Time Machine Backup taking forever...stuck on 'Preparing Backup'

[Synergie]

Since I have upgraded to Lion I have noticed my Time Machine Backup is taking forever... like it's stuck on 'Preparing Backup'. Console in the system.log says that a Deep Scan is required due to subdirectories...

I've let it run now for over half an hour and it's still on Preparing Backup. This is the third time I have tried to do it. The other two times I had to shut my MBP because I had to leave (and take the laptop with me).

Does it usually take this long to prepare a backup when it needs to deep scan? (I don't have a HUGE amount of stuff on my HD...It's a 320 GB with roughly 250 GB free.

How long should I let it run for? The laptop is getting a tad warm in the process.

[HellDiverUK]

My first backup after upgrade took around 6 hours. I left it running overnight.

I'm only using 31GB of drive space on my machine.

[Synergie]

Originally Posted by HellDiverUK

My first backup after upgrade took around 6 hours. I left it running overnight.

I'm only using 31GB of drive space on my machine.

Well, mine was not progressing at all.... the backup got corrupted.... so I ended up having to delete the entire backup history (and along with it any chance of downgrading back to SL, mind you I'm mostly happy with Lion anyway) And I have started a brand new initial backup. It worked right away... it went from 'Preparing Backup' to 'Calculating Space' fairly quickly so I knew it was working this time. However, the estimate on how long to backup: roughly 5 days!!!! for only 75 GB of data! WOW! Glad I don't have more on here!

I couldn't remember how long my initial took before... but I don't remember it taking THAT long! My question is, is it ok for me to be using my MBP during the backing up process? And not that I intend to stop it mid-backup, but what happens if I lose connection briefly or have to shut the MBP down etc during the process? Will it append once it starts again or will it start all over??

[dcorban]

Using 11b wireless?

I just did a full TM backup last night with an external PATA USB drive. It took just under two hours for 120GB.

[cas85]

I just ran into the same problem as in the OP. I just deleted my Time Machine partition on my external and tried again and it worked immediately. I'm not really concerned about missing my SL backup as I didn't have much on there anyway. If I need to revert, I still have the SL install disc.

[Fraaaa]

I got a Time Capsule recently, and I regret a bit. I backed up 80GB in a day(on WiFi) when I first turned on. I still don't know if the local transfer affect my home connection usage or not. Also my TC is not my router. Anyone knows?

[Synergie]

Yes I am doing the backup over WiFi... I don't have a spare ethernet or firewire cable right now to hook up directly.

And the good news is the estimate has dropped down to 4 days in only a couple of hours, so as it progresses, it seems to be recalculating how much time is left for the backup and it seems to be dropping, so I hope that means it won't take nearly as long as it first predicted!!!

At least it's backing up!!! More than I can say for the previous SL running backup... something had to have corrupted it when it first tried to backup after the Lion upgrade.

Oh well.... I also have the SL disk too if need be (somewhere) but like I said I am mostly happy with Lion anyway. Only a few annoyances that I am finding workarounds for. And those aren't really stability / bug issues... just me being picky in how I used to organize stuff.

[cas85]

my first backup is 31GB and it's about done. It took about 35 mins using USB.

[Synergie]

Ok, I figured out my issue. When the estimate went up to 6 days I got fed up... cancelled it again. I then deleted the file it had started on my time capsule again in order to start from scratch again. I then rebooted my Time Capsule after turning off the guest network (after noticing I had 14 of my closest neighbours on my guest network!!!!! Seriously, I had a couple of PS3's, a blackberry, an iPad, a couple iPhones, and the rest computers!) I also rebooted my laptop just to be sure.

The entire backup took 2 hours total.... as an initial backup!!!!!

Moral of the story... if you are going to do an initial backup to your Time Capsule over WiFi, make sure you don't have 14 people hogging your bandwidth first!!!

Now it works great! I have my initial and its been updating the backups just fine since! So the slowness was not Lion.... but the initial corruption of my old long standing backup was. It was working fine before I upgraded

As a side note... anyone know where I can get the wallpaper they are using in the new Time Machine? The blue / pink starry background? I'd like to have it to use as wallpaper!

[fearofpop]

Originally Posted by Fraaaa

I got a Time Capsule recently, and I regret a bit. I backed up 80GB in a day(on WiFi) when I first turned on. I still don't know if the local transfer affect my home connection usage or not. Also my TC is not my router. Anyone knows?

You probably figured this out by now, but it shouldn't affect your home's usage. Internal traffic still uses the Ethernet and WiFi link and protocols (ie TCP/IP), but it is just a means of communicating, and not taking resources from the outside world (ie your internet service provider). You're only supposed to pay for communications between the eternal routers/switches and your home

[katewes]

Are people out there still having problems with Time Machine and Lion 10.7.5? When .5 came out, I read articles about this problem

http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-13727_7...10.7.5-update/

hence, I stayed at .5, however, recently Skydrive doesn't install on my Mac. The problem is it claims my drive is case-sensitive format, when it is not. Anyway, Microsoft claims the problem can be solved by upgrading to .5

But I hesitated to go to .5 because of the Time Machine error.

Any comments?

[katewes]

I found the answer. A few days after 10.7.5, Apple came out with a Supplemental Update to address this. Also, if you've downloaded a recent Combo Update for 10.7.5, this Supplemental update is included so there's no need for the update.

http://support.apple.com/kb/dl1599
http://support.apple.com/kb/dl1582

[ChrisTX]

Originally Posted by katewes

I found the answer. A few days after 10.7.5, Apple came out with a Supplemental Update to address this. Also, if you've downloaded a recent Combo Update for 10.7.5, this Supplemental update is included so there's no need for the update.

http://support.apple.com/kb/dl1599
http://support.apple.com/kb/dl1582

I saw this supplemental update, but I'm on 10.8.3 I'm still having insanely slow back ups. Any idea if this would work, or if there's a fix?

[katewes]

Originally Posted by ChrisTX

I saw this supplemental update, but I'm on 10.8.3 I'm still having insanely slow back ups. Any idea if this would work, or if there's a fix?

I'm not sure of this, but did your Time Machine backup file initially start off as a Lion TM-backup, which you then upgraded to Mountain Lion-TM backup? If so, that could be a source of a problem.

If you have an extra external drive, you might try creating a fresh backup solely created under Mountain Lion.

I have no idea if that'll solve your problem, but it's worth a try.

[ChrisTX]

Originally Posted by katewes

I'm not sure of this, but did your Time Machine backup file initially start off as a Lion TM-backup, which you then upgraded to Mountain Lion-TM backup? If so, that could be a source of a problem.

If you have an extra external drive, you might try creating a fresh backup solely created under Mountain Lion.

I have no idea if that'll solve your problem, but it's worth a try.

When I upgraded to mountain lion is when I started having the problem. And I will try creating a new backup under ML, and see what happens. Thanks!