Time Machine backups to WD My Book Live terribly slow

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Time Machine backups to WD My Book Live terribly slow

I got a Western Digital My Book Live for Christmas and have set it up to take Time Machine backups over my home Wifi network.

Unlike many other posts I've seen, my initial backup took a reasonable amount of time in my opinion. My initial backup was about 400 GB and it did it over night in about 12 hours. I did however plug my Macbook into my router via ethernet in hopes that would be faster (the My Book is also plugged into the same router via ethernet). This was 2-3 weeks ago.

Since then, I have set Time Machine to off as I use my Macbook at work each day and manually tell Time Machine to backup when I'm at home with my computer. I didn't want Time Machine to constantly have errors while looking for my backup disc when I was at work and not at home.

I have been trying to a manual backup all weekend now with no luck. I have approximately 5 GB to backup, and Time Machine is only backing up 50 MB an hour if that. I have even plugged in my computer via ethernet again.

Any ideas on how to speed this up? I've also read a lot about Spotlight indexing slowing TM down, but I don't think Spotlight is indexing right now.

MacBook Pro, OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.2), Non-unibody, 4 GB RAM, 2.2 GHz

Posted on Jan 12, 2013 1:29 PM

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Answer 1

Best reply

leroydouglas

Community+ 2024

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183,396 points

Jan 12, 2013 1:48 PM in response to Rick Wall

Rick Wall wrote:

Time Machine is only backing up 50 MB an hour if that.

Agreed that is crazy slow.

WD use to be problematic for Macs, is this still the case?

Did you you reformat the WD with the correct partitioning scheme and format ; and get rid of the proprietary backup software?

Also TimeMachine if left on, can take local snapshots, and maybe be a benefit to you.

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4878

http://support.apple.com/kb/PH11394

Does not answer your question I know.

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Answer 2

Rick Wall Author

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10 points

Jan 12, 2013 2:00 PM in response to leroydouglas

Thanks for the reply. I didn't change anything with the WD software. My basic understanding of it is that the WD software is necessary for the drive to function as a NAS drive. I'm not exclusively using it as a Time Machine backup disc - it's also delivering music and movies wirelessly to my Xbox, blu-ray player, phone, other computers, etc. I believe the drive has to have something installed on it to function like this.

My router has the option of plugging a drive into via USB, but I've tried that before with no luck. I had to have a Windows computer open connected to the drive in order to share the movies with my xbox for example.

I assume without the WD software, I won't be able to use it like that anymore so I just set the WD Time Machine settings to allow Time Machine backups and went at it.

I had no idea about the local snapshots though. I'll try leaving Time Machine on see how it goes.

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Answer 3

Rick Wall Author

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Jan 12, 2013 2:01 PM in response to leroydouglas

I also like that using the WD software I can access stored files over the internet from anywhere. So I really don't want to get rid of the software on it unless there's some sort of other software I could install on it that would handle all of the above and be more compatible with TM.

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Answer 4

Linc Davis

Level 10

209,535 points

Jan 12, 2013 2:31 PM in response to Rick Wall

Backing up to a network device other than a Time Capsule or another Mac is unsupported by Apple, and in my view, unsafe. If it doesn't work, your only recourse is to the device vendor, which will blame Apple. Apple will blame the vendor.

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Answer 5

Rick Wall Author

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Jan 12, 2013 2:53 PM in response to Linc Davis

What's the reason that a non-Apple NAS is unsafe vs. a non-Apple external drive?

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Answer 6

Linc Davis

Level 10

209,535 points

Jan 12, 2013 3:09 PM in response to Rick Wall

Time Machine has special requirements that have to met by the file server. It's up to the device vendor to meet those requirements. You have no assurance that they've actually done it, and reports on this site suggest that some, at least, do not.

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Answer 7

Rick Wall Author

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10 points

Jan 13, 2013 12:00 PM in response to Rick Wall

I reset the drive and my computer a couple of times and everything returned to normal. I also disabled the drive's "Eco" sleep function so the drive never sleeps - not sure if this is important or not.

I also received an error message at one point stating that the TM backup image was in use. After some quick Googling, I found out that if you have the drive open in Finder it can cause this problem. I then made sure to eject/disconnect from the drive in Finder before telling TM to backup. Perhaps I still had the drive connected before - but not specifically the TM backup share - and that caused it to slow down.

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Answer 8

Ruadh2

Level 1

16 points

Jan 25, 2013 1:48 AM in response to Linc Davis

The WD website says that it is now compatible http://wdc.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/3561/~/using-a-wd-network-drive- with-apple-time-machine-backups with Time Machine. This forum post-dates the WD posting. Did anybody use the WD update?

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Answer 9

Rick Wall Author

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10 points

Jan 25, 2013 5:51 AM in response to Ruadh2

My OS and the WD firmware were completely up to date if that's what you're asking.

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Answer 10

Ruadh2

Level 1

16 points

Jan 26, 2013 12:11 PM in response to Rick Wall

Yes, that's what I meant, but also that you were using WD's current recommended settings . I was just wanting to confirm that this drive's many documented problems had now been fixed, as it seems to have lots of potential. I guess if you're still having problems (albeit resolved) with the latest updates, then, in considering purchase, I'd need to allow for lots of time to fix issues.

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Answer 11

ARI-Boy

Level 1

13 points

Feb 23, 2013 7:41 AM in response to Rick Wall

Rick, are you able to say what version of the firmware you are running on the WD My Book Live?

I've seen a few topics on these forums, discussing various issues with 'My Book Live' and Time Machine (the primary use I want it for) so I'm therefore currently wary of buying this device – although it looks perfect for my needs, and is substantially cheaper than the crazily priced Time Capsule.

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Answer 12

Rick Wall Author

Level 1

10 points

Feb 23, 2013 8:59 AM in response to ARI-Boy

The drive has been working flawlessly since Jan. 13. I'm still not 100% sure this is a good device for Time Machine backups though. It could be a complete fluke that mine didn't work right at first or it could be a complete fluke that it's working right now. It's still been very useful to me regardless, and I think it's a great product. As far as I can tell, it's the best non-Apple Time Machine device available. I think the problems are mostly that Apple doesn't make it easy to use a non-Apple device not anything with Western Digital.

As far as firmware goes, I believe my device is running the most current firmware as I checked for updates just a week ago. I can't confirm this though as I'm currently at work.

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Answer 13

1234!

Level 1

0 points

May 11, 2013 2:43 AM in response to Rick Wall

I believe its because you are logging in Time Machine as Guest...

**Dont log in as guest

Try again. Remove the Backup Disc>Turn Time Machine Off Then On.

Login to the WD Drive as Registered User: Username admin Password: There isnt one...

hope this helps

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Answer 14

Jun 1, 2013 2:38 AM in response to 1234!

I am researching why my Mac olways hangs and hogs disk for some 15 or 20 seconds before the TM backup ...

What I suspect is, that the MyBook life solves the problem of wrong disk format by creating a disk image on the backup share. Now each time TM wants to back up it needs to mount the disk image on the MyBook live share ...

Could that be the problem? And do you see it as solvable? I gather one can not format the share in a different format, can one? Probably the MBL OS can not handle a mac partition or could there be a separate Mac partition created?

Or is it maybe checksum verification?

I certainly would need someone technically better skilled to help with this anoying occurance ...

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Answer 15

Ruadh2

Level 1

16 points

Jun 10, 2013 8:03 AM in response to Rick Wall

I think you're right about the flukey nature of this product. Let me tell my story...

After some consideration of the of the risks, as pointed out in this forum, I went and bought myself a My Book Live.

I installed it as per instructions (including using the Guest login, not Admin, as others advise here). I'm using ethernet for the initial backups, through a 10/100 Thomson router (not gigabit).

First up, all went well, as I backed up my iMac using Time Machine. Here's a chartwhich shows how it progressed. The backup progressed consistently at between 50 and 70 Mb/s, settling on 60Mb/s for most of the time. (That's about 27GB per hour, and the whole c. 400GB completed in less than 16 hours.) The red line on the chart shows the consistent way the time to complete fell as the backup progressed. I'm sure I could have done better with a gigabit switch, better cables etc, but that's manageable.

Second up, I backed up my wife's MacBook Pro. This story was completely different, as the chart shows. Only 108GB to backup so should be easy. However, the backup started at 24Mb/s, about a third of the previous rate. Okay, well it's a quarter of the size of the iMac backup, so maybe it will take about 10 or 12 hours? No, not at all, as each hour went by the speed got slower and the time to complete the remaining data (red line) blew out until it was 160 hours at the half way point! That is, it was going to take 1000% more time to complete half the backup than it was going to take to do the whole backup initially.

What's interesting is that the CPU was on the MacBook pro was never overloaded, only taking up 6-7% throughout. Although, of course, it could be the CPU in the My Book that's the block. Also, the peak transfer rate in the activity monitor was often at 7MB/s (say 60 Mb/s) or about where the previous backup was at consistently. However, there seemed to be long periods where little or no data was transferred.

There seems to be major issues, not just with My Book Live and Time Machine, but with Time Machine in general. As for the reasons here, I started with these error messages...

XXXXs-MacBook-Pro UserEventAgent[11]: com.apple.backupd-auto launchd job enabled
XXXXs-MacBook-Pro UserEventAgent[11]: com.apple.backupd-wake launchd job enabled
XXXXs-MacBook-Pro UserEventAgent[11]: com.apple.backupd-attach launchd job enabled
XXXXs-MacBook-Pro mds[61]: (Error) Volume: Could not find requested backup type:2 for volume
XXXXs-MacBook-Pro com.apple.backupd[720]: Starting standard backup
XXXXs-MacBook-Pro com.apple.backupd[720]: Attempting to mount network destination URL: afp://;AUTH=No%20User%20Authent@MyBookLive.local/TimeMachine
XXXXs-MacBook-Pro com.apple.backupd[720]: Mounted network destination at mountpoint: /Volumes/TimeMachine using URL: afp://;AUTH=No%20User%20Authent@MyBookLive.local/TimeMachine
XXXXs-MacBook-Pro com.apple.backupd[720]: Creating disk image /Volumes/TimeMachine/XXXX’s MacBook Pro.sparsebundle
XXXXs-MacBook-Pro com.apple.backupd[720]: diskimages-helper:
XXXXs-MacBook-Pro com.apple.backupd[720]: DI_kextDriveDisconnect returned 268435459 ((ipc/send) invalid destination port).
XXXXs-MacBook-Pro com.apple.backupd[720]: Failed to hide extension on /Volumes/TimeMachine/XXXX’s MacBook Pro.sparsebundle, error: Error Domain=NSCocoaErrorDomain Code=4 "The file “XXXX’s MacBook Pro.sparsebundle” doesn’t exist." UserInfo=0x109a20430 {NSURL=file://localhost/Volumes/TimeMachine/XXXX%E2%80%99s%20MacBook%20Pro.spar sebundle/, NSFilePath=/Volumes/TimeMachine/XXXX’s MacBook Pro.sparsebundle, NSUnderlyingError=0x109a01e60 "The operation couldn’t be completed. No such file or directory"}.
XXXXs-MacBook-Pro com.apple.backupd[720]: QUICKCHECK ONLY; FILESYSTEM CLEAN
XXXXs-MacBook-Pro fseventsd[17]: could not open <</Volumes/Time Machine Backups/.fseventsd/fseventsd-uuid>> (No such file or directory)
XXXXs-MacBook-Pro fseventsd[17]: log dir: /Volumes/Time Machine Backups/.fseventsd getting new uuid: 95ACD723-EAA7-4867-A63F-362553905EED
XXXXs-MacBook-Pro com.apple.backupd[720]: Disk image /Volumes/TimeMachine/XXXX’s MacBook Pro.sparsebundle mounted at: /Volumes/Time Machine Backups
XXXXs-MacBook-Pro com.apple.backupd[720]: Backing up to: /Volumes/Time Machine Backups/Backups.backupdb
XXXXs-MacBook-Pro com.apple.backupd[720]: Ownership is disabled on the backup destination volume. Enabling.
XXXXs-MacBook-Pro com.apple.backupd[720]: Backup content size: 113.5 GB excluded items size: 5.6 GB for volume Macintosh HD
XXXXs-MacBook-Pro com.apple.backupd[720]: 129.57 GB required (including padding), 2.36 TB available
XXXXs-MacBook-Pro mds[61]: (Error) Volume: Could not find requested backup type:1 for volume
XXXXs-MacBook-Pro com.apple.backupd[720]: Waiting for index to be ready (101)

The backup then began, with the 24Mb/s start. After about three hours of increasingly slower transfers, it then gave some more error messages.

XXXXs-MacBook-Pro mds[61]: (/Volumes/Time Machine Backups/.Spotlight-V100/Store-V2/734EC8D6-7A26-476B-BC6F-70A9A774A529)(Error) IndexStore in bool setLocalizedAttributesLocked(datastore_info*, db_obj**, const __CFString**, const __CFDictionary**, CFIndex, StoreOptions, const __CFDictionary*, bool, bool, const __CFArray*):Error:7 setting field:com_apple_system_prefs_keywords for oid:466441

XXXXs-MacBook-Pro mds[61]: (/Volumes/Time Machine Backups/.Spotlight-V100/Store-V2/734EC8D6-7A26-476B-BC6F-70A9A774A529)(Error) IndexStore in bool setLocalizedAttributesLocked(datastore_info*, db_obj**, const __CFString**, const __CFDictionary**, CFIndex, StoreOptions, const __CFDictionary*, bool, bool, const __CFArray*):Error:7 setting field:com_apple_system_prefs_keywords for oid:470259

XXXXs-MacBook-Pro mds[61]: (/Volumes/Time Machine Backups/.Spotlight-V100/Store-V2/734EC8D6-7A26-476B-BC6F-70A9A774A529)(Error) IndexStore in bool setLocalizedAttributesLocked(datastore_info*, db_obj**, const __CFString**, const __CFDictionary**, CFIndex, StoreOptions, const __CFDictionary*, bool, bool, const __CFArray*):Error:7 setting field:com_apple_system_prefs_keywords for oid:471682

XXXXs-MacBook-Pro mds[61]: (/Volumes/Time Machine Backups/.Spotlight-V100/Store-V2/734EC8D6-7A26-476B-BC6F-70A9A774A529)(Error) IndexStore in bool setLocalizedAttributesLocked(datastore_info*, db_obj**, const __CFString**, const __CFDictionary**, CFIndex, StoreOptions, const __CFDictionary*, bool, bool, const __CFArray*):Error:7 setting field:com_apple_system_prefs_keywords for oid:472988

XXXXs-MacBook-Pro com.apple.backupd[720]

XXXXs-MacBook-Pro mds[61]: (/Volumes/Time Machine Backups/.Spotlight-V100/Store-V2/734EC8D6-7A26-476B-BC6F-70A9A774A529)(Error) IndexStore in bool setLocalizedAttributesLocked(datastore_info*, db_obj**, const __CFString**, const __CFDictionary**, CFIndex, StoreOptions, const __CFDictionary*, bool, bool, const __CFArray*):Error:7 setting field:com_apple_system_prefs_keywords for oid:476278

This appears to be problem with the indexing, but means nothing to me. Then the backup began again, and continued as before (see chart), and is still going two days later!

Any thoughts welcome, but not particularly hopefull given the many threads lacking solutions. Glad I've got SuperDuper as well!

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