Time Machine backing up huge quantity of files

Mizu_Ger

The last few times I have connected my backup drive to let Time Machine do its stuff it's backed-up thousands of files each time. Each backup has been >10Gb (at this rate I'll run out of HDD space in a few weeks). How can I find out what it's backing up? I have no idea where all these files are coming from, the only stuff I have lately is photos, some music, podcasts and a few TV shows I have ripped with Handbrake, but nothing close to the Gb's of data Time Machine is finding each time.

mazthespark

afaik it makes an entire copy of it again. doesnt just update the changes so you can completely restore your computer to a specific date. not sure if u can change that or not

Sad Professor

Yeah, if you delete a file on your Mac, Time Machine will keep its copy provided it backed it up. This means you can go back and restore a deleted file from Time Machine (hence the name).

Eventually, TM is will use all available space on the backup drive, at which point it will start deleting the oldest backups. You can't turn this off, it's the whole point of TM.

Obviously this works better with a desktop machine which is backing up every hour and a large backup drive.

Simon201

Good starting point for an external drive to be used with Time Machine is at least twice the capacity of the drive you're backing up.
If you have Techtool installed though, check the 'Techtool Protection' folder in Library/Application support. Eats up some mad amount of space cos if there's a file in there thats a gigabyte or whatever (and there certainly could be), if there is a change in size of that file, even a kilobyte, it'll back up the whole file again!

Mizu_Ger

It's the quanity of files that is being backed up that i causing the problem. When I connect the drive and start the backup, TM says "preparing xxxx files" and the number runs into the 1,000's. I only backup once a week, but lately all I've been doing is adding photos to iPhoto, updating podcasts and general browsing. Nothing that should generate a huge number of changes to files.

thecommander

Mizu_Ger wrote: »

It's the quanity of files that is being backed up that i causing the problem. When I connect the drive and start the backup, TM says "preparing xxxx files" and the number runs into the 1,000's. I only backup once a week, but lately all I've been doing is adding photos to iPhoto, updating podcasts and general browsing. Nothing that should generate a huge number of changes to files.

Leve it backup at its normal pace and see what it does. Is there any reason why you only plug it in once a week?

need assistance

I had a similar problem and when time machine was mounted there were literally thousands of files in the trash.Googled for a solution and the only one I could find was to wipe time capsule and do a fresh back up.

Mizu_Ger

thecommander wrote: »

Leve it backup at its normal pace and see what it does. Is there any reason why you only plug it in once a week?

It's a MacBook, and I don't have much desk space, so only take out the external drive once a week (or thereabouts) to do a backup.

need assistance wrote:

I had a similar problem and when time machine was mounted there were literally thousands of files in the trash.Googled for a solution and the only one I could find was to wipe time capsule and do a fresh back up.

I might just do that. I don't need any stuff that I delet normally. Just want to have an up-to-date copy of hardd rive in case of a crash (which has happened to me before).

Clanket

Lads I'm having the same issue.

I'm only using an Iomega external hard drive and Time Machine to backup my desktop in case of a major crash or the Imac being stolen.

I plugged it in to do a backup for the first time in about 3 weeks and it's telling me it's backing up 50gb :eek::eek::eek:

I would have made nowhere near this amount of changes to my Imac.

I thought the whole selling point of Time machine is that it only backs up changes?????

Sad Professor

Alofthedunnes wrote: »

I thought the whole selling point of Time machine is that it only backs up changes?????

It does. But when it detects changes within files - lets say you modify a 1GB file - it will backup that whole file again. If you are dealing with a lot of large files, after 3 weeks all those changes will add up.

So with this mind, 50GB after 3 weeks doesn't sound that unusual to me. Do you do a lot of downloading? Work with a lot of large files, like for video editing? Do you have an external hd connected?

Also, for TM to work well you really need to leave it connected all the time (or as much as possible) so it can track changes and backup every hour. Otherwise you might as well be using SuperDuper, which is probably a superior backup solution. TM's speciality is really in allowing you to restore deleted files or roll back to earlier versions of them.

Clanket

Sad Professor wrote: »

So with this mind, 50GB after 3 weeks doesn't sound that unusual to me. Do you do a lot of downloading? Work with a lot of large files, like for video editing? Do you have an external hd connected?

Also, for TM to work well you really need to leave it connected all the time (or as much as possible) so it can track changes and backup every hour. Otherwise you might as well be using SuperDuper, which is probably a superior backup solution. TM's speciality is really in allowing you to restore deleted files or roll back to earlier versions of them.

I download a good few TV shows. Am also constantly buying cd's and ripping them so it may keep backing up my whole music folder. I also do a fair bit in Logic so that might also explain.

It only took about 20 minutes to do the Time machine backup so not a big issue. I'll have a look at SuperDuper though. Thanks Sad Prof

Sad Professor

The tv shows would definitely do it. But making changes to your iTunes library (like adding artwork, modifying mp3 tags, etc) could also account for a lot of changes.

Remember that you can exclude certain folders from being backed up in the Time Machine preference panel. I usually exclude my downloads folder or anywhere that I have a lot of temporary files.

Is leaving the TM drive connected all the time not an option? That and having a large external drive is really essential for getting the most out of Time Machine. Otherwise (as I've discovered) you tend to run into problems.

Clanket

Sad Professor wrote: »

Is leaving the TM drive connected all the time not an option? That and having a large external drive is really essential for getting the most out of Time Machine. Otherwise (as I've discovered) you tend to run into problems.

Is an option but not really necessary. I like to stash the HD away just in case someone nicked the Imac. Or if the computer crashed I'll have a recent enough backup

What problems you talking about? Are they big?

Sad Professor

Alofthedunnes wrote: »

Is an option but not really necessary. I like to stash the HD away just in case someone nicked the Imac. Or if the computer crashed I'll have a recent enough backup

Consider getting another external hd for stashing away and leaving the other connected all the time.

What problems you talking about? Are they big?

Time Machine tends to get a bit buggy when it starts to run out of space on the external drive.