What causes time machine to just "spin"

I have a client whose time machine will sometimes just sit there spinning for hours... and not doing the backup.

You may not get any actual error messages.
If you haven't yet, download the Time Machine Buddy widget (item A1 in the Troubleshooting Guide) or use Console to see them.
Also take a look at items D1 and D2 there.

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"Open With" in Finder/Mail Causes Time Machine Disk to spin up

When Leopard builds a list of suitable applications for "Open With" it spins up the Time Machine disk.
This is bad for several reasons:
1) it slows down what used to be an almost instantaneous process
2) The list of applications contains some things twice (the /Applications copy and the Time machine copy)
I also noticed this when patching MS Office today, the installer asked me which copy to patch.
Anyone else seeing this behavior?

Yes I am seeing that as well. Annoying, and sometimes confusing, but doesn't seem to do any harm.
I haven't found any fixes for it either.

Why wont iPhoto read my library on my time capsule? just spins the color wheel!

why wont iPhoto read my library on my time capsule? just spins the color wheel!

A Time Capsule is a hardware device that can be used in may ways
Are you using it as an external drive? or as a Time Machine backup device?
If it is a TM bakcup then you can not directy access the files there - you use TM to restore them then use the
LN

What is Time-Machine doing with all that space?!!!

When I installed Leopard, I had about 750 GB of data on internal hard drives.
I set up Time-Machine to back-up to a 1.5 TB external hard drive.
I was certain that this was enough space to keep the program happy for a very long time.
But now, only two days later, time machine has left only 50 GB remaining on that external drive, and that number is decreasing rapidly.
So where did all the space go?
(BTW... I have not been manipulating or deleting any massive files since I initiated T.M.)
(BTW Again... for anyone who cares, I strongly suggest you look for a QUIET external drive for time machine, since it runs CONSTANTLY!!)

Mac FixIt has some advice on this problem:
"Time Machine slowness, fix Extremely large or frequently updated files (or worse, files that fall into both categories) can cause Time Machine spike in processor usage, resulting in slowness for other applications or the system in general. The simple solution is to exclude these files from Time Machine's backup routine. You can do this by navigating to the "Time Machine" pane of System Preferences, then clicking the "Options" button. This will bring up a "Do not back up:' dialog box. You can then click the small "+" button and choose folders or files you don't want Time Machine Backup.
Common culprits include:
Virtual Machine hard drive files, including those generated by Parallels and VMWare Fusion. Exclude these immediately.
Databases that are persistently accessed by some applications. For instance, Microsoft Entourage keeps a huge database file for mailboxes that is updated frequently."
I would assume that this would also result in bigger backups.
Sounds like you have another problem if you Time Machine drive runs constantly as you say. It should only do that on initial backup.

What is Time Machine really Backing Up?

I have two internal HD's one 750gig that has Leopard on it, & a second HD that is 500gigs.
I have Time Machine backing up everything. I have noticed this for some time now, & have watched it
very carefully what is new on my system this month, beside a few texted emails, I have nothing new, no new programs, no new photos or no new music or videos. So what is Time Machine backing up?
I plugged in my external HD & let Time Machine start backing up, it stated it was backing up 5.2gigs of WHAT! is my question.
Thanks

If you have photos, then editing any photos will also require an update. You didn't mention which email client you are using. Are you using VMWare or Parallels? To see what folders/files are being updated, you can try:
www.charlessoft.com/timetracker.zip

What is time machine and how i can use it

what is time machine and how i can use it ?

Hope you may find these articles helpful.
https://www.apple.com/support/timemachine/
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1427
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_Machine_(OS_X)
Best.

I have iOS 10.7.5 and if i update to Mountain lion 10.8.2 will i lose all my old applications i've purchased and other software i've downloaded? and what is time machine ?

I have iOS 10.7.5 and if i update to Mountain lion 10.8.2 will i lose all my old applications i've purchased and other software i've downloaded? and what is time machine ?

No. You will not lose any of the applications and data will be safe.
But make sure that you have working backup. This is very important.
Time Machine is the built-in backup software/application.
Best.

Can anyone tell me what this Time Machine error means? The network backup disk does not support the required AFP features?

Can anyone tell me what this Time Machine error means? The network backup disk does not support the required AFP features?

AFP - Apple Filing Protocol
The Network Attached Storage (NAS) that you are pointing Time Machine at does not have the features needed by Time Machine in order to do its Thing. Time Machine needs some specific features that are not typically available on generic networked storage devices.
There are manufactures that support the Mac OS X HFS+ file system formats and implement all the needed AFP protocol packets necessary so that they can be used with Time Machine, but apparently yours does not.
If you are not using a networked mounted volume for Time Machine, then more information will be needed about your Time Machine setup.

Lion time machine - external drive spin up causing apps to crash

I have a 1TB external drive set up for time machine backups on my 27" iMac running Lion 10.7.3 that seems to be causing my Adobe CS 5.5 suite of apps (photoshop in partiucular) to crash as the drive spins up. If an adobe application or lion/time machine is asking the drive to spin up I have no idea, but it seems random, and when it does, the adobe app(s) freeze and the beach ball from **** just spins. All other applications remain uneffected which leads me to believe it's related to a scratch disk function of some sort. I've googled high and low to find an scrap on insight into this issue and have found nothing...
Few questions:
• Why does the time machine external drive randomly spin up even though there are no backup processes running?
• Why would an adobe app would need to access an external drive?
Before anyone says it, I know I can always just eject the drives, but I'd rather keep my backups running for obvious reasons. If a complete wipe and install is the only solution recommended by the doctor, I will. It's just maddening to regularly loose work. Any help is greatly appreciated!
iMac: Mid 2010 27"
Processor 2.8 GHz Intel Core i5
Memory 8 GB 1333 MHz DDR3
Graphics ATI Radeon HD 5750 1024 MB
Software Mac OS X Lion 10.7.3 (11D50)
Adobe CS 5.5
Photoshop CS5 / v12.1 x64
Illustrator CS5 / v15.1.0
InDesign CS5.5 / v7.5.2
External Drives
Firewire800: 2TB Hitachi G-Drive: http://www.g-technology.com/products/g-drive.cfm
USB: 1TB Western Digital MyPassport 0730

Set the TM drive not to spin down, I think there is a setting in the system preferences.
Could be the G drive feature,
consider making option key bootable clone drives
Most commonly used backup methods explained

What is causing Time Machine to momentary freeze my system?

Every 60 minutes when time machine starts its backup routine my entire system momentarily freezes. Audio stops, cursor freezes, then a few moments later the system is running as usual. I have disabled drive sleep, display sleep. The backup drive is an internal drive. Memory is usually between 45% and 65% capacity - not maxed out. CPU usage is minimal. Most of the time I am programming, so this is happening during basic text editing, not during cpu/memory intensive audio/video/3d processing. I'm on a late 2008 mac pro with 10gigs of ram, and a new radeon 5770 video card. It was also happening with the stock video card that died on the reboot after I updated to 10.8.3 :-{.
3/27/13 8:10:42.488 PM com.apple.backupd[25861]: Starting automatic backup
3/27/13 8:10:43.076 PM com.apple.backupd[25861]: Backing up to: /Volumes/Spruce/Backups.backupdb
3/27/13 8:11:00.900 PM com.apple.backupd[25861]: Using file event preflight for Pine
3/27/13 8:11:01.090 PM com.apple.backupd[25861]: Will copy (4.1 MB) from Pine
3/27/13 8:11:01.092 PM com.apple.backupd[25861]: Found 117 files (4.1 MB) needing backup
3/27/13 8:11:01.113 PM com.apple.backupd[25861]: 1.04 GB required (including padding), 1.3 TB available
3/27/13 8:11:40.093 PM com.apple.backupd[25861]: Copied 4413 files (48.9 MB) from volume Pine.
3/27/13 8:11:40.119 PM com.apple.backupd[25861]: Using file event preflight for Pine
3/27/13 8:11:40.123 PM com.apple.backupd[25861]: Will copy (341 KB) from Pine
3/27/13 8:11:40.124 PM com.apple.backupd[25861]: Found 14 files (341 KB) needing backup
3/27/13 8:11:40.125 PM com.apple.backupd[25861]: 1.03 GB required (including padding), 1.3 TB available
3/27/13 8:11:42.876 PM mdworker[25875]: Unable to talk to lsboxd
3/27/13 8:11:43.000 PM kernel[0]: Sandbox: sandboxd(25876) deny mach-lookup com.apple.coresymbolicationd
3/27/13 8:11:44.725 PM sandboxd[25876]: ([25875]) mdworker(25875) deny mach-lookup com.apple.ls.boxd
3/27/13 8:11:46.272 PM com.apple.backupd[25861]: Copied 709 files (3.1 MB) from volume Pine.
3/27/13 8:11:46.886 PM com.apple.backupd[25861]: Created new backup: 2013-03-27-201146
3/27/13 8:11:48.315 PM com.apple.backupd[25861]: Starting post-backup thinning
3/27/13 8:11:55.958 PM com.apple.backupd[25861]: Deleted /Volumes/Spruce/Backups.backupdb/Pine/2013-03-26-191143 (17.8 MB)
3/27/13 8:11:55.958 PM com.apple.backupd[25861]: Post-back up thinning complete: 1 expired backups removed
3/27/13 8:11:56.095 PM com.apple.backupd[25861]: Backup completed successfully.
I beleive this has started since the 10.8.1 update. It is happening every hour on the hour so to speak - exactly when time machine is starting. It has become very intrusive - just in the middle of some important coding and then I'm frozen. I'd prefer to set a timer to take a break instead of being forced to do so!

The log shows nothing unusual.
Some "eco" or "green" drives may spin down when idle regardless of the Energy Saver setting. The application "KeepDriveSpinning" from developer Jon Stovell may help in that case, or there may be a way to change the behavior in the drive's firmware settings.

LaCie "Eco Mode" causing Time Machine problems

I just purchased a LaCie P'9231, which is advertised as an Apple Store Exclusive. I've been having problems with it and Time Machine and I'm starting to think its due to the Eco Mode feature. I'd rather have the HD on all the time and turn "Eco Mode" completely off and I've unchecked the "Put the Hard Disk to Sleep..." option in Energy Saver. Still I'm looking at it right in front of me in Eco Mode (so it didn't help). Any drivers to instal or are others experienceing this problem? Thank you so much!!!!

I just encountered essentially the same problem with a new LaCie "USB 3.0" 3-terabyte d2 drive (part of their new "v3" series). Although it's called the "USB 3.0" drive, it actually has ports for eSata, USB 2.0, USB 3.0, and Firewire 800 -- I use Firewire 800.
The manual says you can turn off Eco Mode using the LaCie Desktop Manager. I want it turned off because I have several drives and waiting for them to spin up one by one every time I use my Mac is unacceptable. Desktop Manager's Eco tab has a single button that takes you to the Energy Saver pane of System Preferences, where I always have the 'Put the Hard Disk to Sleep..." option turned off. The manual says this will stop the drive from spinning down in Eco Mode.
Nevertheless, the drive always spins down after a few minutes of inactivity. Worse, it will NOT spin back up when I open the drive's window or drag a file onto it. Instead, it freezes the Finder so that I can do nothing on my Mac -- among other things, I can't drag the drive icon to the trash to dismount it. I have to turn the drive off using its power switch, which of course brings up an alert telling me that doing this might damage the drive and instead I should dismount it first -- and then the Finder comes back to life. According to Desktop Manager, I could also set up the button on the front of the drive so that pushing it will cause the drive to spin back up. I haven't bothered to try that because I am unwilling to have to turn my devices on and off by pushing hardware buttons all the time.
LaCie tech support just sent me a message telling me that the drive is designed so that you cannot turn off Eco Mode. That is directly inconsistent with the manual, so I assume tech support means that they still don't have the firmware in the drive working right. They released a firmware update in late August that supposedly fixes a wake/sleep problem, but reading between the lines of the tech support messages I received, that apparently relates only to a problem when your Mac goes to sleep -- I have mine set so that it never sleeps.
Bottom line: unless and until LaCie revises the firmware to allow the drive to keep spinning all the time -- as advertised -- this product is essentially unusable to me.

Use ext. harddrive for time machine or just as additional storage?

I was wondering, given the problems some people have had with TM, should I maybe just use it to store stuff and free up space on my laptop, or can I use one drive for both my TM backups as well as additional storage?

Mark_Clemons wrote:
I was wondering, given the problems some people have had with TM
First, take what you read here with a grain (or large block) of salt. This is the ER for Time Machine, and no more representative of the average user's experience than your local bricks-and-mortar ER is of the health of your community. Second, most of the problems here are either misunderstandings of how TM works and how to use it; or hardware problems that would be the same with any backup app.
should I maybe just use it to store stuff and free up space on my laptop, or can I use one drive for both my TM backups as well as additional storage?
You can do both, but if you do, your best bet is to partition the drive so TM has it's own, exclusive partition. And TM can back-up the other partition. See item 5 in the +Frequently Asked Questions+ post at the top of this forum for instructions.
Still, this isn't a very good solution, as both the original and copies of those files will be on the same physical disk drive: when (not if) it fails, you may lose both. So you may want to archive those files to DVDs instead of (or in addition to) TM.

Time Machine: I just found out that my backups doesn't contain the Applications folder anymore!

I take backups manually, irregularly, with Time Machine. Sometimes twice or thrice a day, sometimes much more seldom, and I recently found out that none of my backups since early June contain the Applications folder anymore.
(This caused a bit of a crisis, since the new upgrade of 1Passport demands that you delete the old version first - and when trying to open the new version I get the message: File corrupt, download again (or something equivalent), over and over again. So now my only option seems to be to use a version from early June, without many of my new passwords).
I've searched all help foras I've found, without coming across this issue - and no, I have not put the Applications folder in Time Machine's omit-panel.
This problem has probably come into existence during an upgrade of OSX 10.8 in early June this year.
So, if anyone could help, I'd be very grateful. How can the Applications folder suddenly stop to be backup'ed - and what to do with it??
Sincerely,
John Fridlund
Oslo, Norway

I know of at least two things that can cause this.
1)
It may be working but you need to be patient.
When I look back in time at my Applications Folder it often looks blank.
I wait a minute or two and then it populates the folder.
So try this simple test.
> Go > Applications
> Enter Time Machine
Click back in time.
Go get a cup of coffee. Enjoy it for a minute or two.
2)
If the apps do not reappear when you are patient try this:
You may have parameters set that exclude the applications folder.
This happened to me once, even though I never set this parameter.
> System Preferences > Time Machine
Click on the padlock if it is closed.
> Options
Check if it is excluding any things other than the backup volume.
If so remove them by selecting them an clicking on the minus sign.
Run a backup and check that the applications were really backed up repeat the steps above.

What is time machine for?

Hi I'm new to mac and was wondering if someone could tell me what its good for.
is it just a program that helps backup my computer?

In addition, you might want to review these:
Time Machine Tutorial
Time Machine 101
How to back up and restore your files
Time Machine Features
Apple - Support - Mac OSX v10.5 Leopard Time Machine
and perhaps browse the Time Machine - Frequently Asked Questions *User Tip* at the top of this forum.

What is Time Machine actually doing?

During Time Machine backups, I always get curious as to what Time Machine is actually doing.
For example, towards the end of a backup, TM is "Cleaning up...". What does that mean? I didn't realise TM made a mess to begin with. And also, when I click "Stop Backing Up" whilst TM is cleaning up, the backup finishes a lot quicker, yet is considered a successful backup. Makes me think that "Cleaning up..." is an unnecessary part of the whole process.
Additionally, there is also this "Finalising backup..." message. What does that even mean? Once your finished cleaning up, surely there's nothing more to be done?
Just curious as to whether or not anybody has figured out what TM is actually doing.

Hi, and welcome to the forums.
The main things are converting the "in.Progress" package into an actual backup folder; deleting "expired" backups, if necessary; and finishing up the (hidden) log in each backup folder, updating the status, date of last backup, in various places.
If you cancel while it's deleting expired backups, it just skips that step, as it will get them the next time, so yes, that's considered a successful backup.
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), for a handy widget to display the backup messages from your logs.

What causes time machine to just "spin"

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