Time Machine attempting a full backup after a disk repair and reinstall

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Time Machine attempting a full backup after a disk repair and reinstall

I'm baffled in how to resolve this issue: I did two reinstalls in short order of the past week, and the second one included erasing my hard drive first, then a Time Machine reinstall. This sequence seems to have told Time Machine that a complete backup is needed -- and therefore, there's not enough room for the backup. I've got 1.5 TB reserved in an external hard drive partition, with nearly 1 TB free (and my entire backup is only about 600 GB). This hasn't been an issue until now, but that's what I think is going on.

I'm also checking the external drive I use for Time Machine right now with disk utility, just to rule out issues there. I'm starting to think I need to erase and repartition the external drive -- something I'd rather not do! Working on a late 2009 iMac with a couple of 2 TB external drives attached.

Is this a known issue? Thanks in advance!

Tom

iMac (21.5-inch Late 2009), OS X Mavericks (10.9.5)

Posted on Nov 21, 2015 7:00 PM

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Answer 1

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Eric Root

Level 10

684,027 points

Nov 23, 2015 8:22 PM in response to Portland Phan

Start with D3/D4 in the 1st linked article.

Time Machine Troubleshooting

Time Machine Troubleshooting Problems

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Answer 2

Nov 23, 2015 8:22 PM in response to Eric Root

Thanks, Eric! After stumbling around a bit, I did find a solution and thought I'd post in case others come across this thread. After researching what was going on, I finally decided to exclude enough files to allow Time Machine to complete the backup (ignoring the fact that there would have been plenty of room for the files -- e.g., that the Time Machine "not enough space" number in error). Mostly, I didn't want to go without a backup of core apps, etc., given that I'd just had a major crash last weekend. But it turned out that allowing Time Machine to do even a partial backup seemed to allow it to find it's place among the already backed-up files on the external drive. It spent a lot of time "cleaning up", then allowed me to move the rest of my hard drive back up into the backup column and complete a full backup. Not an ideal path, but it worked. 😕

Thanks again for your help! 🙂

Tom

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Answer 3

Eric Root

Level 10

684,027 points

Nov 24, 2015 6:22 AM in response to Portland Phan

You are welcome.

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