Leopard to new iMac with Lion - can I do this?

Hi folks,
1. I have a 6 year old iMac running Snow Leopard (can't upgrade to Lion)
2. Just bought a new iMac running Lion.
3. I want to migrate all accounts, files, apps, etc from old iMac to new iMac (about 150 Gb worth)..
4. I would normally connect both iMacs either with an Ethernet cable or via wi-fi network and run Setup Assistant to move everything to the new iMac.
Based on my experience doing this on other Macs I have, I know it's gonna take 8 to 10 hours to migrate everything over to the new iMac so I'm looking for ways to migrate so my iMac isn't tied up all day and I don't have to spend all day in front of the computer making sure all is o.k. So, if I make a bootable clone on a separate portable drive using SuperDuper, can I hook that drive up (instead of old iMac) to my new iMac and run Setup Assistant that way? That would free up the old iMac to use while the new iMac crunches away copying all those files from the portable drive. Will that work? Has anyone done this successfully? Any cautions or things to watch for?
Thanks everyone,
Ed

Linc,
Thanks for the info, but I want to use an external FireWire drive as the target disk, not the old iMac. I'd need to keep the external FireWire drive connected to the old iMac in order to use the screen, keyboard, mouse, etc. Could I just connect the FW drive to the new iMac and then start up the new iMac in hopes it would "recognize" the external FireWire drive through Setup Assistant?

Can I transfer Time Machine data from two separate hard drives into one new one?

I'm using a MacBook Pro as my primary computer. My 500 gig Time Capsule filled up a year or so ago, so I stopped using it with Time Machine for awhile so I could keep the data from those old back-ups. There were a number of things I deleted from my computer's very limited hard drive after they were backed up to the Time Capsule. I got a 1T external USB drive last year to use as my "filing Cabinet" to store files I didn't necessarily need all the time or that were filling up my small laptop hard drive--including my iTunes library--all organized in a way that made it relatively easy for me to find what I needed, even if I didn't remember exactly when I'd filed it or what I'd called it. I got another 1 terabyte external (portable) drive last July and dedicated it to TimeMachine backups and labeled it "TimeMachine".
Over the last couple of weeks, my friend has been helping me upgrade to Yosemite and clean up my laptop hard drive. Last week he cloned my laptop hard drive to a new 1T hard drive and I exchanged it for my old drive in my computer today. All good.
Here's the issue. We replaced my Time Capsule hard drive with a 1 terabyte drive with the idea of transferring the data from the old Time Capsule (500G) drive and the newer USB 1T "TimeMachine" compact drive to the new 1T Time Capsule drive and beginning using the latter for my Time Machine backups going forward. Originally he thought we could copy everything from each of my external drives (the old 500gig drive from my Time Capsule, the USB "TimeMachine" drive I've been using since July, and the "file cabinet" files) to my computer in their own folders and then start regular TimeMachine backups to the new Time Capsule drive, thus preserving all my old data and making regular backups going forward. The "file cabinet" data was no problem at all, but when I tried to copy my USB "TimeMachine" data to my computer, I was unable to. My friend found instructions for transferring old TimeMachine data to a new TimeCapsule, but I don't know if I can transfer the data from two separate disks to the new TimeCapsule drive. I'm afraid that one set of data will supersede the other and either my newer backups or my old ones will be lost if I try to transfer both.
Are my fears justified or is there a way to insure that no such problem will occur? Of course, my data will still be on those two older drives, but that won't do me a lot of good if I can't access it when I need to. Also, the 1T drive now belongs to my friend; he used a brand new drive he'd bought for himself for my new internal hard drive and plans to take my 1T "TimeCapsule" drive in exchange, once the data has been transferred, so he will, of course, erase that drive.

Should we be able to bring up the old (500G) Time Capsule Drive to rename it using a SATA to FireWire harness and then copy the whole thing to the new Time Capsule drive?
You can copy a whole sparsebundle from one drive to another. That is not a problem. Whether you can access the sparsebundle is something you should test before you even start though.
If it's on the Desktop and I don't tell Time Machine to exclude it from backups, will it just automatically back it up?
All drives you plug into the Mac are excluded by default.. you must include them. So no problems there.. but I hope I am understanding the question.
Will both volumes or directories (which is the right term?) show up when I open Time Machine?
No, Time Machine will only open what it is told to open... or its backup default location.
You can force Time Machine to open alternative/old/no longer used backups by (now I have a problem as things have changed somewhat in Yosemite and I consider it alpha release software at this point in time). The old method was to right click on the TM icon and select a different TM backup. easy. Yosemite seems to have made easy stuff harder.
Here it is on my current computer.. clearly not Yosemite.. Right click on the TM icon in the dock.. select Browse Other Time Machine Disks.. And supply the info of where that is located. Easy. If you cannot figure it out one of the other posters here (with more patience than me for Yosemite) will help you.
Or will we have to partition the new drive somehow--is that even possible?
I am getting more lost as I go down the list.. but the TC disk cannot be partitioned.
If you have included all those USB drives in the new backup on a Time a Time Capsule.. you have made life rather hard because now your files are stored another layer deeper than they were.
So to open a file from a disk you need to open the sparsebundle.. then dig down to the drive in question and then dig down to the backup.. and all of this means Time Machine has to work perfectly which is Yosemite is a very big ask.
I thought you wanted to just backup your old drives to central location.. which means copying the files to a separate folder on the Time Capsule.
One correction I need to make to my post, which will make my strategy make a bit more sense: my new Time Capsule drive is 4T
It makes it much harder.. and I have to pose a real question of long term .. if you have put a 4TB drive in a Gen1 TC.. did you also replace its power supply because I can assure you the drive might be ok but the TC itself will not last forever.. and what happens when it dies. The Gen1 power supply is already well beyond its normal life span and the vast majority are dead. When the backup device is unreliable and the backups on it are made that much harder to get access to.. is this a great plan??
If you are going to consolidate all your old files on one disk.. a task I find understandable. I have done much the same albeit the usefulness of files made on emac running OS9 may be questioned. A disk lying in the bottom of a draw is a more appropriate place for them.
You want those files as easily accessible as possible (at the point of recovery) and not buried inside a sparsebundle.. particularly not a sparsebundle from the old TC disk buried inside a new sparsebundle.. keep files as accessible as possible as you can run searches.. and that is best done on a USB 3 (or faster ie thunderbolt) drive plugged into a new(ish) computer.. not network. And since the files are not being accessed on a daily/weekly or even monthly or yearly basis.. keeping them in actively running TC network storage.. I would say is a waste of space. That is only my opinion of course.. you might consider it highly important that files you will never look at are available any time of day or night when the urge comes to track down that elusive pimpernel email you sent 10 years ago... but I find it hard to justify. What the case.. the problem with TM and things like Mail is you cannot search it.. you must restore the whole library/files/program even before you can access it.. that makes file recovery out of a sparsebundle double step process.
So.. summary.
If you want to store files on the 4TB drive in the TC.. that is not a great strategy but it can work.. simply create a folder named.. OldFilesEMac for instance.. and do a simple copy and paste of all the file to that location. Do not use TM.. Since you have already used TM.. and from what I am reading you have already done the backup with the external drives included.. then you are going to end up needing to erase the TC and start over.. which you may not be prepared to do.. which is fair enough. (I am coming across as overbearing school master.. apologies).
TM is to backup your main OS and current files.. not files from 10-20years ago.
Please do read the issues involved in Pondini..
See his FAQ. I recommend you read through Q14-17 so you understand what is involved in recovery.
http://pondini.org/TM/FAQ.html
I also recommend you read the first couple of articles here. http://pondini.org/TM/Home.html
Particularly so you understand the complexity of Time Machine.
And the articles here. http://pondini.org/TM/Time_Capsule.html
Particularly Q3 on mixing data and backups on a TC.
I wish I could spend an hour or two face to face and work it out.. the whole strategy to do this.. !!

Transfer Time Machine Data to New Hard Drive

I recently purchased a Seagate 250GB FreeAgent External Hard Drive ($75 at Buy.com, with shipping and a five year warranty!) and decided that when it arrives it would be my dedicated Time Machine drive, though I am currently using a 75GB hard drive that I had laying around the apartment.
What I am wondering is that if I can, when the new drive arrives, drag the Time Machine files that are on the old drive to the new one, then designate the new drive for Time Machine backups.
The reason I want to do this is to create a relatively seamless backup from when I first got Leopard, as opposed to starting over again (which I can do, but defeats my purpose to some degree).

Hi,
Yes, you can do this. I have recently done the exact same thing. See this thread for details:-
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1218415
Regards

Time Machine and Snow Leopard installation problem

I'm trying to install Snow Leopard, but keep getting an error saying that my hard drive is used for time machin back ups. I have unplugged my external device, turned off time machine, yet this keeps happening. What am I doing wrong? I have been able to install Leopard on the computers that I haven't used time machine.

BusyChris18 wrote:
1) Do I have to do anything special with Time Machine BEFORE I install SL? I have been doing regular backups with TM.
Do a "final" backup and turn TM off.
2) should Time machine disc be off/disconnected when I do the install?
It's safest to eject and disconnect it, "just in case."
3) After I reconnect TM disc after SL install, do I have to "migrate" stuff from TM? OR will it just do a new backup and work like normal from that point forward.
If you do the normal install, there's no migration needed. 99.9 % of everything will be fine. In some rare cases of 3rd-party apps putting things in unusual places, there may be a problem, and you may need to re-enter some 3rd-party app purchase codes.
If you erase the drive, then install SL, then yes, of course, you'll have to transfer your data. There should be no reason to do that, but some folks seem to do it out of habit. If you do that, when your Mac boots up again, you can transfer your data from the TM backups. And if you do that, I'd strongly recommend making a separate full backup on a second external drive, again "just in case," preferably a "bootable clone." CarbonCopyCloner and SuperDuper are the most common. (There was a post here just last week where someone did this, the restore got to 99%, then BAM! the TM disk failed.)
TM backups should just continue normally, although there will almost certainly be a long "Calculating Changes" phase (used to be called "Preparing"). And they've added a progress bar, which doesn't seem to be particularly accurate.
However, it may try a new, full backup. If it does, cancel the backup and do a Restart. That may reset whatever confused it. If not, there's nothing you can do to prevent it.
4) Will I be able to access files that were backuped when I have just Leopard?
Yes.

Time Machine on Snow Leopard just doesn't work.

So I've had huge nightmares over the past few days over Time Machine.
So I've always been a big proponent of Time Machine. I always tell everyone that you NEED a backup solution, and while Time Machine may not be the be all and end all, it's a great starter solution for those that don't want any fuss.
But perhaps not anymore.
It just works, right? Well apparently not.
So a little while ago I performed a Time Machine-assisted hard drive swap for a MacBook (not mine). That is, I install a new drive, boot from SL DVD, perform a HD wipe, then restore from Time Machine. It seemed to go well.
Fast forward to more recently, I went on a trip overseas (Taiwan). While there, I obviously took a lot of photos, and it became that time again - purchase a new hard drive with more capacity for my MacBook Pro! HD were a little cheaper where I visited, so I not only bought a new drive for my MBP, but also a new drive for my wife's MB, as well as new external drives to upgrade our Time Machine drives.
While I was there, I decided to update my own Time Machine first - following the instructions from Apple's own knowledge base on the matter:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1427
I transferred my existing backups to the new drive to continue my Time Machine. I didn't notice any problem at the time.
Then I returned to my home country (New Zealand). First thing I did when I got back was to perform the Time Machine-assisted HD swap after making sure the OS were up-to-date as were their respective backups, on both my own MBP and my wife's MacBook.
That's when the troubles started.
First off, I noticed that a few images from my Aperture Library were missing. The album data and everything were there, but the actual files were not. They also did not exist anywhere on the Time Machine drive and as such never made it over to the new HD. Weird, I thought. They were there, clear as day on my original drive. They simply weren't backed up.
Now I'm aware of a few TM niggles, such as the false backups after verifying a disk, but I hadn't done that.
The second issue was much more major. My Wife's MB would be endlessly stuck on the white boot screen with the grey Apple logo. As it turns out, it's exactly this issue here:
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/2738620?threadID=2738620&tstart=74
In short, the fresh Time Machine backups I made before transferring to the new HD showed no sign of updating the /System/Library/Framework/Security.framework/Versions/A/Security package, which is REQUIRED for the Mac to boot into 10.6.7 (it had an old one from before).
Great, I thought, but maybe I can fix that by installing a fresh 10.6.7 combo update on the MB via target disk mode.
No dice. On trying, it goes all the way to the end, and then fails installation. I had to resort to copying over the correct, more recent security package just to get it to boot.
After booting, what to do? Who knows what other files Time Machine failed to update, and what consequences they would have. After putting back the original security package, I tried updating 10.6.7 again. Nope, no dmgs would open - i HAD to use the new Security package for anything to open. Fair enough, but even with that, the installation would inevitably fail.
Problem with the package? Nope. Tried a fresh download, and checked the SHA and everything.
Time to do some blitzing. I pulled out my trusty Snow Leopard DVD and did a reinstall on top. That's gotta get my problem, right? Well, nope. After resetting to 10.6.0, the 10.6.7 combo updater STILL failed on installation. Furthermore, the updater no longer worked on MY MBP either.
What gives?
As it turns out, it was related to this:
https://discussions.apple.com/message/11317470?messageID=11317470
In short, some files had the user immutable flag switched on, preventing changes from being made to those files (manifests as a little lock icon on the file icon). They included (and I'm sure not limited to) the Acknowledgement.rtfs in /Library/Documentation/, as well as a majority of the fonts in /Library/Fonts.
Checking back in the backup drives, it was clear that Time Machine was the culprit - instances of those files in the backups were also locked. When did that happen? Looking back, it looks like it happened when I transferred the backups from one Time Machine drive to another. But it wasn't all at once - in the first backup on one drive, one of the Acknowledgement.rtf files was locked, and the other one wasn't, but in the second onwards, both were. It was clear that Time Machine seemed to be doing it to those files. Which files and why? I have no idea.
So removing the uchg flag with "sudo chflags -R nouchg /" in terminal finally allowed me to apply the 10.6.7 combo update without failure.
So were the troubles over then?
Nope.
While checking if everything was fine, I noticed iPhoto on the MB had all the thumbs missing - after rebuilding, they weren't back, and only a .plist trashing fixed it (I consider this pretty normal - probably looking for the files on the old UUID drive or something).
But what gives? ALL the photos taken on the trip were gone! Not just the thumbs - the actual files were missing from the iPhoto Library! The data in the albums existed, just the actual files, just like my instance in Aperture on my own MBP.
Checked the Time Machine - again, it was clear Time Machine had completely stuffed up - the files were nowhere to be found on the Time Machine drive.
So currently, I've returned the original internal drive to the MacBook, performing a FRESH on new reformatted disk Time MAchine, and will use THAT to restore.
Nightmares, indeed. It's several days of work doing all the restores, considering I have limited drives to work with. And yes, rest-assured, I was doing enough permission repairs, and PRAM resets to ensure they weren't issues.
It occurs to me there are several faults with the most recent version of Time Machine (maybe 10.6.6 or something as that's when people had some of the issues above):
1) At some point in time, Time Machine may not update a necessary Security package (and probably other files too - I believe the files around it were also not updated), meaning that if you use that Time Machine to restore, the outdated package will cause your computer to fail to boot.
2) Transferring your backups to a new destination Time Machine drive may cause certain files to become user immutable or 'locked', with one consequence being you cannot update the OS.
3) Time Machine may fail to backup image files with the Aperture or iPhoto Library. Trying to remember back, I *think* this may be related to the fact that we changed time zones, as the unupdated image files were after the zones were changed. Strangely, every other file within the Library packages were updated, as album data was updated - just not the actual image files and folders.
Conclusion? I no longer trust Time Machine. The basic foundation of a backup service is that you trust it to do what it's supposed to do. After all this, how can I?
You might think they are isolated incidents, but they were occurring on two Macs that I have, and they same errors can be found in others.I think I have detailed some root causes, but who really knows.
At any rate you should keep an eye on at least these files I have detailed. Would love to hear Pondini on the matter, as I know he knows a lot about Time Machine.

Someone has suggested just installing Snow Leopard on the machine. Will that work?
If you can find a copy of the workstation version of Snow Leopard shipped with the same model of Mac mini, yes. Apple has not, to my knowledge, shipped a retail version of Snow Leopard new enough to boot your mini.
I've also heard there is a way to install SL while connected to my old Powerbook in order to suck the entire old drive onto the new machine in an operable manner. Is this accurate, and can this be done if my old machine is the Powerbook on the old apple chip when the new machine is intel based
No, it's not accurate. The OS on your PowerBook will not boot your mini.
what are the differences between the single pack and the family pack?
If you mean single and family pack of Mac OS X, the single pack is licensed for installation on one computer only, while the family pack is licensed for installation on up to five Macs.
Regards.
Message was edited by: Dave Sawyer

Problem with Time Machine, running Snow Leopard

Hi all,
Last week I had a new hard drive fitted into my iMac 8,1, after which Snow Leopard was reloaded (10.6.3 from the disc, updated to 10.6.8), followed by the restoration of data via Time Machine from my external hard drive. Whilst my Mac is now running beautifully, I am having problems backing up with Time Machine.
When I run a backup, it prepares about 100,000 items, then starts to backup, usually about 650mb. It crawls along in kb until it gets to about 1mb, then jumps quickly to the end, but then it adds extra mb on the end. Then it suddenly starts again "preparing x items....." and off it goes again.
I have tried repairing the backup disc, and it appears to be ok. I even erased it and started again. Time Machine did a full backup (139gb) in about 2 hours, then immediately added another 640mb at the end - strange, but I do at least have a full backup from yesterday. But now, everytime I run backup, it looks for the same sort of figure (650-700mb) and then goes round in circles.
Any help would be very much appreciated!
Thanks, David

Hi Eric
Thank you for your reply. Here are the screenshots for each change:
Having prepared about 95,000 items, the backup of 612mb begins
14 minutes later a message appears
Another 3 minutes and another message. You will see from this screenshot that the backup figure has changed to 613.1mb
Another 30 seconds and it all begins again....
And finally, 7 more minutes pass, another 96,000 items are prepared, and another 604.8mb backup begins.
I might add, that between posting this morning, and your reply, I also went into disk utility, chose the top leve of the external drive, clicked on the partition tab, charged current to 1 partition, renamed the drive, erased it, and did a full back up of 139GB. After 137GB it started again, looked for 602mb, backed them up and finished the backup, which is why TM states that the last back up was at 18:16 today.
Thanks again
David

Is Time Machine under Snow Leopard faster only for the initial backup?

A few days ago, I upgraded to Snow Leopard -- via clean install, manual reinstallation of apps, etc. So understandably, the first Time Machine backup to a preexisting store on an original 500 GB Time Capsule is going to be huge and take a long time. Apple claims that TM is 40% faster on the initial backup, but are there speed improvements as well? I was surprised by the slowness; I started it before going to bed, and it wasn't nearly done when I woke up:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1770
Jan 6 01:29:52 Musa com.apple.backupd[438]: Copied 8.3 GB of 59.3 GB, 9299 of 250057 items
Jan 6 02:29:52 Musa com.apple.backupd[438]: Copied 9.6 GB of 59.3 GB, 35209 of 250057 items
Jan 6 03:29:52 Musa com.apple.backupd[438]: Copied 11.5 GB of 59.3 GB, 48441 of 250057 items
Jan 6 04:29:52 Musa com.apple.backupd[438]: Copied 12.9 GB of 59.3 GB, 109846 of 250057 items
Jan 6 05:29:53 Musa com.apple.backupd[438]: Copied 17.4 GB of 59.3 GB, 140388 of 250057 items
Jan 6 06:29:54 Musa com.apple.backupd[438]: Copied 26.1 GB of 59.3 GB, 151723 of 250057 items
Jan 6 07:29:54 Musa com.apple.backupd[438]: Copied 36.9 GB of 59.3 GB, 167431 of 250057 items
Jan 6 08:20:04 Musa com.apple.backupd[438]: Copied 219433 files (38.0 GB) from volume Gigas.
The throughput rate is quite variable, but at its best, it's only about 2.7 MB/sec. Is that to be expected, or would I have to start a new backup to see speed improvements?

Kappy wrote:
i'd say you are concerned over nothing.
Not sure I agree. Look at this system.log output:
Jan 6 19:54:22 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Starting standard backup
Jan 6 19:54:22 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Attempting to mount network destination using URL: afp://odysseus@Time%20Capsule.afpovertcp.tcp.local/odysseus
Jan 6 19:54:30 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Mounted network destination using URL: afp://odysseus@Time%20Capsule.afpovertcp.tcp.local/odysseus
Jan 6 19:54:33 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Disk image /Volumes/odysseus/Musa_002332d5c37e.sparsebundle mounted at: /Volumes/Backup of Musa
Jan 6 19:54:33 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Backing up to: /Volumes/Backup of Musa/Backups.backupdb
Jan 6 19:54:42 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Node requires deep traversal:/ reason:must scan subdirs|
Jan 6 20:00:50 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Compacting storage: 72.07 GB requested (including padding), 58.36 GB available before compacting
Jan 6 20:00:50 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Stopping backup.
Jan 6 20:00:50 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Backup canceled.
Jan 6 20:00:53 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Ejected Time Machine disk image.
Jan 6 20:00:53 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Compacting backup disk image to recover free space
Jan 6 20:01:12 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Completed backup disk image compaction
Jan 6 20:01:12 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Starting standard backup
Jan 6 20:01:12 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Network destination already mounted at: /Volumes/odysseus
Jan 6 20:01:14 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Disk image /Volumes/odysseus/Musa_002332d5c37e.sparsebundle mounted at: /Volumes/Backup of Musa
Jan 6 20:01:14 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Backing up to: /Volumes/Backup of Musa/Backups.backupdb
Jan 6 20:01:20 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Node requires deep traversal:/ reason:must scan subdirs|
Jan 6 20:07:26 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Starting pre-backup thinning: 72.07 GB requested (including padding), 58.36 GB available
Jan 6 20:10:46 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Deleted backup /Volumes/Backup of Musa/Backups.backupdb/Musa/2010-01-03-131536: 58.42 GB now available
Jan 6 20:12:10 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Deleted backup /Volumes/Backup of Musa/Backups.backupdb/Musa/2010-01-04-094152: 58.52 GB now available
Jan 6 20:13:02 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Deleted backup /Volumes/Backup of Musa/Backups.backupdb/Musa/2010-01-04-073331: 58.57 GB now available
Jan 6 20:13:02 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Stopping backup.
Jan 6 20:13:02 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Backup canceled.
Jan 6 20:13:08 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Ejected Time Machine disk image.
Jan 6 20:13:08 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Compacting backup disk image to recover free space
Jan 6 20:13:30 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Completed backup disk image compaction
Jan 6 20:13:30 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Starting standard backup
Jan 6 20:13:30 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Network destination already mounted at: /Volumes/odysseus
Jan 6 20:13:33 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Disk image /Volumes/odysseus/Musa_002332d5c37e.sparsebundle mounted at: /Volumes/Backup of Musa
Jan 6 20:13:33 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Backing up to: /Volumes/Backup of Musa/Backups.backupdb
Jan 6 20:13:41 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Node requires deep traversal:/ reason:must scan subdirs|
Jan 6 20:19:36 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Starting pre-backup thinning: 72.07 GB requested (including padding), 58.57 GB available
Jan 6 20:20:38 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Deleted backup /Volumes/Backup of Musa/Backups.backupdb/Musa/2010-01-04-071252: 58.58 GB now available
Jan 6 20:20:38 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Removed all 1 expired backups, more space is needed - deleting oldest backups to make room
Jan 6 20:25:17 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Deleted backup /Volumes/Backup of Musa/Backups.backupdb/Musa/2009-07-31-231155: 60.81 GB now available
Jan 6 20:25:17 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Deleted 2 backups: oldest backup is now Aug 15, 2009
Jan 6 20:25:17 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Stopping backup.
Jan 6 20:25:20 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Backup canceled.
Jan 6 20:25:24 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Ejected Time Machine disk image.
Jan 6 20:25:24 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Compacting backup disk image to recover free space
Jan 6 20:26:39 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Completed backup disk image compaction
Jan 6 20:26:39 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Starting standard backup
Jan 6 20:26:39 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Network destination already mounted at: /Volumes/odysseus
Jan 6 20:26:41 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Disk image /Volumes/odysseus/Musa_002332d5c37e.sparsebundle mounted at: /Volumes/Backup of Musa
Jan 6 20:26:41 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Backing up to: /Volumes/Backup of Musa/Backups.backupdb
Jan 6 20:26:49 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Node requires deep traversal:/ reason:must scan subdirs|
Jan 6 20:32:46 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Starting pre-backup thinning: 72.07 GB requested (including padding), 60.81 GB available
Jan 6 20:32:46 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: No expired backups exist - deleting oldest backups to make room
Jan 6 20:47:38 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Deleted backup /Volumes/Backup of Musa/Backups.backupdb/Musa/2009-08-15-182619: 65.12 GB now available
Jan 6 20:47:38 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Deleted 1 backups: oldest backup is now Aug 25, 2009
Jan 6 20:47:38 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Stopping backup.
Jan 6 20:47:41 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Backup canceled.
Jan 6 20:47:47 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Ejected Time Machine disk image.
Jan 6 20:47:47 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Compacting backup disk image to recover free space
Jan 6 20:49:36 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Completed backup disk image compaction
Jan 6 20:49:36 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Starting standard backup
Jan 6 20:49:36 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Network destination already mounted at: /Volumes/odysseus
Jan 6 20:49:38 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Disk image /Volumes/odysseus/Musa_002332d5c37e.sparsebundle mounted at: /Volumes/Backup of Musa
Jan 6 20:49:38 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Backing up to: /Volumes/Backup of Musa/Backups.backupdb
Jan 6 20:49:46 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Node requires deep traversal:/ reason:must scan subdirs|
Jan 6 20:55:48 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Starting pre-backup thinning: 72.06 GB requested (including padding), 65.12 GB available
Jan 6 20:55:48 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: No expired backups exist - deleting oldest backups to make room
Jan 6 21:05:11 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Deleted backup /Volumes/Backup of Musa/Backups.backupdb/Musa/2009-08-25-185228: 67.32 GB now available
Jan 6 21:05:11 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Deleted 1 backups: oldest backup is now Sep 1, 2009
Jan 6 21:05:11 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Stopping backup.
Jan 6 21:05:13 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Backup canceled.
Jan 6 21:05:22 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Ejected Time Machine disk image.
Jan 6 21:05:22 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Compacting backup disk image to recover free space
Jan 6 21:06:45 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Completed backup disk image compaction
Jan 6 21:06:45 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Starting standard backup
Jan 6 21:06:45 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Network destination already mounted at: /Volumes/odysseus
Jan 6 21:06:48 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Disk image /Volumes/odysseus/Musa_002332d5c37e.sparsebundle mounted at: /Volumes/Backup of Musa
Jan 6 21:06:48 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Backing up to: /Volumes/Backup of Musa/Backups.backupdb
Jan 6 21:06:57 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Node requires deep traversal:/ reason:must scan subdirs|
Jan 6 21:12:57 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Starting pre-backup thinning: 72.06 GB requested (including padding), 67.32 GB available
Jan 6 21:12:57 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: No expired backups exist - deleting oldest backups to make room
Jan 6 21:25:51 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Deleted backup /Volumes/Backup of Musa/Backups.backupdb/Musa/2009-09-01-060212: 69.89 GB now available
Jan 6 21:25:51 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Deleted 1 backups: oldest backup is now Sep 8, 2009
Jan 6 21:25:51 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Stopping backup.
Jan 6 21:25:53 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Backup canceled.
Jan 6 21:26:00 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Ejected Time Machine disk image.
Jan 6 21:26:00 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Compacting backup disk image to recover free space
Jan 6 21:27:30 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Completed backup disk image compaction
Jan 6 21:27:30 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Starting standard backup
Jan 6 21:27:30 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Network destination already mounted at: /Volumes/odysseus
Jan 6 21:27:33 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Disk image /Volumes/odysseus/Musa_002332d5c37e.sparsebundle mounted at: /Volumes/Backup of Musa
Jan 6 21:27:33 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Backing up to: /Volumes/Backup of Musa/Backups.backupdb
Jan 6 21:27:41 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Node requires deep traversal:/ reason:must scan subdirs|
Jan 6 21:33:37 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Starting pre-backup thinning: 72.06 GB requested (including padding), 69.89 GB available
Jan 6 21:33:37 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: No expired backups exist - deleting oldest backups to make room
Jan 6 21:45:33 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Deleted backup /Volumes/Backup of Musa/Backups.backupdb/Musa/2009-09-08-081225: 72.34 GB now available
Jan 6 21:45:33 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Pre-backup thinning completed successfully: 1 backups were deleted
Jan 6 21:45:33 Musa com.apple.backupd[7571]: Backup date range was shortened: oldest backup is now Sep 15, 2009

Time Machine to Snow Leopard not working

Ok, so this issue appears to be multi-faceted so please bear with me as I try to fully explain what's happening.
I have a mid-2009 Macbook Pro with OSX 10.6.8, and I decided to give Yosemite a try since it was free. Before upgrading, I did a Time Machine backup on an external 500GB WD drive in case I wanted to switch back to Snow Leopard.
I did the upgrade, but wasn't very pleased with the results. Seeing as how the computer was older I figured it would slow down a touch, but what broke the deal was when I tried to run After Effects and had plugins - that never gave me trouble before - crashing. I decided to restore from Time Machine and rebooted into Recovery Mode. However, by accident I selected the External Drive with the backups as my boot disk. I quickly rebooted AGAIN and selected the Recovery drive, but the TM drive wasn't showing up when I tried to access it for the backup.
I rebooted back to Yosemite and found that the drive was not mounting despite lighting up and making spinny sounds. Disk Utility could see it but was unable to repair, so I used DiskWarrior instead. Everything seemed to work out ok and the drive was reading on my desktop as a TM backup. I rebooted AGAIN to recovery mode, selected the appropriate backup, and let the computer do it's work overnight.
When I woke up in the morning and checked in on it, I got an error message saying that the restoration had FAILED at some point along the way. I tried to reboot normally, but the grey screen of death would appear after a few seconds and I'd have to shut down.
I went back to Recovery mode, tried to access the TM drive, but once again it was not showing up! So I reinstalled Yosemite and was able to login to my desktop. The TM drive was still showing up, and according to a reinstalled DiskWarrior the drive was fine. I rebooted in Recovery, selected the TM backup, and it only took about 20 minutes before the restoration failed! This time the computer appeared to be wiped clean, with no OS.
Fortunately I still had my Snow Leopard install DVD, so I managed to reinstall it from there. However, now I CANNOT login. My username shows up but the password I've used for FOUR YEARS is constantly rejected. I can't even login to the GUEST account!
If you've made it this far, PLEASE HELP!!!!

Pondini - I have an issue too. And so I went to the troubleshooting tips you listed here and was not able to find a solution. Specifically, I don't get a message. I plain ole don't get nothing. After I installed Snow my first backup failed. Funny thing is the backup on my wifes computer also failed. She does not have an Intel Mac. It's a PowerBook G4. Hence no Snow Leopard there. I have a iMac 24 Aluminum. My Time Capsule backup worked fine until Snow. My TC is wired via ethernet. There is no latest date. When Time Machine backup starts the TM preference pane says it's "Making disk available" Something to that effect. And that's where it stays. If I then try to do anything with the preference panel - like close it - I find out the Preferences are not responding. So I force quit. I try to stop Time Machine backups and it's no good. The TM indicator - that little backwards running clock - in the menu bar just keeps on it's merry little way. The only way to stop it - shutdown. Strange thing is shutdown then refuses to - well, shutdown. I end up having to hold the power button for 5 seconds. I don't get error messages. I get nothing indicating what may be causing this problem. I have been searching these and other forums looking for an answer. I had hoped the user tips you listed would have a solution, but, alas, no. I deleted the timemachine plist in the "higher" library. No luck. I have powered down everything. No luck. Those were two ideas I saw that said they worked. So where do I go from here? Where do I look for error messages that will point me in the right direction? I'd appreciate any help from anybody.

Transfer time machine data (snow leopard) to new mb air (lion)

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