Problem with Time Machine and External Drives

[MACFAN1700]

Before you upgrade to Mavericks consider this.

I have not been able to get time machine to work properly after upgrade. I even tried throwing away most of my data (backed up elsewhere of course) and no luck. Time Machine either backs up very slowly or not at all. I also encountered problems where the backup would stop entirely when the compute went to sleep.

Also, and I know this is kind of an exotic set up, by I have a LaCie ESATA to Thunderbolt port adapter set up to a docked bare hard drive. This setup managed to destroy two Time Machine back-up disks. Disk read and write errors began to happen and eventually the drives were unusable. I was using this setup for months prior with no problems.

My machine in question is:

Model Name: iMac
Model Identifier: iMac13,2
Processor Name: Intel Core i7
Processor Speed: 3.4 GHz
Number of Processors: 1
Total Number of Cores: 4
L2 Cache (per Core): 256 KB
L3 Cache: 8 MB
Memory: 32 GB

Also note that I installed Mavericks on a mid-2010 MacBook Pro and I don't have the same problems with Time Machine. There is no Thunderbolt port on that machine so it is not possible to test there.

Apple was very helpful and tried to collect system data to help troubleshoot but that didn't work and in the end it was easier for me to kill the hard drive and reformat to Mountain Lion.

I would be very careful about installing this OS, especially if you have any kind of valuable data on it and you use Time Machine to back it up.

Time Machine works great and it has saved my life many times. Having it broken or in question was too much of a risk for me to take.

I would take a look at the Mavericks discussion group to see what kind of experience people report before you upgrade. I got so excited by "free" that I didn't wait and see before I installed.

 

[Fzang]

Strange. No problems here. MBA 2012 and using a USB 3 Seagate drive as Time Machine. It's even a partitioned drive, with only 1/4 being allotted for Time Machine, and it still works flawlessly, and very fast.

 

[iriejedi]

What external drive

I have the exact same problem - no backup since install of mavericks.

What is your external drive? I have Seagate Drive 4TB using firewire 800.

Drive works I can move files to it and load/open documents from the drive... but Time machine takes forever 'preparing backup' and it got to 4k out of ~800gb and just sat there.

I also notice ALOT of HD activity slowing down the machine.

 

[Baculo]

Another Time Machine problem

I am using a LaCie drive with Time Machine. I have not had any problems for several years using OS10.6 (except when I had to replace the drive). However, with a new iMac and OS10.8.5, I have had a similar experience as discussed above, including very slow backup times, freezing of my computer screen and absolutely glacial activity of the computer while Time Machine was trying to do a routine backup. Finally, the external drive was no longer visible on the desktop. After several attempts to get it back, including Disk Utility Repair Disk and Disk Warrior, that were unsuccessful, LaCie tech support suggested that files must have become corrupted and suggested erasing the drive with Disk Utility and starting over. That worked, the drive is functioning again and I was able to make another full Time Machine backup overnight. However, if I turn on Time Machine, and allow it to run normal backups, I get the same slow response, and freezing of the iMac while it tries to make a backup. If I turn off Time Machine, my iMac performs as expected.
Whats going on?

 

[squeakr]

Is there anything posted in the console while the time machine is executing to possibly point to the issue?