While searching in Time Machine, I'm seeing double of the files

While I do searches in time machine the finder shows two of every file it finds. It only does this for the month of December. Is it saving two of every file or is this just a glitch? I recently did an erase and install of Leopard and I think that could be a possible cause.

If you make an alias in OS X, it points to one item. In TM, it uses multiple pointers to the original. Get rid of one alias, and the rest still work. That's how it should be working.

Similar Messages

  • Hi, I have a macbook pro with a new hard drive installed. My WD external drive backup on time machine now wont let me access the files. I get a prompt saying 'you do not have permission to access the files'

    hi, I have a macbook pro with a new hard drive installed and restored. My WD external drive backup on time machine now wont let me access the files. I get a prompt saying 'you do not have permission to access the files' After my new drive was installed I plugged in time machine and it started backing up. I paused it when I realised that it was running for more than a few minutes. I now realise that it probably started backing up the new hard drive all over again. Which makes me think that the original back up must be on the WD back I cant seem to access it. Any ideas would be helpful.

    See E-10 in the first link.
    Time Machine Troubleshooting
    Time Machine Troubleshooting Problems

  • Time machine back-up has nothing in the files!!!

    My iMac 20 inch has just given up the ghost after 3 years and can't be repaired. I bought a new 24 inch iMac and planned to restore my files using the Time Machine back up I had from the old iMac. I have connected the hard drive to Airport Extreme and can see the Time Machine backups but the folders all seem to be aliases with nothing in them. What's happened and can I do anything about it?

    When you connect the drive to an Airport Extreme's USB port then you need to enable File Sharing or the drive will not be accessible to any computer using the router. Furthermore, using the drive in this way is not the same as having the drive connected directly to a computer. Using the AEBS is the same as using any NAS which means TM employs a different method of storing files. TM would be looking for a sparsebundle disc image file in which the actual files are stored. What you see in the TM backup folder are simply Unix hard links (a type of alias) to the actual data stored in the sparsebundle.
    If you used this drive connected to the AEBS, then TM will need to locate the sparsebundle. If it's gone or damaged, then the backup is lost.

  • Why is my Time Machine backup so much larger than the files being backed up?

    Mac Mini Server 10.7.1 on a 2011 Mac Mini Server
    Here are the drives on my system:
    Here are the items excluded from backup:
    Note that Server HD and Archive are the only non-excluded disks and the estimated backup size is 563.2 GB (this corresponds with the actual usage on those drives.
    However, when I run time machine, it keeps going until by 2TB backup drive is nearly full! And that's with only a single backup instance and nothing else on the drive:
    What's going on here??? If I don't backup the other external drive, the backup size doesn't blow up like this.

    Just to clarify, the reason why Time Machine backups are generally small is that TM makes extensive use of hard links.  symbolic links are small files that point to a different file system entry, while hard links point directly to the original file data on disk (hard links are  unintuitive - they are like having multiple doors into a room, except that you can place the doors anywhere you like and still get to the room).  So even though there may be dozens of backups of a disk, most of the backed-up items will only have one data source on disk, with only items that have changed needing new representations.
    I suspect that when you try to backup a time machine backup, it is converting the hard links into separate on-disk representations - basically taking every pointer to a given piece of on-disk data and creating a new file from it. I'm not sure if that would be a linear or geometric size increase (it sounds like the latter), but either way it's going to get ugly fairly fast.

  • Repartitioning a single drive from 2 partitions to 1 while maintaining a Time Machine backup

    This is a bit of a quirky situation and I had a very difficult time finding the right search terms to bring me anywhere close to an answer. I still don't have one.
    So here's the situation: I have an iMac hooked up to a 1TB external HDD via FireWire. Previously I had the HDD partitioned into 1 500GB partition for Time Machine and 1 1500GB partition for media files. I have since decided to move all my media back onto my internal HDD and would like to repartition the entire external HDD for use with Time Machine (as I will now have Time Machine backing up many of these media files as well) but I don't want to lose my existing backup history. I've seen the instructions for moving a Time Machine backup from one drive to another but how do I move a Time Machine backup off of an external HDD, reformat said drive from 2 partitions to 1, and move the backup back to it without disrupting the hard links?

    BacktwoBedlam wrote:
    The Time Machine backup is just an image
    No, it's a complex set of folders and files, intricately linked together with multiple hard links.
    Copying it to your internal HD will take a long time, if there's room for it; and emptying the trash after deleting it will take an extremely long time, and likely result in permissions and/or locked file problems.
    If you do have to copy the Backups.backupdb folder, copy it only to a separate partition so you can just erase it when done.
    See #18 in  Time Machine - Frequently Asked Questions for details.

  • Time machine doesn't see external hard drive on network

    I have a pair of external hard drives connected to my iMac, which is connected to my 2WIRE modem/router via Ethernet. I'm using one of them as a Time Machine drive. For the past couple years, I've been backing up the laptops in the house to that Time Machine drive without fail.
    Now none of the laptops (a MacBook and an iBook) won't see either external drive connected to the iMac, even though the iMac has file sharing turned on (as it always has) and both laptops are connected to the iMac via the Finder. Both laptops can see the iMac and the external drives connected to it via the Finder, but in Time Machine, when I try to select my Time Machine drive, nothing appears in the window.
    I was having a problem with the Time Machine drive and had to wipe and reformat it, but I don't understand why Time Machine won't see the other external drive either, even if there is a problem with the TM drive. I recall Time Machine picking up all available hard drives as possible backup destinations, as long as they're also seen in the Finder.
    The iMac has been having some OS X issues. The Finder will crash sometimes, and I have no choice but to hold down the power button to shut it down and then start it up. When it starts, it takes longer than it normally does, I assume because it's checking and/or fixing some things.  However, those issues have been going on for a long time (I think I need to reinstall OS X in it, since Disk Utility finds nothing wrong; also, the hard drive in the iMac crashed about 2 months ago and I put a new one in; I then restored the TM backup to it, and the OS X issues have persisted, which tells me it's software-related, not the drive).
    Also, the iMac backs up to the Time Machine drive just fine. Of course, the TM drive is connected to it locally, whereas the laptops have to get to that drive via wireless file sharing.
    I did try plugging one of the external hard drives on the iMac into my MacBook, and Time Machine saw it immediately, so my guess is the issue must lie with my router and/or the iMac, but I don't know what to check next.  I've restarted the iMac, I've restarted the laptops, I've turned TM on and off on the laptops, and I've turned file sharing on and off on the iMac; none of those things reestablished the connection.
    I suppose I could just go with external hard drives for the laptops, but my wife moves her iBook all over the house, so I know hers won't get backed up regularly. That was the nice thing about the system I had in place, which I realize wasn't as elegant as a Time Capsule.
    Any advice is appreciated.  Thanks.

    That should say "Now none of the laptops (a MacBook and an iBook) will see either external drive..."  I hate typos.
    Anyway, after rereading my post, I'm starting to think I just need to reinstall OS X on the iMac, given the other issues it's experiencing.  Any advice for doing that would be appreciated, if that's indeed the solution. Thanks.

  • I used time machine to restore on a formatted MAC. Now the HDD space has reduced by 100GB but I cannot see any of the files. How do I find and delete those 100GB data from the HDD?

    I used time machine to restore on a formatted MAC. Now the HDD space has reduced by 100GB but I cannot see any of the files. How do I find and delete those 100GB data from the HDD?

    dglenn9000 wrote:
    I created a new user account just to see if it was my user Library or if there was something wrong with my system. And the new user account is doing most of the same things so I will need to do a full restore anyway.
    Not necessarily. I'd suggest downloading and installing the "combo" update. That's a combination (thus the clever name) of all the updates to Leopard since it was first released, so installing it should fix anything that's gone wrong since then, such as with one of the normal "point" updates. Info and download available at: http://support.apple.com/downloads/MacOS_X_10_5_8_ComboUpdate Be sure to do a +Repair Permissions+ via Disk Utility (in your Applications/Utilities folder) afterwards.

  • Time Machine does not see a Time Capsule external drive

    Time Machine will not recognize an external drive attached to my Time Capsule, even though it did so last week. How do I get it working again?
    Until last week, I was using Time Machine to back up to a Verbatim 2 TB drive attached to a Time Capsule. It occasionally hung, requiring me to restart the Time Capsule in order to get backups working again, so I bought a Seagate 2 TB drive to replace the Verbatim in case the problem was a flaky drive. Now I can't get Time Machine to recognize either disk when the disk is attached to the Time Capsule.
    Both disks are formatted in Mac OS Extended (Journaled). Both disks work correctly when I attach them directly to my Mac. When I attach either disk to the Time Capsule, Airport Utility shows the external drive, shows that sharing is enabled, and I can even mount the Time Capsule with Finder and see the external disk with Finder. But when I try to Select Disk in Time Machine Preferences, whether or not the Time Capsule is mounted with Finder, Time Machine Preferences doesn't see the disk—the only choices of disk are My User Account on the Time Capsule, and Other Time Capsule.
    Restarting my Mac and restarting the Time Capsule does not help. Software and firmware updates are (and have been) up to date. I'm running OS X Mavericks 10.9.2 and Time Capsule version 7.6.4.
    To reiterate, this was working a week ago. How do I get it working again?

    If nothing in your configuration has changed, you can try plugging the disks one at a time directly into your mac, run Disk Utility and perform a Repair Disk. If any errors are displayed, rerun Repair Disk until there are none. Then try them back on the Time Capsule.

  • Time Machine won't see Windows Home Server 2011 Disk (NAS)

    Since upgrading too Mountian Lion, Time Machine doesn't see my NAS. The NAS is available in Lion, and Time Machine will back up to it. I have done the steps in HT4700 on the Mountian Lion mac, and it did work.
    I can manually mount the drives, and browse the files via the finder. Help please.

    Mcdonsco,
    Have you reviewed the logs on the computer you are trying to backup? What does it say in the console?

  • Time Machine does not see my external HD

    I would like to setup TM but it does not see my external HD, but I can see it on desktop in and finder. I can browse it. But time machine does not see it and forces me to use airport time capsule but I don't have it. Help please.

    What format is the external drive in?
    If it's formatted for Windows (either using the MBR partition table or using FAT/NTFS volumes) then Time Machine cannot back up to this disk.
    The disk needs to be formatted as Mac OS X Extended using either the APM or GPT partition tables.
    Life is complicated somewhat by the fact that the OS, in general, can read MBR/FAT drives, but they're not suitable for Time Machine (limitations in the disk formats prevent some of Time Machine's features from working).
    You can check the current partition map/disk format in Disk Utility.app - just select the disk on the left and the information will be displayed below. If the disk is using MBR and/or FAT then you'd need to reformat the drive in order to use it with Time Machine.

  • I migrated info from a hard drive to a new mac under time machine. It says I have shared files, but I don't see the old info on the new machine. Where do I look for it ? How do I make the old backup the base for my new macbook ?

    I migrated info from a hard drive to a new mac under time machine. It says I have shared files, but I don't see the old info on the new machine. Where do I look for it ? How do I make the old backup the basis for my new macbook ?
    The old OS was Mac X 10.5.8.   I think the new one is  10.7.2     Lion.

    Have a read here How do I set up a new Mac from an old one, its backups, or a PC?
    Stefan

  • HT3728 since Oct 25 my time capsule is not working properly. I enter the time machine to check my backups and the only thing I see is balck screen on every single day since I put it to work on my house. Any ideas on what's going on?

    I am having problems with my time capsule.
    It's not backing up... if I enter the time machine, all I see is a black page, any day I look, since the day I bought it.
    Was not like this before Oct 25...
    Any ideas on what's going on and what should I do to make it work again?

    Check the USB cable first to make sure that it is operating correctly on another connection.
    You may need to use a powered USB hub with the drive since the USB port on the Time Capsule is not a high powered port like you have on your Mac.
    You may need to use the powered hub even if the hard drive has its own external power supply.

  • When I open Time Machine all I see is the desktop. Where r the other folders?

    All I see are copies of desktops that were bacjed up on my time machine. I can only restore the desktop. Where can I find the rest of hard drive contents?

    See Here  How do I view or restore selected items?
    Video here   http://support.apple.com/kb/VI29

  • When i enter time machine with mail open can see past mail .  when i open iPhoto and enter time machine can not see past photos  have i got a problem  ????

    when i enter time machine with mail open can see past mail .  when i open iPhoto and enter time machine can not see past photos  have i got a problem  ????

    iPhoto '11: Restoring from Time Machine with iPhoto '11 (9.2 or later) and OS X Lion 10.7.2 (or later)

  • Time machine won't see my airdisk for i can't mount it

    hi,
    i can't use my lacie hard dirve that is hooked up to my airport extreme base station with the time machine.
    looking around the forums i understood that time machine only works with the drives that are mounted on the desktop. some apparently do that manually by clicking to it in finder, others use an automator app to automatically mount.
    but my problem is i can't mount the drive in anyways. clicking on it in finder wouldn't mount it on the desktop in may case: although i can browse it in finder it wouldn't appear on the desktop.
    since it never appears on the desktop i can't drag it to an automator app.
    does anyone have any solutions?

    TM may start a new backup sequence for any of a number of reasons. See #D3 in the Time Machine - Troubleshooting *User Tip* at the top of this forum.
    Click here to download the +Time Machine Buddy+ widget. It shows the messages from your logs for one TM backup run at a time, in a small window.
    Navigate to the first of the backup attempt that failed, copy and post the messages here. A clue should be lurking in there.
    i'd like to keep those backups because there's some important stuff in there.
    That's a curious comment. Have you been deleting things from your internal HD, relying on TM to keep it's copies archived?

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