Time Machine drive won't mount

[Rydawg96]

My Time Machine backup disk will not mount. When I plug it in, it does not appear on the desktop, it does nothing. When I go onto disk utility and click on the mount button, it does nothing. And when I try to run first aid, it's just stuck on this screen with the bar bouncing from left to right non stop. How do I fix this so my drive mounts?

 

[Rydawg96]

And just as luck has it, the drive finally mounted right as I hit submit on the post. Also got this message but it seems to be working now.

 

[russell_314]

If it’s more than three years old and you didn’t improperly disconnect it, you might want to consider a new drive. It might be ready to give up the ghost.

 

[gilby101]

Also got this message but it seems to be working now.

But it says "File system verify or repair failed". The repair ran, but not successfully.

In Disk Utility, make sure that in the menus you have enabled View > Show All Devices. Now you will see 1) the disk/drive, 2) inside that an APFS Container, and 3) inside that an APFS volume.

When using First Aid, do it three times - on the volume, the container and the device (in that order).

I don't really expect that to resolve your issue, but that is the correct sequence. Assuming the repair continues to fail, you are left with erasing the disk and starting a new TM backup.

But, like @russell_314, I would not trust the drive and would want to get a replacement.

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

I agree with #3: that drive is probably on the verge of conking and you were lucky to get it to mount again. I wouldn't trust it with any important data, particularly a backup. I'd immediately get a replacement drive.

If this is your ONLY backup drive, I suggest buying TWO drives of (BIG) size (usual recommendation is multiply total disc sizes (not total of what is stored on the discs now) you want to backup times at least 3 or 4) with one being used as a current attached TM drive and the other being a recent TM backup now stored safely offsite. Regularly rotate the two so the one offsite is always a relatively fresh backup. Why do you need TWO? Very common data destroyers like fire-flood-theft will be likely to take out BOTH the master files on the Mac AND the TM drive sitting near it. But one recent TM backup stored elsewhere can make you almost whole again after any such loss.

The key to success with this is that regular rotation. The longer you wait to rotate the 2 drives, the more data will not be recoverable from the offsite drive in a worst-case scenario.

If I want to just have some kind of faith that the Passport drive still has legs, I might reformat it and still not store anything important on it for the next few months to see how it does. Or I might make it a THIRD TM backup drive, considered long-term storage with less frequent "rotation" with the other two... like also backing up to what are otherwise retired drives that still work just for one more backup.