Corrupted Time machine smartbundles

Question

Level 1

17 points

Corrupted Time machine smartbundles

I've run into this problem a few times in the past and it just happened again.

On my new MB Air (bought just before Christmas) I got a message saying that it had been unable to backup to my NAS for over 10 days because it could not connect to the disk. Backups to an external drive over USB have been working fine.

I noticed in the folder on my NAS where all three of the Macs in the house (my Air, my wife's Air and my iMac) store the sparsebundles that there was a sprasebundle dated 12/23/2022 for my Air and a second one dated 2/23/2023 in the folder's recycle subfolder. The other machines show recent backups completed.

I also checked the NAS system log and it noted a "system event" five days ago which would be after the last successful backup to the NAS. No other errors were in the log.

Time Machine continued to claim it could not connect to the disk. I manually mounted the folder to the desktpop, this often clears such errors. This time it did not. I restarted the Air, restarted the NAS and still nothing.

I am now starting a brand new full backup from scratch, luckily I don't have much on the Air's SSD so the progress bar shows it will take another three hours.

I've been using Time Machine for backups for many years, formerly to a Time Capsule that I retired two and a half years ago repalced by my Synology NAS which Ialso use as a media streamer. I know there have numerous cases where users have found Time Machine backups over a network can fail. I'm just curious if anyone has ever found a way to recover other than simply trashing the smartbundle and starting a fresh backup.

MacBook Air M1 2020 1TB SSD, 16GB RAM

Mac OS 12.6.3 (Monterey)

Synology DS220j NAS (16TB, SHR RAID)

MacBook Air (M1, 2020)

Posted on Mar 9, 2023 6:40 AM

Reply

Answer 1

Best reply

mudbucker Author

Level 1

17 points

Mar 10, 2023 9:50 AM in response to OrigamiFan1

Thanks, but the real problem is not the disk isn't there. It's that the smartbundle is somehow corrupted.

How do I know the disk is there? Because as a last resort I always mount the drive manually. So when TM complains it can't locate the disk, it's really lying ;) After removing the smartbundle TM just starts a new backup from scratch.

Starting from scratch is an annoyance, since it takes a few hours to complete even with less than 300GB on the system SSD. It gets more than annoying when the system disk has close to a terabyte on it. It also loses back history, so if I suddenly found out today that I needed TM to retrieve a file from a backup made any time prior to yesterday, that's no longer possible. It's also an annoyance that TM waits for days before letting me know that it hasn't been able to back up.

As I wrote, I have has this happen now and then but it's never been fatal, TM just happily starts a fresh smartbundle and all is well with the world. I appreciate how simple TM makes the backup process, this is really the only thing I'd like to find a fix for.

Reply

Answer 2

Mar 10, 2023 9:12 AM in response to mudbucker

Hi mudbucker,

Having not had run into the issue personally, for help with Time Machine backups not finding your disk a good place to start is the guide page here: If Time Machine on your Mac can’t find your backup disk

The following may also help:

Time Machine troubleshooting on Mac - Apple Support

If you can't back up or restore your Mac using Time Machine - Apple Support

If may help to also check the keychain access details are correct. What is Keychain Access on Mac?

Hopefully others may have additional helpful information. However, if the issue continues you can reach out to Apple Support directly to report it and further assist.

Contact - Official Apple Support

Contact Apple for support and service - Apple Support

Best.

Reply

Answer 3

Mar 10, 2023 12:33 PM in response to mudbucker

mudbucker, In that case, we recommend that you contact Apple Support directly so that they can work with you to find a solution. You can reach them by clicking here: Apple Support or calling the most local number in your region: Contact Apple for support and service - Apple Support Thank you for participating in the Apple Support Communities. Cheers!

Reply

Corrupted Time machine smartbundles

Similar questions