Time Capsule filling

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Level 1

8 points

Time Capsule filling

I have a 2nd Gen 1 Tb Time Capsule, model A1302. It's sole purpose (in addition to being my main router) is to back up 3 machines: an mid 2010 MacBook Air, a mid 2012 MacBook Pro and a late 2006 iMac. All are running OS X Yosemite except the iMac which runs 10.5.8 (and is hardly ever on).

Recently, I started getting messages through TimeMachine on the MacBook Pro that the Time Capsule was full. Clicking Details told me that the Time Capsule had only 8 GB of space. This is nigh on impossible because the 3 machines have combined less than 500 Mb on all three hard drives. Also, the MacBook Air was still getting successful backups and has not been getting the Time Capsule is full message.

I tried looking at the Time Machine in Finder through the MacBook Pro, but nothing I could do in Finder would mount it (including setting Preferences to Show Connected Servers on Desktop). Finally, I ran Disk Utility on the MBP. Using that, I was able to see that the Time Machine had a stated capacity of 997 Gb, with only 9 Gb available. I ran a Verify and it indicated the Time Machine needed repairs. I ran Repair Disk and all the space was recovered. After Repair Disk, there was 562 Gb available. Time Machine then successful ran on the MacBook Pro. A total of 20 Gb was backed up.

24 hrs later, Time Machine on the MacBook Pro (and only the MBP) is once again indicating the Time Machine is full. Details said there was less than 2 Gb free. I once again ran Disk Utility on the MBP. When I opened Disk Utility, it showed only 8 Gb available. I skipped the Verify step and went straight to Repair Disk. After a few minutes, it reported no repair was needed, but the available space was once again at 582 Gb.

Why is Time Machine convinced that there's no space on the Time Capsule? What is causing it to fill up? How can Disk Utility recover space when nothing needs repair? And what can/should I do to stop Time Machine from running out of space?

MacBook Pro (13-inch Mid 2012), OS X Mavericks (10.9.4)

Posted on Oct 3, 2015 4:19 PM

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Answer 1

Best reply

LaPastenague

Level 9

67,202 points

Oct 4, 2015 3:56 PM in response to D. Ryder

I do not know what is the issue but when you backup multiple computers to a single target things can go amiss pretty easily..

You should compact the sparsebundle of each backup and then set a Max size for each with enough free space left on the TC for the largest backup possible.

See Pondini

A8 here. http://pondini.org/TM/Troubleshooting.html

And Q12 here. http://pondini.org/TM/FAQ.html

I also recommend you move on.. a Gen2 TC is now 5years old and really likely to die suddenly at a moments notice.. if you do want to keep using it get a large usb drive and plug that in and use that as the target instead.

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Answer 2

D. Ryder Author

Level 1

8 points

Oct 4, 2015 9:02 AM in response to LaPastenague

Step A8: I'm not smart enough to know what a Sparse Bundle is, so I'm flying blind.

I was successful at seeing the screen shot shown on the MacBook Pro. The MBP only shows the TC in Disk Utility when TimeMachine is doing something. Otherwise, as I mentioned, I can't see it in Finder, and can't do a drag/drop as suggested in A8 steps 2 & 3. The partition size was the full 998 Gb. This makes no sense to me; I can only see the backups for the MBP and not the Air. But in any case I reset it to 650 Gb. It has about 450 Gb in it.

Like the MBP, the Air only shows the TC in Disk Utility when TimeMachine is doing something. Unlike the MPB, in Finder the Air shows the TC as a shared drive always, but if you click on it, it always shows as Not Connected, even when TimeMachine is active. In any case, the partition was also 998 Gb. It has about 80 Gb in it. I waited until the MBP was done re-partitioning, then set the partition size to 120 Gb. My plan is to do the process a 3rd time on the iMac.

Since this problem is only happening on the MBP during it's back ups, and it took 24 hrs last time to have the problem return, I'll have to wait to see what happens. TimeMachine was already killing off backups to create space. The 450 Gb makes sense to me; there's about 400 Gb on the drive. If there's a full backup plus a few months of incremental ones, that would be 450 Mb, so getting rid of old stuff shouldn't create a lot of space.

As to replacing my Gen 2, I would not have thought 5 years was that long to bring it close to failure. The drive's allegedly a server quality drive with a MTBF of 1,000,000 hrs, or 114 years. I don't like the idea of a USB connected drive as the target because I like the background transparency of the TC, and the TC is my router anyway. The only reason I would replace the Gen 2 TC is if it becomes a bottleneck in the WiFi network limiting speed.

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Answer 3

Oct 4, 2015 7:28 PM in response to D. Ryder

The drive's allegedly a server quality drive with a MTBF of 1,000,000 hrs, or 114 years.

Allegedly is the right word.. it is a standard WD black desktop drive. Apple are fudging .. there was a total of one.. server drive ever used .. the 500GB seagate in the Gen1 TC.. all other drives used are standard desktop and the cheapest green drives they can get their hands on.

But it is the power supply and overheating problems that are more to the point.. even if the drive survives the hard disk won't.

The MBP only shows the TC in Disk Utility when TimeMachine is doing something.

A sparsebundle is a virtual disk.. it is a single large file that when mounted is used as a pretend hard disk.

Your MBP is mounting the sparsebundle when it does the backup.. which is correct.. and disk utility can then check it.. but unfortunately Disk Utility can never check the real hardware disk.. and checking virtual disk for hardware errors is like checking Cinderella for shoe size charts.

You can mount the TC in your MBP permanently..

In Finder.. use Go, Connect to server.

Type in the name as follows.

SMB://TCname.local or SMB://TCIPaddress

Where you replace TCname with the actual network name of the TC.. this is not its name as you see it in airport utility.. it is the name as the network sees it..

ie if your TC name is Ryder's Time Capsule

The network name is ryders-time-capsule

However I do strongly recommend people get rid of the poor apple naming scheme and use names that are correct to network from get go. See more below.

Using IP address is better if it is the main router then SMB://10.0.1.1 is default.

The request for password will happen when it discovers the network resource and you can type in the password and save that in your keychain.

From there you should be able to follow the instructions.. but I really think you are going to have issues..

A 400GB disk will rapidly fill out to twice that size.. TM needs a lot more space than you think.

Again read pondini's info.

Q1

He suggests 2-4 x the used data size.. ie from 400GB you need a min of 800GB and up to 1.6TB.

http://pondini.org/TM/FAQ.html

I don't like the idea of a USB connected drive as the target because I like the background transparency of the TC, and the TC is my router anyway.

The USB drive is plugged into the TC and is functionally an extension of the internal disk.

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Answer 4

D. Ryder Author

Level 1

8 points

Oct 4, 2015 7:31 PM in response to LaPastenague

So whatever we have done, Time Machine is now taking quite a while to back stuff up. I started a backup at 11 AM. It's 24 Gb in size. As of 8:30 PM, 601 Mb has backed up. At this rate, the back up will take 15 days.

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Answer 5

Oct 4, 2015 11:46 PM in response to D. Ryder

This is not surprising.. you are effectively forced to fix the sparsebundle on a daily basis.. that means there is major disk errors or major hardware failure..

BTW .. this statement.

even if the drive survives the hard disk won't.

was meant to say

even if the drive survives the power supply won't.

One of the things about getting old is I type with my fingers what is NOT in my brain.. it is something else entirely.

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Answer 6

D. Ryder Author

Level 1

8 points

Oct 5, 2015 12:45 PM in response to LaPastenague

So, I got ~700 Mb backed up last night and shut down. This morning, it seemed to progress OK. However, I just received a Time Machine mesage saying not enough space. Looking at the log in the time machine monitoring widget, it started out with 650 Kb free space, and was able to free up 9.8 Gb by deleting old back ups. But it wants the 24 Gb, and doesn't have it. Again.

Which is where I started 2 days ago.

What's next?

Note: The Air just backed up 3 Gb without issue and, according to the widget, without having to delete anything.

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Answer 7

Oct 5, 2015 12:53 PM in response to D. Ryder

What's next?

If you want to keep your old backups archive them off the TC to a USB drive.

Wipe the disk.. ie do an erase.. from airport utility and start again.

OR

Use the USB drive plugged into the TC and copy the sparsebundle of the MBP to the USB drive and continue the backup in that location..

You simply need more space.. the only way to get it is to use a bigger disk or a second disk.

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Answer 8

D. Ryder Author

Level 1

8 points

Oct 5, 2015 1:01 PM in response to LaPastenague

Back to being confused (not unusual for a decrepit old guy)....

1) How can I need more space when I can clearly see that the TC is nowhere near half full?

2) The Gen 2 has 1 USB port, and that's in use for my printer. Can you plug in a USB Hub? Otherwise, how can I connect another HD and keep the print server?

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Answer 9

Oct 5, 2015 1:07 PM in response to D. Ryder

You need more space because TM is not behaving itself sharing with another TM backup.. it happens..

Sorry if I wasn't clear.. TM is accident prone. ie it occasionally corrupts itself.. the only fix is to clear out everything and start over.

If you are satisfied that 1TB is enough space for all your files on both machines.. and are prepared to break the pondini rule that space for TM is 2x greater at least and really should be 4x greater when you share the space.. wipe the TC and start over.. if the backup history is of importance to you archive it before hand.

Then start over with fresh clean backups from both MBP and MBA.

2) The Gen 2 has 1 USB port, and that's in use for my printer. Can you plug in a USB Hub? Otherwise, how can I connect another HD and keep the print server?

Yes, you can use a hub.. buy only powered hubs.. this is important.. an unpowered hub can have issues with power demand.. the gen2 TC is already stressed for power.. an unpowered hub can be the straw that broke the camel's back.

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Answer 10

D. Ryder Author

Level 1

8 points

Oct 5, 2015 2:49 PM in response to LaPastenague

So in the Air, which can't see nor manipulate the TC in the Finder, how do I do archive the TC to an external drive?

I'm not actually sure how to do it in the MBP either...

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Answer 11

Oct 5, 2015 3:04 PM in response to D. Ryder

Archive is a function available via the Airport Utility.

Click on the TC in the utility.. click edit then go to the Disks tab..

There are two functions (and only two).. you can archive the disk.. so plug in a USB drive of equal size to the TC or larger.. ie 1TB.. min.. formatted on your mac to standard Mac format.. and click archive. Do this overnight as it will take several hours.. and you do not need the computer running whilst it is doing the archive.

Once finished do quick erase.. so click the other button.. I marked in green.. and select the default.. quick.. it only takes a min or two .. and your TC will then be erased and you can start over.

If you want to test the disk then select a full erase.. I only ever recommend Zero Out Data.. this is a low level format.. doing it 7 times or 35 times.. is crazy. If you have data of that security level put an axe through the hard disk.

A full erase will still take a long while.. it has to write zeros to every sector.. >8 hours to complete on 2TB drive.

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Answer 12

D. Ryder Author

Level 1

8 points

Oct 6, 2015 3:53 PM in response to LaPastenague

Since I don't have an external Tb drive, I suspect what I'm going to have to do is cross my fingers I don't need any backups, clear out the entire TC, and start afresh with all 3 machines. Then I will run a full suite of backups on both the MBP, Air and iMac. And I will get all that done before even thinking of upgrading to El Capitan. If I was going to get an new external Tb drive, I'd probably just break down and get a new TC.

To add insult to injury, I can't get TimeMachine to turn off on the MBP. I keep going into preferences, turning it off, re-locking it, and it just keeps trying to do backups. That having been said, I used an app called TimeMachineScheduler to adjust the settings of the TimeMachine about a year ago, so that may be causing me grief.

Thank you for all your patient help. If I knew how to give you more points, I would (are they worth something? Like, free TimeCapsules?)

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Answer 13

Oct 6, 2015 4:29 PM in response to D. Ryder

Don't I wish.. I am too old to be over worried by brownie points.. and boy scout badges.

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