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Time Machine "Cleaning Up..." for the last 12 Hours

I have time machine set up since 2 months ago with my Iomega iX2-200 (that supports Time Machine by default). Everything was fine until 2 days ago when I got an error saying that time machine was unable to backup one of the regular hours backup.

Searching the internet i found that it appears this was a problem with spotlight trying to index the Time machine drive. after a couple of hours i was able to disable spotlight indexing of TM. and also removed the "backupdate.inprogress" file. Manually started time machine and was able to make a backup and usual.

The log of this backup was the following:

Starting standard backup
Attempting to mount network destination using URL: afp://stejimenez@Steorage.local/TimeMachine
Mounted network destination using URL: afp://stejimenez@Steorage.local/TimeMachine
Warning: Destination /Volumes/TimeMachine-1 does not support TM Lock Stealing
Warning: Destination /Volumes/TimeMachine-1 does not support Server Reply Cache
Disk image /Volumes/TimeMachine-1/Sterling-Jimenez-MacBook-Pro_0017f2c6a9c4.sparsebundle mounted at: /Volumes/Time Machine
Backing up to: /Volumes/Time Machine/Backups.backupdb
No pre-backup thinning needed: 707.6 MB requested (including padding), 222.90 GB available
Error: Flushing index to disk returned an error: 0
Copied 386 files (463 KB) from volume Macintosh HD.
Backup canceled.
Ejected Time Machine disk image.
Ejected Time Machine network volume.

But at the second automatic backup I Noticed that 4 hours later the little icon in the notification area was still moving. When checked it says "Cleaning Up..." and it has been there for the last 18 hours. I have noticed that it seems that TM is doing something in the iX2-200, The disk is constantly reading and writing. Its been 12 hours since the backup and "Cleaning Up...", and the log looks something like this:

Starting standard backup
Attempting to mount network destination using URL: afp://stejimenez@Steorage.local/TimeMachine
Mounted network destination using URL: afp://stejimenez@Steorage.local/TimeMachine
Warning: Destination /Volumes/TimeMachine-1 does not support TM Lock Stealing
Warning: Destination /Volumes/TimeMachine-1 does not support Server Reply Cache
Disk image /Volumes/TimeMachine-1/Sterling-Jimenez-MacBook-Pro_0017f2c6a9c4.sparsebundle mounted at: /Volumes/Time Machine
Backing up to: /Volumes/Time Machine/Backups.backupdb


Can anyone Help me?

How long Cleaning Up its supposed to Take?
Is This "Normal"?
What Should I do?

I have not used my Machine since the "Cleaning Up..." ; Im still waiting for it to finish.

Best Regards,

Sterling

Macbook Pro 17" 2.33GHz Core 2 Duo - Late 2006, Mac OS X (10.6.2), 2GB 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAM

Posted on Jan 24, 2010 11:48 AM

Reply
18 replies

Jan 24, 2010 1:06 PM in response to Stejimenez

Stejimenez wrote:
. . .
and also removed the "backupdate.inprogress" file.


Not good advice. Time Machine is designed to recover from a failed/cancelled/interrupted backup on it's own. Deleting things via the Finder can corrupt your backups. You need to repair them, per #A5 of the Time Machine - Troubleshooting *User Tip,* also at the top of this forum. That might solve the problems.

Warning: Destination /Volumes/TimeMachine-1 does not support TM Lock Stealing
Warning: Destination /Volumes/TimeMachine-1 does not support Server Reply Cache


That's a warning from Time Machine that your NAS does not support all the things that Time Machine needs in Snow Leopard. See if the maker has an update.

Error: Flushing index to disk returned an error: 0


More trouble talking to your NAS.

But at the second automatic backup I Noticed that 4 hours later the little icon in the notification area was still moving. When checked it says "Cleaning Up..." and it has been there for the last 18 hours. I have noticed that it seems that TM is doing something in the iX2-200, The disk is constantly reading and writing. Its been 12 hours since the backup and "Cleaning Up...",
. . .
How long Cleaning Up its supposed to Take?


Most of that phase is deleting expired backups, and should not take long. This may well be related to the problem caused by deleting the .InProgress file.

Cancel the backup and do the repair (just how you do that on your NAS, I can't say -- if Disk Utility sees the NAS, it may be able to repair your backups). Otherwise, check with the maker.

Jan 24, 2010 4:56 PM in response to Pondini

!! Thanks for your help !!

As you instructed, I stopped the "Cleaning Up..." and proceeded to repair The Sparcebundle in DiskUtility... Nothing Happened. TM is "Cleaning Up..."

After the repair I got "The volume Appears to be Ok." (Twice) and proceeded to make a backup only to find that Time Machine is doing "Cleaning Up..." for the last 2 Hours. Tried canceling time machine and now for the last Hour is "Cleaning Up..." and the "Stop Backing Up" option is grayed out.

My Nas (iX2-200) hard drives are running like crazy... I don't know what Time machine is doing but its sure moving a lot of data around. Since i have 2TB mirrored drives booth are working like ****.

I tried Restoring a 25GB file from a TM backup and the file restored fine. So the problem appears to be Backing up.

Also I originally deleted the "backupdate.inprogress" file because googling around the internet in the forums was the only solution to the problem i was originally having.

It did solved the problem, I has able to make 1 manual backup and on the automatic backup this "Cleaning Up..." thing came.

I have tried all the tricks on the Time Machine - Troubleshooting User and still no solution.

Can you think of something else?

Jan 24, 2010 5:22 PM in response to Stejimenez

Stejimenez wrote:
. . .
So the problem appears to be Backing up.


Strictly speaking, no, it's not the actual backup. It seems like it's a problem deleting expired backups.

Also I originally deleted the "backupdate.inprogress" file because googling around the internet in the forums was the only solution to the problem i was originally having.

It did solved the problem, I has able to make 1 manual backup and on the automatic backup this "Cleaning Up..." thing came.


It may not have solved the problem but made a new one!

I have tried all the tricks on the Time Machine - Troubleshooting User and still no solution.

Can you think of something else?


To confirm whether it's a problem deleting expired backups, go into the "Star Wars" display and note what recent backups are there. If there are any that were over 24 hours old at the time of the last backup, other than the first of each day, that's likely the problem.

You might also want to see if there are any other messages in your logs. If you're not familiar with the Console app, see #A1 in the Troubleshooting tip. About the 5th paragraph, starting "Use the Console app ..." shows how to view your system.log.

Navigate there to the date & time of the last hung backup. After the "Backing up to ..." message should be several others sent by the backupd process. Most of the other messages look like gibberish as they're info, etc., for developers.

You're looking for any messages from backupd about "thinning" and/or problems deleting backups.

You're also looking for any messages from other processes that might be related. Anything dire-sounding, like +failed, exited abnormally,+ or +unable to ..+ referencing anything to do with Time Machine, your network, or the NAS might be clues.

Copy and post anything that looks suspicious here, but do not post pages of stuff.

I still suspect that deleting the .inProgress file has damaged your backups, and you're going to have to delete them or erase the drive and start over; and/or that your NAS doesn't work properly with Time Machine.

Jan 24, 2010 7:15 PM in response to Pondini

Dear Pondini :

Thanks for your help... I just decided to do the last thing you proposed in your last post. I have just deleted the sparcebundle of the computer that was having problems with backup, Reseted Time Machine, Checked MBP Hard Disk, Repaired Permissions (Just in Case), and Resetup Time Machine.

Right now its doing the first backup a 160GB long backup. I know this will last all night. Tomorrow i will keep you posted about the results.

Best Regards,

Sterling

Jan 25, 2010 7:11 AM in response to Pondini

!! Everything Is Fine Now !! Thanks Pondini,

This is the log of the backup after deleting the sparcebudle file on NAS and resetting TM on MBP:
Starting standard backup

Attempting to mount network destination using URL: afp://stejimenez@Steorage.local/TimeMachine
Mounted network destination using URL: afp://stejimenez@Steorage.local/TimeMachine
Warning: Destination /Volumes/TimeMachine-1 does not support TM Lock Stealing
Warning: Destination /Volumes/TimeMachine-1 does not support Server Reply Cache
Disk image /Volumes/TimeMachine-1/Sterling-Jimenez-Macbook-Pro_0017f2c6a9c4.sparsebundle mounted at: /Volumes/Time Machine
Backing up to: /Volumes/Time Machine/Backups.backupdb
Backup content size: 154.5 GB excluded items size: 3.1 GB for volume Macintosh HD
No pre-backup thinning needed: 181.68 GB requested (including padding), 499.53 GB available
Waiting for index to be ready (101)
Copied 10.5 GB of 151.4 GB, 52279 of 799533 items
Copied 26.9 GB of 151.4 GB, 157445 of 799533 items
Copied 50.1 GB of 151.4 GB, 160352 of 799533 items
Copied 66.2 GB of 151.4 GB, 188970 of 799533 items
Copied 88.7 GB of 151.4 GB, 191475 of 799533 items
Copied 111.0 GB of 151.4 GB, 195790 of 799533 items
Copied 131.8 GB of 151.4 GB, 198720 of 799533 items
Copied 198869 files (149.0 GB) from volume Macintosh HD.
No pre-backup thinning needed: 743.4 MB requested (including padding), 348.82 GB available
Waiting for index to be ready (100)
Waiting for index to be ready (100)
Waiting for index to be ready (100)
Waiting for index to be ready (100)
Waiting for index to be ready (100)
Copied 1328 files (14.9 MB) from volume Macintosh HD.
Starting post-backup thinning
No post-back up thinning needed: no expired backups exist
Backup completed successfully.
Ejected Time Machine disk image.
Ejected Time Machine network volume.

After That the machine has made at least 4 automatic backups without incidents.

Again !!! Thanks Pondini !!!

Best Regards,

Feb 2, 2010 11:59 AM in response to Pondini

I'm encountering a similar problem so I figured I would just ask here before I make a new thread.

I'm on new Mac mini with Snow Leopard and I'm using a Western Digital External Hard drive for backup. It's been partitioned with half being used on my PC and the other half used for the Time Machine backup. It was working fine for a couple weeks and then the other day it started giving me the C3 error(an error occurred while...).

I got the Time Machine widget and disabled backing up Firefox, which seemed to be the first problem. It continued giving me the C3 error message so I disabled the Spotlight search which got it back on track again. At least it stopped having the C3 error.

Now it endlessly hangs while doing a backup. It says 'Cleaning up'. It's gone as long as 24 hours with no change in status. I end up turning my computer off eventually because it seems it'll never stop. The last backup was performed on Jan 27th and since has been endlessly cleaning up.

I've disabled putting the Hard drive to sleep, but it hasn't helped.
I've checked for drivers, and there is none.
I've tried different USB ports to no avail.
The external reads and writes fine from both the mac and pc.
Verify disc says it's OK.
I've done a repair disc and that too endlessly hangs. Last night it said 8 minutes remaining for about 6 hours until I canceled out and shut down.


Starting standard backup
Backing up to: /Volumes/Mac Backup/Backups.backupdb

Any suggestions or help are appreciated. Thanks.

Feb 2, 2010 12:17 PM in response to Doug E Fresh 91

Doug E Fresh 91 wrote:
. . .
Verify disc says it's OK.


Do you mean on your internal HD?

I've done a repair disc and that too endlessly hangs. Last night it said 8 minutes remaining for about 6 hours until I canceled out and shut down.


That's the problem (assuming it's your TM drive) -- your backups are corrupted.

Did it report any errors? You can still see them by starting up Disk Utility again, then clicking +Window > Show Log+ in the menubar. Each task is separated by a row of asterisks -- if it shows errors, copy a reasonable portion here.

If you have a heavy-duty 3rd-party +Disk Repair+ app, such as +*Disk Warrior,+* there's a chance it can repair the file system. Just be sure whatever you use is compatible with Snow Leopard (Disk Warrior 4.2, free upgrade from earlier versions).

If you don't have one, or don't want to buy one (DW is about $100), or it still can't fix your backups, you may need to erase the partition and let TM start fresh.

Feb 2, 2010 12:53 PM in response to Pondini

Thank you for your reply.

I did the verify disc on the external last night and it says the disc appears to be OK.

But when I do repair, it gets as far as this:
2010-02-01 19:42:58 -0600: Verify and Repair volume “disk1s1”
2010-02-01 19:42:58 -0600: Starting repair tool:
2010-02-01 19:42:59 -0600: Checking Journaled HFS Plus volume.
2010-02-01 19:42:59 -0600: Checking extents overflow file.
2010-02-01 19:42:59 -0600: Checking catalog file.
2010-02-01 19:43:21 -0600: Checking multi-linked files.
2010-02-01 19:43:23 -0600: Checking catalog hierarchy.
2010-02-01 19:43:50 -0600: Checking extended attributes file.
2010-02-01 19:44:26 -0600: Checking multi-linked directories.
2010-02-01 19:45:40 -0600: Checking volume bitmap.
2010-02-01 19:45:40 -0600: Checking volume information.
2010-02-01 19:45:40 -0600: The volume Mac Backup appears to be OK.
2010-02-01 19:45:40 -0600: Volume repair complete.2010-02-01 19:45:40 -0600: Updating boot support partitions for the volume as required.2010-02-01 20:10:14 -0600: Stopped by user
I stopped it last night after being stuck on 8mins for 6 hours. Should I just let it keep going?

The most recent disc utility log entry:
2010-02-02 14:39:19 -0600: Disk Utility started.

I don't see any errors. And that's where I am now... 'Cleaning up' since 10:30am this morning. I don't have any 3rd party apps to try. I've only had this computer for two months, so I'm still pretty new to the Mac OS.

I don't mind erasing the external if I have to reformat or whatever, I'm just not sure it'll make a difference as I don't see any errors.

Thanks for your help. If I have to buy a new external, so be it, I'd just like to be sure there's nothing I can do first.

Feb 2, 2010 1:41 PM in response to Pondini

The external Hard Drive:
Disk Description : WD 2500JB External Media
Total Capacity : 250.06 GB
Connection Bus : USB
Write Status : Read/Write
Connection Type : External
S.M.A.R.T. Status : Not supported
Partition Map Scheme : Master Boot Record

Mac Partition is Mac OS Extended (Journaled)
PC Partition is FAT32

I'm glad I'm not the only one puzzled by this. For all the tutorials I've read I'm just at a loss. When plugged into the PC everything seems fine and for the few years I've had this I've never had any problems. It is, however, an older My Book Hard Drive that I've had for quite a few years. It reads and writes fine, and as I type I can copy files to and from either partition.

Feb 2, 2010 2:03 PM in response to Doug E Fresh 91

Doug E Fresh 91 wrote:
. . .
Partition Map Scheme : Master Boot Record


Bingo.

In theory, Time Machine will back up this way, but it's not a native Apple setup. If you connect a drive with MBR to a Mac that doesn't have Time Machine set up, it will ask if you want to use it with Time Machine, and if you say yes, reformat it with the GUID Partition Map Scheme (APM on a PPC Mac).

I'm glad I'm not the only one puzzled by this. For all the tutorials I've read I'm just at a loss. When plugged into the PC everything seems fine and for the few years I've had this I've never had any problems. It is, however, an older My Book Hard Drive that I've had for quite a few years. It reads and writes fine, and as I type I can copy files to and from either partition.


I can't swear that's the problem, but if the drive is already a few years old, it may not have a great deal of life left in it anyway. Your best bet may be to get a new drive and format it for a Mac (see #5 in the Frequently Asked Questions *User Tip,* also at the top of this forum).

You could use it exclusively for Time Machine, or put a FAT partition on it to use with your PC as you're now doing with the old one.

Feb 2, 2010 2:25 PM in response to Pondini

OK, so are you suggesting I reformat with the GUID Partition Map Scheme? Just trying to clarify before I do anything as I don't understand 100% what you mean.

Is it that this is a PC hard drive so it's just not fully compatible? If so what do you think of this as a replacement?
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0019C4OLY/ref=s9simi_gw_p23_t1?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=center-2&pf_rd_r=1EEZSW7VZ2NDMBS655 9J&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=470938631&pf_rdi=507846

Feb 2, 2010 2:49 PM in response to Doug E Fresh 91

Doug E Fresh 91 wrote:
OK, so are you suggesting I reformat with the GUID Partition Map Scheme? Just trying to clarify before I do anything as I don't understand 100% what you mean.


You can't do that without erasing the drive. If you have enough room somewhere to copy the data from the FAT partition temporarily, you could do that.

Is it that this is a PC hard drive so it's just not fully compatible?


It's not the drive hardware itself, it's the way it was set up, with the +Master Boot Record+ *Partition Map Scheme.* That's the way most HDs come (since Windoze has most of the market). It's easy to change, but once there's data on it, you can't do it without erasing.

If so what do you think of this as a replacement?


I don't have any experience with that one, but it gets good reviews and should work fine. It will be faster, take less CPU, (and probably be more reliable) if connected via FireWire. (It's amazing how cheap huge drives have gotten in the last couple of years!)

Time Machine "Cleaning Up..." for the last 12 Hours

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