Encrypted time machine will not mount

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Encrypted time machine will not mount

Last night I “removed” my hard drive (a my book drive), for some reason instead of my usual way. I wanted to start fresh and encrypt my back up drive. I really did not mean to do it this way. Now my drive will not mount! I have tried everything! It shows if I open my disk utiliity. It shows both the physical external disc, and the logical os x extended volume named “time machine”, however that is ghosted. It will not allow me to mount it through the disk utility. If I try to run first aid, the ghosted volume disappears. I have also tried these steps through the WD my book utilities to no avail. I have also tried to go through restore mode and recover, but it just is an endless spinning wheel for hours and hours. Basically it appears as if it is already encrypted. Its is as if it started the process, since I selected it, yet it removed it. But, it does ask me for the password on restart. Any tips on how to remount? I have tried a direct plug in with both computer and drive to the wall. I have also tried different ports. As a last resort I tried to erase the drive, but it also will not let me do that. It says it is “unable to delete the core storage logical volume group."

I have read a few other threads here and so far, none have helped... so I am posting separate in hopes of a miracle! The drive is new.

iMac, OS X El Capitan (10.11.3), my book for time machine

Posted on Feb 7, 2016 9:34 AM

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Answer 1

Schlmale Author

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Feb 7, 2016 12:29 PM in response to Schlmale

Is there not ONE person willing to repond to this?

Obviously this is an issue due to the "removal" of the drive. Because I just went out and bought a new drive. The same one. Of course recognized at first and as soon as I selected encrypted and the process started. The disc disappeared and it gives the same message. 😠

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Answer 2

Drew Reece

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Feb 7, 2016 1:33 PM in response to Schlmale

How large is the drive in question?

Disk encryption can take many hours to complete, if you remove, stop or pause the process it will resume when OS X sees the disk again.

Repairing encrypted disks normally requires you to enter the password to decrypt it, but I don't have 10.11 in front of me to check how Disk Utility handles it. Obviously the disk needs to be fully encrypted before you can repair.

I think this lists the 'encryption' and 'converting' status via Terminal…

diskutil cs list

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Answer 3

Schlmale Author

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Feb 7, 2016 6:14 PM in response to Drew Reece

It is a T3 Mybook. And it did not even start encrypting before it disappeared. I just selected it and it unmounted before the process started. Yet it does ask me for the password. Meanwhile I have spoken to apple and they said if my actual hard drive was encrypted, to unencrypt, which I have and try to restart. When I did, it allowed me to erase the mybook drive and upon restart it did mount.... but alas not even a full minute went by and it disappeared. Apple said if it did not mount, I would likely need to take it in to a service provider, being that it is an older imac. I would love to try to resolve without having to pay.

I wished they had a warning on that remove button!

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Answer 4

Drew Reece

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Feb 7, 2016 6:34 PM in response to Schlmale

I'm unclear what state this disk is in - does it contain data that you need to access or is it able to be erased? If it has important data you may want to stop using it - it can reduce the chance of recovery if it is actually failing.

If you have other Macs around I would try the disk on them, it's possible the disk is failing/ faulty.

What remove button do you mean, where is this button? If you mean you removed the partition in Disk Utility that may explain what is going on.

Did you encrypt via Disk Utility or use some of WD's own software? WD's software has been known to be bad in the past, ensure that is up to date, quite frankly I doubt you actually need it & I would remove it - most disks just work on OS X until third parties get involved. The OS can format & encrypt disks on it's own.

If you want to be sure the disk is 'hosed' reboot into recovery mode & try inspecting it within Disk Utility, that can indicate if the disk is generally working but having issues with something in your OS. Hold cmd+r at startup get you into recovery mode, just don't install the OS!

Safe mode is also another way to disable installed third party add-ons, it is worth trying before you go to Apple.

Try safe mode if your Mac doesn't finish starting up - Apple Support

Hold shift at startup to enable safe mode (keep holding until you see the login window stating you are in safe mode).

Just be warned that many non-essestial Apple extensions are disabled in safe mode, so the graphics may be terrible & performance may be odd, just test your disk as much as you can.

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Answer 5

Schlmale Author

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Feb 7, 2016 7:12 PM in response to Drew Reece

Both the older and the new hard drive(s), I purchased today are currently erased. I was able to erase to get the to briefly mount and erase, since the initial first 2 posts. I had purchased a second drive, due to the fact nothing I tried was getting me anywhere and I am on vacation! I have tried every mode possible. I do have some tech knowledge. The true issue is NOT the drives after all. The problem is the drives will not stay mounted. The show up for a minute and even let me start the time machine process, but just as it starts, it stops, due to the drive unmounting!

The "button" is in the time machine preferences, when a disk is selected there is an option to "remove disk" that is what I am speaking of. This is what started it all.

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Answer 6

Schlmale Author

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Feb 8, 2016 10:55 AM in response to Schlmale

posted in wrong thread

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Answer 7

Drew Reece

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Feb 8, 2016 11:17 AM in response to Schlmale

Thanks for clarifying the button.

Another option is to look at logs for hints, /Applications/Utilities/Console will show those. They can be confusing but look for patterns as you connect the drive. An admin account is required to view the system logs (it can help to test in another account anyway).

All messages may have a few lines of info otherwise Disk Utility's log & System log may help too. Just avoid assuming everything is abnormal, tons of data is logged daily, most of it worthless, occasionally it lead to useful info.

Looking at your other thread (Hard drive will not stay mounted) it appears it works better in recovery mode? If that is the case I would consider the OS or some third party software could be the issue. Just to double check – did safe mode make them work any better at all? Just connect one at a time & test in safe mode.

If you have sufficient internet connection to download the installer (over 5GB is downloaded) you could consider installing OS X onto one of these drives. Erase the external in recovery mode - if it works you can suspect your current OS is handling the drives badly. If it fails you can suspect the hardware.

P.S. please don't make any more threads for this, it gets impossible to follow & help gets repeated.

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Answer 8

Schlmale Author

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Feb 8, 2016 1:23 PM in response to Drew Reece

Thanks, I had to make another thread as at the time was getting no response. Working on my moms account (thus her computer) and here on vacation with family out of town and leaving in a day! Sitting the whole time behind the computer with family in from out of the country! Normally I would not do that. But, the issue also changed. I will try this, thanks

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Answer 9

Schlmale Author

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Feb 8, 2016 1:23 PM in response to Schlmale

OK switched over.... fail, as I thought. So, do I do as I thought above? AS clean install? How do I back up her computer prior to that without being able to keep a mount on the HD?

Is there not a way to find out what is causing this error in the system? Perhaps in single or verbose mode?

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Answer 10

Drew Reece

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Feb 8, 2016 1:41 PM in response to Schlmale

To do the clean install you would boot to recovery mode, reformat the external disk in Disk Utility & then install OS X to that external disk (the installer lets you choose the destination). If the disk unmounts itself the install will fail.

Personally I would try reformatting in recovery mode & see if it behaves after a normal boot again, (is this what you mean by 'switched over… fail'?)

This covers reformatting an external in recovery mode…

http://www.macworld.com/article/2990837/storage/how-to-format-a-startup-drive-in -el-capitan.html (the title seems wrong, it is showing how to format an external disk, not a startup drive)

As for backing up, you are correct that can't do that until you have a working external disk. You can however clone the internal disk in recovery mode onto a working external disk. That is also done in Disk Utility, under the restore tab. If you do this be sure the source is the internal disk & the destination is the external!

This claims to cover that process, but it seems vague & could do with some image…

Disk Utility (El Capitan): Restore a disk

I may be missing something, but recovery mode has been the most reliable for these disks so far?

As for verbose mode there seems little point - most errors should be logged when you are inside a normal boot, verbose mode will log more low level errors but I don't think it is appropriate here. Did you look at Console?

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Answer 11

Schlmale Author

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Feb 8, 2016 2:13 PM in response to Drew Reece

Yes, this is what I meant by fail. I did exactly that as you suggested earlier. But it did not resolve the problem. That is why I thought clean install would be the next step. But I don't know how to back up all the data prior to in order to do a clean install. I can't do a recovery, due to the fact I can't keep the hd mounted!

I have also done the "restore" in disk utility.

Yes, recovery mode has been seamless. No I did not look at the console, I may know a lot of what to do, but I do not know what to look for!

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Answer 12

Schlmale Author

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Feb 8, 2016 2:47 PM in response to Schlmale

Actually, it is letting me restore in recovery mode! ➕ Here's to the hopes all goes well and next time I come back I will have been able to do a clean install and get all the back up, returned to the drive and have my last day to relax!

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Answer 13

Drew Reece

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Feb 8, 2016 2:52 PM in response to Schlmale

Assuming the restore completes correctly it should be bootable. To test your copy reboot with the disk connected, hold alt, when the disks appear select your external disk (probably an orange icon), if it is not bootable it will not be an option, only the startup disk will be shown in that case. Obviously a clone of this OS will have the same software that could be conflicting with these disks - it could be tough to test.

If that disk starts up OK take a look at your files to see if it appears correct. You can change back to the internal disk within System Preferences > Startup disk this does speed up booting a little since the system will otherwise search for the last used disk to boot.

Sorry the logs are not easy to digest, it is a case of seeing what appears & then looking for similar items.

I do have to wonder if you are having power issues, are the disks connected to a known good wall outlet? Try to take any extensions out of the issue if possible and avoid too many other devices on the same outlet. Hubs & other peripherals should be avoided too.

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Answer 14

Schlmale Author

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Feb 8, 2016 8:49 PM in response to Drew Reece

Yes, I did plug the HD and the computer directly into a wall outlet as well.

So, I did a clean install, and it appeared to work, but now that I did a restore from the clone, it is doing the same thing. It makes me wonder since it was a clone, it is probably copying over the same issues it was having prior to the clean install making all that work useless. This is why I wanted to get to the root of the problem. I think there is some conflict somewhere, after I did the "remove disk". Unfortunately, I won't be able to do much more. I may have a few hours tomorrow.

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Answer 15

Drew Reece

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Feb 8, 2016 10:38 PM in response to Schlmale

You are right about the clone, safe mode should have allowed you to see the OS in a 'cleaner state'. That would have disabled third part extensions that can cause this type of issue. It really helps you begin isolating things, but you said that was fine earlier. It makes me think it may be the OS itself or the hardware.

Perhaps I wasn't harsh enough in my earlier post - I strongly recommend you remove all of WD's disk software from the clone & retest. You will need to find an uninstaller or removal instructions & purge all of their items. This is just a hunch, but I have a strong distrust of their software, it has done bad things on Macs in the past.

If that fails to alter it you can reinstall the OS over the top of this restored copy. The installer will simply copy new versions of the OS files into place leaving user data & third party apps on the disk, if that fixes it you know the OS was at fault.

I completely understand if you don't want to jump through these hoops - it can be an exercise in frustration, but that is the contents of my head on this issue 🙂

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