Backing up takes 1 hour+??

nojokews6 said:

i read all the posts and changed the option of never sending my crash reports and it still takes forever. it used to take 60 seconds but since i updated to 2.0.1 it takes forever.. is there something wrong? thanks in advance John

Click to expand...

Try a restore

I think I've encountered my longest backup.

It's now been 1 hour and 42 minutes, and the backup bar is only two 3rds full.

This is a 16gig 3G 2.0.1 with only 1.8gigs used, so why does it take this long?

My phone was shutdown and turned back on last night, where I only played Auroa Feint for the first time, then a little this morning before syncing the phone due to low battery. So the phone should have been pretty fresh and running well. I did a restore once a day or so after launch. The 2.0.1 update was done a few days ago.

Usually, backup is around 10-30 minutes for me.

I actually go a step further and keep the crash reports directory completely empty. This seems to have helped.

When my backup was stuck in the same place for about an hour, I just removed imy iPhone from the dock.

Worked perfectly and the second backup was super fast.

Now 2 hours, and the progress bar does seem to have moved since my last post, so it's not stuck stuck. It might go faster if I did try to restart it.

I actually go a step further and keep the crash reports directory completely empty. This seems to have helped.

Click to expand...

How do you find those on a PC?

Err something is not right with that...

I have 8 apps and 8+ GB of iTunes Media on my phone and it takes about a minute at most to backup.

Sad to say it but it might be time to visit Apple.

Same here

I have the exact same issue. It started with the upgrade from 2.0 to 2.01. It takes several hours to backup. Once it completes I can sync quickly / normally a few more times then a day or so later it takes the hour + to sync.

If it is only the actual backup that is taking you this long to sync, then try this code in Terminal Application to disable them:


This will have the iPhone automatically skip right over the backup part of the sync each time it is connected to the computer, and if you would like to backup again, then replace "true" in the last code with "false" or by using this code:


--credit goes to the guys over at Macworld in their most recent video podcast, here is the link to the online version of the podcast and the show notes that have the code in them:

Macworld Link

That sucks. On my iPhone it only takes 10 seconds.

nojokews6 said:

will a restore help at all? What could my problem be?

Click to expand...

I don't think that there is any real problem, as it seems to affect many if not most people. Try that code that I gave a few posts back, unless if you are on a PC in which case it would not work. The backup is for your apps and their stored information, so if you don't want to try my suggestion, then your next best bet would be to remove any apps from your device that you do not use regularly in a hope that it will speed up the backup time. But otherwise your only real choice is to wait it out until Apple gives out the next iPhone/iPod touch firmware update or an update to iTunes, one of those could make the backup time quicker, or make it backup less often (maybe every other day, once a week, or something like that).

TimothyB said:

Now 2 hours, and the progress bar does seem to have moved since my last post, so it's not stuck stuck. It might go faster if I did try to restart it.



How do you find those on a PC?

Click to expand...

Mine are here:

C:\Users\%username%\AppData\Roaming\Apple Computer\Logs\CrashReporter\MobileDevice\%nameofiphone%

Replace %username% with your Windows account name
Replace %nameofiphone% with the name you gave your device during setup

Since my aborted back-up that was taking 2 hours, I just tried again tonight, and It was over 2 hours again, with what seemed like another hour left.

I gave up and hit the small cancel button at the top of iTunes and now it's syncing.

I'm going to try and clear all the crash reports like someone suggested.

Mine takes forever as well. It started acting this way since 2.0 so I believe something in the OS isn't working quite right.

JML42691 said:

If it is only the actual backup that is taking you this long to sync, then try this code in Terminal Application to disable them:

Code:

defaults write com.apple.itunes DeviceBackupsDisabled -bool true

This will have the iPhone automatically skip right over the backup part of the sync each time it is connected to the computer, and if you would like to backup again, then replace "true" in the last code with "false" or by using this code:

Code:

defaults write com.apple.itunes DeviceBackupsDisabled -bool false

--credit goes to the guys over at Macworld in their most recent video podcast, here is the link to the online version of the podcast and the show notes that have the code in them:

Macworld Link

Click to expand...

Good job on posting this. I think this should be a sticky because I know a hell of a lot of people having this problem. I for one turned it off the moment I saw this "fix". I hope in 2.1 they fix this because it is very annoying.

TimothyB said:

I think I've encountered my longest backup.

It's now been 1 hour and 42 minutes, and the backup bar is only two 3rds full.

This is a 16gig 3G 2.0.1 with only 1.8gigs used, so why does it take this long?

Click to expand...

I have this same issue although I have 7 gigs worth of media on my iphone so I always thought that was the reason why mine took so long.

TimothyB said:

Usually, backup is around 10-30 minutes for me.

Click to expand...

i am sometimes able to back up in 5 minutes, but i restored my iphone and what i found out is that you can only restore from the full 2 hour backup that you did. luckily i roughed it out and let it back up for that long or else i would have lost a lot. all my short backups didn't even show up as options when restoring. so just as a warning, everyone should let their iphone backup for two hours occasionally so that you don't lose everything

Possible solution

Aloha everyone,

I had other issues as well as the long backup issue, but here's a possible solution.

1. In iTunes, leave the Sync Applications checked, but UNCHECK all individual applications. This will delete the apps from your iPhone, which may take a bit of time depending on the number of apps installed. It is important to get back to only a "stock" load.

2. Once that process is complete, unmount your iPhone (eject it from within iTunes and disconnect the syncing cable). Once completed, mount your iPhone again (connect the syncing cable) and get an initial "stock" backup, which should take between 1 and 2 minutes (but probably the former).

3. Now that your iPhone has its initial "stock" backup (ie., no 3rd party apps), add those apps still available in the App Store (I wouldn't add NetShare at this time, for example) and repeat step 2. This initial "fully loaded" backup will take a bit of time, once again depending on the number of apps now installed. For example, my initial "fully loaded" backup took right around 20 minutes (I currently have 47 apps loaded).

4. Once this backup has been completed, repeat step 2 once again and your backup should be between 1 and 2 minutes only. I'm not sure, but this seems to be an incremental backup only.

In other words, you will perform a total of three backups - once after all apps have been deleted, once again after the apps have been re-installed, and finally once again for incremental purposes. In other words, it appears that once the backup performed in step 3 has been completed, each subsequent backup in an incremental backup, vice the full backups we've all been experiencing.

Apparently some corruption occurs with either the 2.0.1 firmware or iTunes 7.7.1 - I'm not sure, but in addition to the long backup times, I also suffered deletion of all iPod content (audio and video) and the ability to run any 3rd party applications (including Apple's Remote app). My only solution, previously, had been to restore my iPhone as a new phone and literally start all over again. After doing quite a bit of troubleshooting and some internet research, I came across the the solution detailed above. It solved all of my issues as well as battery life. In other words, I've also seen much better battery life than before. I'm currently charging my iPhone to 100% now, in order to conduct yet another battery life test and will post screenshots later.

HawaiiMacAddict

HawaiiMacAddict said:

snip

Click to expand...

Or you could try the much easier and less complicated process that I suggested above.

Google it. You can run a terminal command to disable backups.

yea this backup has been worthless, i could retype all my numbers manually by the time a backup has completed if i ever needed to lol

bbplayer5 said:

Google it. You can run a terminal command to disable backups.

Click to expand...

This has already been posted in this thread, see the ninth post

--JML

cWeems said:

yea this backup has been worthless, i could retype all my numbers manually by the time a backup has completed if i ever needed to lol

Click to expand...

thats just retarded.

bbplayer5 said:

Google it. You can run a terminal command to disable backups.

Click to expand...

I think that was posted already, and I don't think you can do that for PC.

But, it only takes a second to click the cancel button during a back-up to allow the normal sync to follow. Or I hear sliding the lock button the phone does the same.