How to create a network available drive

Aargh! Thought I was done bothering you, but I'm back with another issue. When I double click on the Sparse Bundle, it first said it was not mountable:

Then I waited and tried again a few times and it did mount, but then when I looked inside the folder, there was nothing. Odd. So I tried going into Time Machine. It took a while to load. I got this for about a minute.

When it did, I then got into Time Machine and it would not go back any further than right now. No other backups. That's the kind of thing that really worries me. Obviously one just expects it to work and it did work before, when it was directly connected to my computer, but I don't expect Time Capsule to be an issue since it's desgned to do exactly this. Yesterday, it would go back, by the way, so the back ups were there.

Sorry to be a pain.

Thanks. I will try that. Disappointing that a newly formatted drive with a brand new first backup would have this problem when I've never had it before. Is there some inherrent instability with using Time Capsule compared to directly connected? Do you find that using Time Capsule is just not as reliable, or am I just a bit unlucky here?

I get what you explain about it being a little more complicated, so clearly less bullet proof, but Apple sells a product, Time Capsule, precisely to do this, so it seems it should work. I am using it only through ethernet, by the way.

I can't see how the older TC should be an issue here as it is still supported. All my gear is older, so on that basis, I shouldn't be relying on anything. My wife's Imac is mid 2007 and it is backing up to the internal TC drive and in that case, it's working perfectly. Much less data, however, but the old internal TC drive and my wife's old Imac are doing exactly what I would expect. My late 2009 i7 Imac with much more data, saving to an external drive connected to the TC is not acting as expected. So I'm guessing that TC is less happy with a USB connected drive, or the amount of data over a network. Or it's just my luck.

I have now attached the drive directly and done a repair as you explain. The log report showed all OK. Not sure if it means it repaired and is now ok or did not find anything at all. Here's what it said exactly:

2013-06-20 11:33:11 -0700: Verify and Repair volume “Time Machine Backups”

2013-06-20 11:33:11 -0700: Starting repair tool:

2013-06-20 11:33:11 -0700: Checking file system2013-06-20 11:33:11 -0700: Checking Journaled HFS Plus volume.

2013-06-20 11:33:11 -0700: Detected a case-sensitive volume.

2013-06-20 11:33:11 -0700: Checking extents overflow file.

2013-06-20 11:33:11 -0700: Checking catalog file.

2013-06-20 11:33:59 -0700: Checking multi-linked files.

2013-06-20 11:34:00 -0700: Checking catalog hierarchy.

2013-06-20 11:35:30 -0700: Checking extended attributes file.

2013-06-20 11:36:25 -0700: Checking multi-linked directories.

2013-06-20 11:38:13 -0700: Checking volume bitmap.

2013-06-20 11:38:14 -0700: Checking volume information.

2013-06-20 11:38:14 -0700: The volume Time Machine Backups appears to be OK.

2013-06-20 11:38:14 -0700: Volume repair complete.2013-06-20 11:38:14 -0700: Updating boot support partitions for the volume as required.2013-06-20 11:38:15 -0700: Repair tool completed:

Does that mean I should just plug it back in now and see if it works, or should I reformat and do another full back up from scratch? Would prefer to avoid that, however, but if so, might try your trick for attaching it to the computer to speed it up.

Okay, so I plugged it back in and so far, so good. I do notice that going to look at the back ups is less responsive then when it was directly connected. Sounds like that might be normal. By the way, the 5 minutes scan might have been short becuase it was the second scan. I ran it once first. It took a little longer the first time, but I posted the log from the second one.

As regards the hardware age, as I mentioned before, I feel that apart from the internal drive, which is unrelated to this issue, I feel it's unlikely that the units age would be causing problems. I will report back about how the drive is functioning in a few days, unless I have another problem before that!

Cheers!

Okay, so reporting back already. Using an external drive, connected to my Time Capsule, for a backup is proving to be very unreliable, which is about the worst thing when you are wanting a safe back up. Right now, I am having the following issues:

• Takes ages to connect.
• When it finally does, it only has one back up. No incremental back ups from earlier.
• After restart, going into Time Machine, more back ups appear, but only one for each day.

Meanwhile, my wife's Imac is backing up to the internal drive on the TC and all works flawlessly. Exactly as I would expect. All the incrmental back ups there should be and no issue connecting (although it does take a bit longer than a directly connected drive). So if I did not have an external drive connected to the TC, I would surmise that the TC works perfectly. My issue is solely with regard to the external drive connected to the TC. My suspician is that using a drive connected to the TC is just not a good idea, despite the fact that it's supposed to be okay to do.

Now if Pondini is right and I am having issues because the TC is older, then a new one should work perfectly. That would surprise me, but it could be. I am going to order an Apple certified refurb of the 2TB model they are selling right now for a good deal. That way, I willl also have Apple support on it.

So if anyone (especially Pondini) has any thoughts on this, please let me know, but I will report back...