Time Machine backs up everything every hour!

[PeterSG]

Thank you chscag.

I appreciate your teaching me proper use of this forum.

This certainly makes sense -- now. Thanks.

 

[chas_m]

This is a wild guess, and I know you said you already excluded Parallels -- but when you said this did you mean the "virtual machine" file, or the app? Excluding the app does nothing.

I get the strangest feeling it is backing up your (ever changing) Windows virtual machine file over and over.

 

[Slydude]

That's worth a look. At this point it's better than any idea I've had but aren't the vm files a handful of large files rather than the large number being reported by Time Machine?

For some reason I was thinking we had solved this problem. I had not looked into this in quite some time. There's got to be something happening at the stage where Time Machine decides what to back up. It's also possible that for whatever reason Time Machine is ignoring the exclusion list. If so the fixes in the gray box at the bottom of that page may help. Assuming we haven't tried that. Even after re-reading the thread I've kinda lost track if what's already been done.

Have we tried a Full Reset of TimeMachine?

 

[PeterSG]

Thank you.

I have done the full reset of TM -- twice.

 

[Slydude]

I thought so. Guess it's back to the research shed. There is some information on that site about instances where Time Machine reports a large amount of data needing to be backed up but then only backing up a smaller (more reasonable) number of files.

In your case though from. the data, you've provided, it seems to be backing up the large amount of data (based on time). I've got to re-read that section later when I'm a little more awake.

 

[PeterSG]

I truly appreciate everyone's assistance.

~~~~~

I went through the TM option list and made certain that everything to do with Parallels was excluded.

The backup then took 1 hour & 18 minutes.

TM backed up 18,100 items in 252.7 meg.

 

[Slydude]

The number of roles being backed up suggests to me that Time Machine is somehow backing up some files that you told it to ignore (files you've excluded).

There are ways to see which files are being included in a recent backup. Some of these involve Terminal but personally that gives me the hives. If you haven't done something similar I would try the following:

1. Download a free program called Grand Perspective.
2. Analyze your most recent Time Machine backup. See "Check which Files Have Been Backed Up" Make sure to exclude hard links from the list. That way the list should show only files Time Machine thinks are new.

I don't expect you to comb the entire list since apparently Time Machine thinks it is thousands of files. Just look for a few files that you were sure you had excluded. I'd loot at one or two VM related files in case it is ignoring that preference as well as few other documents which you are sure you haven't modified in say a couple of days.

If you have tried this feel free to ignore me.

 

[PeterSG]

Well... I downloaded GrandPerspective.

I located the latest backup file.

I then had no idea of how to point GrandPerspective to the file to do the SCAN function -- that is, to make it SCAN the backup file.

I tried several times to get a menu or something to click on and point GrandPerspective to the back up file.

I am sorry, but I could not figure out how to scan the file.

 

[PeterSG]

To learn about what is being backed up I ran TM with exclusions and then removed all excluded files.

With exclusions:

18,043 items 248.3 MB

With no excluded files:

23,900 items 1.61GB

So... TM appears to be excluding the Parallels and other files properly.

 

[chas_m]

Here's what I think is happening: some program on your hard drive is "touching" all the directories and files. This could be something like an "anti-virus" (ISTR you said you didn't have one in operation) or even a bad Spotlight file, something that indexes the HD.

Has there EVER been an anti-malware tool or "cleaning" type software installed on the machine?

 

[PeterSG]

When I run Parallels, the only program or virtual machine is Windows 7. The only system I run is FrontPage 2003.

I used McAfee for one year, but now use Norton Internet Security.

My Mac is four years old.

I have never installed any anti-malware or anti-virus systems for the Apple side.

IIRC, Windows has installed some malicious software removal software as part of its update regimen.

Thank you.

 

[chas_m]

My questions refer only to the Mac "side." If you are 100% certain that Parallels' virtual machine file is in the "ignore" list in Time Machine, then we need not concern ourselves with that. For the record, the virtual machine file would be in Users/(your home folder)/Documents/Parallels.

 

[PeterSG]

I cleared all excluded files from TM's option list.

Then went through all folders, including "Users/(your home folder)/Documents/Parallels" and excluded all Parallels-related files.

I ran a backup which backed up:

18,050 items into 218.3 MB & took 1-1/4 hour to complete.

Then, 4 minutes later, I ran a backup which backed up:

17,860 items into 152.4 MB & took 1-1/4 hour to complete.

Thank you, everyone, for your efforts with this unusual situation.

 

[chas_m]

Your patience with this has been heroic.

If you've already tried this, forgive me ... you've tried a lot of things and we've suggested a lot of things and its late.

Have you tried opening a new admin account, doing a separate TM first time backup, then creating a new document and doing another TM backup all in that new account? Any difference?

(ignore this if you've already done that)

 

[PeterSG]

Your patience with this has been heroic.

If you've already tried this, forgive me ... you've tried a lot of things and we've suggested a lot of things and its late.

Have you tried opening a new admin account, doing a separate TM first time backup, then creating a new document and doing another TM backup all in that new account? Any difference?

(ignore this if you've already done that)

~~~~~~~

Chas_m, thank you for calling me "heroic." But it is you and others who are the heroes. I truly appreciate your efforts to ferret out a resolution to this problem. Hopefully, the resolution that we identify will assist others who have similar problem with TM.

As for setting up a new Admin account, I would rather avoid doing that to my Mac. Being an unknown area for me, I am concerned about what it could do.

 

[Slydude]

It's basically the same as setting up an account and shouldn't really do any harm. There are some instances where it can help when problems arise. Here's an example from my own experience:

I was trying to install something from Adobe a while ago (Elements maybe). Every time I ran the installer it hung at the same point. After several attempts and a great deal of wasted time I contacted them through that hideous web chat/live help system they use. More wasted time including re-downloading the file.

The tech support person finally suggested I do the install from a new (clean) admin account. It worked on the first shot from that account. I should have thought of that right away since I already had such an account in place. Time Machine should work in that account since it is system wide backup. The only question will be does it screw up as it does now.

OS X User Accounts - Add Administrator Accounts to Your Mac

 

[PeterSG]

Thanks Sly.

I set up an additional Admin account.

I logged in and did two backups with the following results.

Backup 1:

18,304 items, 618.8 MB, Duration = 1 hour 16 minutes

Then I waited 2 minutes.

Backup 2:

17,847 items, 346 KB, Duration = 1 hour 8 minutes

~~~~~~~~

Something is touching files in a manner that makes TM thinks they are changed & need to be backed up.

I know that is obvious, but I just had to write it to believe it.

I have no idea what specifically makes TM think a file has changed... a time stamp?

And the second backup was so small compared to the first backup. Did TM think only some index data needed to be backed up, not the actual data in the records?

 

[chas_m]

Except for the amount of time it is taking to back up, the count and data look correct to me.

In a new admin account, there would be few items that need to be backed up other than all the prefs and associated files created when you created the account. 18,000 items sounds like a lot but it isn't at all -- in OS X speak that's not a lot of stuff when every little pref file and temp file is counted.

The second backup would have much less to backup, since very little has changed, so yes that 346kb looks about right for that situation.

(I'm assuming TM is being directed to only back up the home folder for this account)

Overall, it would seem to me that TM is operating normally except for one thing: the amount of time it is taking to write this data. How is your backup disc connected? Are we sure it's not using USB 1 or something? Is it healthy?

 

[PeterSG]

Backups take the same amount of time on both my Seagate Backup Plus for Mac & my LaCie drive. Both drives have nearly 400 GB free.

Regarding Elapsed Times:

All backups have sporadic, bursting data flows.

During the backups, the amount of time the sliding gauge displays data being written is no more than 4 minutes. That's 4 minutes out of an hour. That is, once the items have been "counted" and "prepared," during the remaining one-hour, the drive appears to be writing data for only about 4 minutes.

The vast amount of backup time is spent with no significant change displayed in the amount of data written to the hard drive.

There is the appearance that the system and drive are organizing data on the hard drive or to be written to the hard drive.

I am using the USB 2 cables that came with each drive. These used to provide data flow for backups that took only about 6 minutes.

~~~~~~~~

Regarding Item Count:

Until several weeks ago, the item count was approximately 7,000. It had been that size for several months. Suddenly, in recent weeks, the item count has increased to approximately 18,000.

No new systems, programs, or functions have been added or changed on this Mac during the last 3-1/2 years. That is, since Parallels & Windows were installed.

In Parallels, the box is checked telling TM to not backup its files.

~~~~~~~~

Regarding The Immediate Changes Detected By TM:

TM claims in its description to do backups every hour.

It seems strange that TM could promise to take hourly backups when it takes nearly 1-1/4 hour to perform a backup on a Mac that it just finished backing up 2 minutes before, and which had no user interaction.

~~~~~~~~

A question about your point: "I'm assuming TM is being directed to only back up the home folder for this account."

Since it is my desire here to not waste anyone's time, I want to ask about this comment. Perhaps I am doing something wrong that is causing my -- and now our -- problem.

How do I know that I am directing TM to backup only the home folder?

I have excluded anything to do with Parallels & Windows using the Option control on TM. I believe it is backing up only my user files. But how would I know?

~~~~~~~

Thank you.

 

[chas_m]

Time Machine normally backs up EVERYTHING (system, apps, documents, everything) unless those items are excluded. You would know if you were doing that.

Your comment about the data-writing time is interesting, as that sounds about right for a normal "update" backup (a few seconds for light users, a few minutes for more active users). Something is disrupting/corrupting/changing the normally very-quick "preparing" process (well, usually quick after the initial backup).