James Wittmer
Level 1 (93 points)
Desktops

Q: Why do my Time Machine backups take many hours?

I recently switched my external backup from a disc backup to a large flash drive.  Some of the Time Machine backups take many hours, sometimes all night or longer.  Typically the info on Time Machine Prefs will indicate large backups, as now "Backing up 39.6 of 89.7MB, with one hour remaining" (The flash drive is only about one quarter full.)  Is this normal for a flash drive backup?  Thanks.

iMac, OS X El Capitan (10.11.1)

Posted on Apr 25, 2016 10:31 AM

by Glenn Leblanc,Solvedanswer
Glenn Leblanc Glenn Leblanc
Level 6 (11,016 points)
Mac OS X
A:

That's very slow. I back up to my old Time Capsule on the network with 60Mb in less than 3 minutes from the time TM starts to finish. I did 90Gig in 1.5 hours. If you have another drive to test it with, I would. There may be something wrong with your flash drive, or there is something else going on that isn't right.

Posted on Apr 25, 2016 4:47 PM

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James Wittmer

Q: Why do my Time Machine backups take many hours?

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  • by Glenn Leblanc,

    Glenn Leblanc Glenn Leblanc Apr 25, 2016 10:36 AM in response to James Wittmer
    Level 6 (11,016 points)
    Mac OS X
    Apr 25, 2016 10:36 AM in response to James Wittmer

    How is the drive formatted? It should be Mac OS Extended Journaled.

  • by Old Toad,Helpful

    Old Toad Old Toad Apr 25, 2016 6:04 PM in response to James Wittmer
    Level 10 (141,115 points)
    Mac OS X
    Apr 25, 2016 6:04 PM in response to James Wittmer

    How is the flash drive connected? 

     

    Is this a large capacity thumb drive thats inserted into a USB port or a flash drive in an enclosure and connected by cable to your iMac?  If the former it will be slow.

    OTsig.png

  • by James Wittmer,Helpful

    James Wittmer James Wittmer Apr 25, 2016 6:04 PM in response to Glenn Leblanc
    Level 1 (93 points)
    Desktops
    Apr 25, 2016 6:04 PM in response to Glenn Leblanc

    It's a 500GB flash drive with only 150 GB used, with USB2.0 connection, so the slowness must be OK.  To go back to the first (Glenn's) question, is it still important it have the flash drive Extended Journaled, and if so, how do I find out and how do I accomplish this (or where can I find out)?  I'm totally unversed on the subject of journalling and the details of backing up in general. Thanks.

  • by Glenn Leblanc,

    Glenn Leblanc Glenn Leblanc Apr 25, 2016 11:19 AM in response to James Wittmer
    Level 6 (11,016 points)
    Mac OS X
    Apr 25, 2016 11:19 AM in response to James Wittmer

    Select the drive, right click on it and choose get info. Look at the format of the drive.

    Or open Disk Utility and look at how it's formatted.

     

    Backup disks you can use with Time Machine - Apple Support

  • by James Wittmer,

    James Wittmer James Wittmer Apr 25, 2016 11:35 AM in response to Glenn Leblanc
    Level 1 (93 points)
    Desktops
    Apr 25, 2016 11:35 AM in response to Glenn Leblanc

    Here's the Disc Utility info:  Time Machine Corsair 505.66GB USB External Physical Volume OS X Extended.  Sound OK?  (And thanks for the Time Machine-Apple Support ref.)

  • by Glenn Leblanc,

    Glenn Leblanc Glenn Leblanc Apr 25, 2016 11:41 AM in response to James Wittmer
    Level 6 (11,016 points)
    Mac OS X
    Apr 25, 2016 11:41 AM in response to James Wittmer

    Yes, it's the correct format. Is the usb drive connected directly to the usb on the computer, or maybe a hub. Try a different usb port. I can understand 60GB taking a long time to back up, but not 60 MB. That's a small amount of data and should be done in minutes.

  • by James Wittmer,

    James Wittmer James Wittmer Apr 25, 2016 2:41 PM in response to Glenn Leblanc
    Level 1 (93 points)
    Desktops
    Apr 25, 2016 2:41 PM in response to Glenn Leblanc

    Until I switched ports it took up to 11 minutes to back up 1 MB; after changing to another USB port it perhaps is somewhat faster, with the speed varying with the fastest time around 51/2 to 6 min per MB.  The Time Machine estimates for time remaining use about 1 MB per minute but this doesn't happen.  I can live with these times if you indicate that, given the hardware and software being in use, it seems to be functioning, albeit slowly.  Thanks.

  • by dialabrain,

    dialabrain dialabrain Apr 25, 2016 2:57 PM in response to James Wittmer
    Level 5 (6,216 points)
    Mac App Store
    Apr 25, 2016 2:57 PM in response to James Wittmer

    FWIW, I would be hesitant to use flash drives for Time Machine backups. I've had a couple fail for no apparent reason and I wasn't writing to them very often.

  • by Glenn Leblanc,Solvedanswer

    Glenn Leblanc Glenn Leblanc Apr 25, 2016 4:47 PM in response to James Wittmer
    Level 6 (11,016 points)
    Mac OS X
    Apr 25, 2016 4:47 PM in response to James Wittmer

    That's very slow. I back up to my old Time Capsule on the network with 60Mb in less than 3 minutes from the time TM starts to finish. I did 90Gig in 1.5 hours. If you have another drive to test it with, I would. There may be something wrong with your flash drive, or there is something else going on that isn't right.

  • by KimUserName,

    KimUserName KimUserName Apr 25, 2016 5:04 PM in response to James Wittmer
    Level 4 (1,400 points)
    Notebooks
    Apr 25, 2016 5:04 PM in response to James Wittmer

    Hi James:

     

    Flash drives are just extremely slow.

     

    Just as a test try copying a few large files to the flash drive.

    Now copy the same files to an external hard drive.

     

    Notice how much faster the external hard drive is.

     

    With the low cost of external hard drives, I would really recommend that you invest in one and use it, instead of the flash drive.

    If you are not concerned about your data and backups then by all means continue using the flash drive.

     

    Kim

  • by James Wittmer,

    James Wittmer James Wittmer Apr 25, 2016 5:18 PM in response to KimUserName
    Level 1 (93 points)
    Desktops
    Apr 25, 2016 5:18 PM in response to KimUserName

    Thanks for the info  I am concerned about backing up my data (pix, emails, and files mostly) but it doesn't matter how long it takes to back it all up. So I'm willing to stick with a slow flash drive backup as long as the backup occurs properly and I'm able to retrieve, and perhaps eventually, transfer the data. Will that still be the case with a slow flash drive process?

  • by KimUserName,

    KimUserName KimUserName Apr 25, 2016 5:29 PM in response to James Wittmer
    Level 4 (1,400 points)
    Notebooks
    Apr 25, 2016 5:29 PM in response to James Wittmer

    Hi James:

     

    I found this link. Maybe it will be helpful. http://www.engadget.com/2011/09/07/reasons-why-usb-thumb-drives-are-the-wrong-ch oice/

     

    Kim

  • by James Wittmer,

    James Wittmer James Wittmer Apr 25, 2016 6:10 PM in response to KimUserName
    Level 1 (93 points)
    Desktops
    Apr 25, 2016 6:10 PM in response to KimUserName

    Thanks!  Before I switched from disc drive backup, I asked several "experts", including a supervisor at Best Buy, who assured me a flash drive, if big enough, would be just fine and much less expensive.  I've tried to click the "Correct Answer" on your second note but it doesn't seem to take.  Anyway, Thanks!

  • by KimUserName,

    KimUserName KimUserName Apr 25, 2016 6:29 PM in response to James Wittmer
    Level 4 (1,400 points)
    Notebooks
    Apr 25, 2016 6:29 PM in response to James Wittmer

    Your welcome.

    Good to see you are making a backup before you need it.

     

    Your hard drive will fail, it is just a matter of when. So having a good backup will be the only thing that will save you.

    Also I'm not sure if you have investigated using something like Carbon Copy Cloner or Super Duper. These will make an exact bootable clone of your hard drive. If you have a hard drive failure, you will be able to boot from your external drive and continue working until you can repair the failure.

     

    Kim