Time Machine 'Preparing' Problem

[Ace2617]

Hey everyone,

I'm having a problem with Time Machine in 10.12 Sierra.

For nearly the past 45 minutes, I've been trying to run a Time Machine backup on my 2015 rMBP. I plug my WD HDD in, and it says preparing for backup, which is normal. However, it seems to get stuck there. The blue progress bar fills up all the way, but the backup doesn't actually commence.

I've had this problem once before, last year when I had my MacBook Air. Eventually, it worked. But so far, I can't get it to work today. I've tried to unmount and remount the drive, etc. I even thought perhaps there was something wrong with one of my USB ports, so I tried the other one, but that didn't make a difference either.

Is anyone else having this problem? If so, is there a way to get past the "preparing" stage?

Thanks

 

[997440]

In this case, the preparing stage may be normal if TM is doing a "deep scan" or Spotlight is indexing.

See this for explanation(s) and troubleshooting steps to take if you determine that your wait isn't a normal one -- http://pondini.org/TM/D1.html

 

[Ace2617]

In this case, the preparing stage may be normal if TM is doing a "deep scan" or Spotlight is indexing.

See this for explanation(s) and troubleshooting steps to take if you determine that your wait isn't a normal one -- http://pondini.org/TM/D1.html

I will check that out, thanks.

 

[KALLT]

45 minutes is not that uncommon or unreasonable. Just wait a bit longer.

 

[Ace2617]

45 minutes is not that uncommon or unreasonable. Just wait a bit longer.

Oh is it not? I feel like this is the longest I've ever waited lol but if it's not unusual, perhaps there is nothing to be concerned about. I tried to restart the process and am still currently waiting, but I'll wait it out and see what happens. Thanks

 

[jgelin]

This is normal, let it do its thing. You can see if it is still doing things in the console window, and look for the backupd process. Likely it will say it is doing a deep scan, or rebuilding the index as others have stated above. This especially occurs if you add any directories to the exclusion list in TM prefs.

 

[KALLT]

Restarting it will reset the progress, so it really must be allowed to complete. Time Machine is most effective when you use it regularly, ideally daily or a couple of times a week. The more time passes between backups, the higher the chance that Time Machine will have to perform a deep scan.

 

[Ace2617]

This is normal, let it do its thing. You can see if it is still doing things in the console window, and look for the backupd process. Likely it will say it is doing a deep scan, or rebuilding the index as others have stated above. This especially occurs if you add any directories to the exclusion list in TM prefs.

Thanks, I will continue to wait it out.

Restarting it will reset the progress, so it really must be allowed to complete. Time Machine is most effective when you use it regularly, ideally daily or a couple of times a week. The more time passes between backups, the higher the chance that Time Machine will have to perform a deep scan.

I have been slacking on the TM backups, which is probably why it's taking so long - I'd say it's been ~ 2 weeks. Like you both have said, it seems it's probably doing a deep scan. Thanks to both of you, I appreciate your help.

 

[Matthew.H]

It took a little while for my TM backup yesterday to move from preparing to actually backing up. Although my previous backup was may 2016 so that could well be the reason why.

 

[Ace2617]

It took a little while for my TM backup yesterday to move from preparing to actually backing up. Although my previous backup was may 2016 so that could well be the reason why.

Mine is still preparing from the last time I wrote here, which was a little over an hour ago. The last backup i did was I believe around 2 weeks ago. I should backup more, but since its a laptop I don't always have the drive connected.

 

[Eric5h5]

It's not normal to take 45 minutes for an incremental backup, unless you did a massive amount of stuff in two weeks. (If this was the first backup, sure.) This happened to me once, so I tried canceling the backup and restarting the computer, which fixed whatever the problem was.

--Eric

 

[Ace2617]

It's not normal to take 45 minutes for an incremental backup, unless you did a massive amount of stuff in two weeks. (If this was the first backup, sure.) This happened to me once, so I tried canceling the backup and restarting the computer, which fixed whatever the problem was.

--Eric

Well I've been trying for a few hours now. It's not the first backup, as I've had the drive for in use for about a year. I haven't done anything too strenuous over the past 2 weeks, I wasn't even expecting this to be a big backup, just trying to do it more frequently. It's taken way longer than I aniticipated. At some point, if it continues like this for a few more hours, I might restart the computer (with the drive disconnected) and see if that fixes it.

Thanks