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Level 1

5 points

Keep getting Time Machine backup failure

4TB Hard Drive plugged direct into iMac on a USB port, with iMac running OSX 10.8.5, (3.06 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo with 8GB memory)

All worked fine for months.

For the last few days, Time Machine backup fails every time it's scheduled or I try to run it manually with the following error:

Time Machine couldn't complete the backup to "TIME MACHINE".

Unable to complete backup. An error occurred while creating the backup folder

This is the error message the Time Machine widget displays:

Backing up to: /Volumes/TIME MACHINE/Backups.backupdb

Error: (22) setxattr for key:com.apple.backupd.HostUUID path:/Volumes/TIME MACHINE/Backups.backupdb/CTN iMac size:37

Backup failed with error: 2

Tried the obvious reboot, repair disk permissions and repair disk but still the failure returns.

Any suggestions???

iMac, OS X Mountain Lion, 3.06 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo 8GB RAM

Posted on Oct 1, 2013 3:28 AM

Best reply

Joe Gramm

Level 5

6,407 points

Posted on Oct 1, 2013 4:53 AM

This has helped me in the past. Full reset of Time Machine

View in context

17 replies

Dec 24, 2016 12:02 PM in response to CNix London

Time Machine stopped working for me. Deleting the partition on the backup drive and then recreating the partition fixed the problem.

Simply erasing the partition (as opposed to actually deleting / removing the partition) was not enough in my situation.

TM wasn't reporting any errors; it merely stalled for days and days without progressing.

Hope this helps somebody with a similar problem. This specific remedy did not appear in any of the sources I had consulted, so I am posting it here for the community.

Aug 26, 2017 11:39 AM in response to Joe Gramm

Thanks! Old post just helped me 8/26/17

Keep getting Time Machine backup failure