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Time Machine Error - backup too large

I haven't backup my Macbook Pro for more than 10 days. I was out of town for a week and then had to turn it in for repair to replace the faulty nvidia GPU (lost all display - see http://www.macrumors.com/2008/10/10/some-macbook-pros-affected-by-nvidia-gpu-fai lures/).

So I just picked it up from the repair facility and tried to backup and got this message:
"+This backup is too large for the backup volume. The backup requires 174.0 GB but only 106.3 GB are available.+

+To select a larger volume, or make the backup smaller by excluding files, open System Preferences and choose Time Machine.+"

My computer's hard drive is 200GB and my Time Machine is 500GB. Why doesn't it just do it's job and delete old backups to make space for the new backups? Does it no longer recognize that I have previously backed up my computer? I don't want to delete the sparsebundle and start all over.

Mark

2.2Ghz MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.5.8)

Posted on Aug 26, 2009 4:14 PM

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Posted on Aug 26, 2009 4:54 PM

musicelect wrote:
I haven't backup my Macbook Pro for more than 10 days. I was out of town for a week and then had to turn it in for repair to replace the faulty nvidia GPU


So I just picked it up from the repair facility and tried to backup and got this message:
"+This backup is too large for the backup volume. The backup requires 174.0 GB but only 106.3 GB are available.+


My computer's hard drive is 200GB and my Time Machine is 500GB. Why doesn't it just do it's job and delete old backups to make space for the new backups? Does it no longer recognize that I have previously backed up my computer? I don't want to delete the sparsebundle and start all over.


I think it's possible that enough of your computer was replaced that Time Machine no longer recognizes it as the same machine. In that case Time Machine may be trying to create an entirely new backup. One solution to that would be to reinitialize your Time Machine volume and start over.
16 replies
Question marked as Best reply

Aug 26, 2009 4:54 PM in response to musicelect

musicelect wrote:
I haven't backup my Macbook Pro for more than 10 days. I was out of town for a week and then had to turn it in for repair to replace the faulty nvidia GPU


So I just picked it up from the repair facility and tried to backup and got this message:
"+This backup is too large for the backup volume. The backup requires 174.0 GB but only 106.3 GB are available.+


My computer's hard drive is 200GB and my Time Machine is 500GB. Why doesn't it just do it's job and delete old backups to make space for the new backups? Does it no longer recognize that I have previously backed up my computer? I don't want to delete the sparsebundle and start all over.


I think it's possible that enough of your computer was replaced that Time Machine no longer recognizes it as the same machine. In that case Time Machine may be trying to create an entirely new backup. One solution to that would be to reinitialize your Time Machine volume and start over.

Aug 26, 2009 5:06 PM in response to William-Boyd-Jr

Thank you for your reply.

I've been playing around with it and trying to get it to backup. No dice. The Time Capsule won't let me Archive the backup to a USB drive either.

As proof that the Time Capsule no longer recognizes my computer I entered Time Machine and saw no history of backups. It only showed my information as it is right now.

I guess I'll have to re-initialize it.

Mark

Oct 17, 2009 1:19 PM in response to canadianehme

I am having this same problem. The exact text of the error message:

"This backup is too large for the backup volume. The backup requires 46.0 GB but only 40.9 GB are available. To select a larger volume, or make the backup smaller by excluding files, open System Preferences and choose Time Machine."

The Time Machine has never had problems deleting old backups when quantity got too large. Any idea what setting I can change in order to do this? Many thanks.

Oct 18, 2009 9:13 AM in response to GrantM37

GrantM37 wrote:
I am having this same problem. The exact text of the error message:

"This backup is too large for the backup volume. The backup requires 46.0 GB but only 40.9 GB are available. To select a larger volume, or make the backup smaller by excluding files, open System Preferences and choose Time Machine."

The Time Machine has never had problems deleting old backups when quantity got too large. Any idea what setting I can change in order to do this?


Did anything change regarding your computer or the method you use to connect to your backup volume?

Oct 18, 2009 8:39 PM in response to William-Boyd-Jr

Hi all,
I have the exact same issue. I regularly back up my iMac (it's on automatic) using my time capsule. Somehow, since yesterday it starts giving me the same error message as everyone else. It seems to loose it's ability to delete the older files and keep saying that my TC is too small for backup. Can someone from Apple actually help with this issue? Or did anyone else have any success in solving this on their own.

Update: This is extremely strange and concerning. My Time Machine no longer recognize my old backup on TC. I have not made any hardware changes or method for backing up my iMac. This is not good at all! Anyone else experience the same issue of loosing their older backup?

Message was edited by: Shadowgram

Oct 19, 2009 7:36 PM in response to musicelect

The same thing just happened to me, when I try to backup with Time Machine I get "The backup is too large for the backup disk" message. I did a restore yesterday and I think that's why I can't back up. When I enter Time Machine the only backup it shows is the one I did the restore from. I guess I'll have to re-intitialize the backup disk.

Oct 26, 2009 4:19 AM in response to Jack...

My Time Capsule has 167GB out of 500GB free. Worked perfectly for 6 Month now.
I had a "blue screen" a few days ago and had to shutdown and reboot the hard way.

Now Time Machine shown no backups and cant create new ones since disk is not big enough.
Strangely enough, Time Machine wants to backup 460GB even though my disk is only filled with 360GB...

Any thought on how I could tell Time Machine that this MacBook is the one it already knows ?
Or are all my backups gone ?

Dec 6, 2009 8:47 PM in response to billsharar

billsharar wrote:
I also have this problem after selecting the option to restore a new computer from a backup.


Hi, and welcome to the forums.

Do you mean you got a new Mac and restored the backups from an old one? If so, exactly how did you do that? If not, what do you mean?

I assumed I could continue using the backup with Time Machine on the new computer, but this does not work.


On Snow Leopard, you should get an option to make a new backup or "re-use" the old ones.

It tries to backup to a new name on the same volume.


Did you select the same volume in TM Preferences > Select Disk?

Has anyone successfully resolved this issue?


Yes, probably, but it varies depending on exactly what the situation is, and whether you're now on Leopard (per your profile) or Snow Leopard. So please clarify.

Have no Apple engineers helped?


This is a user-to-user forum. Apple does not monitor it for technical issues.

Jan 2, 2010 4:52 PM in response to Paris 92

Paris 92 wrote:
The day prior to this happening I happened to move a very large folder from my Desktop to my Documents Folder. So now I moved that folder back to my Desktop and now the Time Capsule works fine, as it previously did. Odd. For some reason relocating a very large file/folder seems to cause this issue.


Yes, Time Machine will back it up again, including all it's contents. This is because it maintains all the backups in the same structure as when the backup occurred. If you go into the "Star Wars" display and look at individual backups, you'll see each is a complete "snapshot" of the way your system was at the time of each backup, including "before" and "after" versions of the moved items.

But that's not likely the actual cause of the failure. If it happens again, see #C4 in the Time Machine - Troubleshooting *User Tip,* also at the top of the +Time Machine+ forum.

Time Machine Error - backup too large

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