Time Machine Problem - Help Needed!

cambsno

cambsno

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Simon
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I have an Iomega HD, into which I plug in my imac and macbook every so often and do a Time Machine Backup. Not done one for 4 weeks, so tried today. imac worked fine, backed up as normal. But when I plug Macbook in it does the right things, starts to prepare items as normal and you can hear the drives whirring away, but it gets to about 25k items and stops, the icon goes from desktop and a message comes up saying it was not ejected properly (as you get when you just pull cable out. Have turned both on and off, but does exactly the same each time! Not had issues in the past, so any ideas?
 
Looks as though it is mounting the drive , then is getting a disconnect. I'd look at the USB cable. It may have a break and is getting an intermittent connection. Had this myself with a CF card reader

Check the power supply is OK. It may be for some reason the portable drive is not getting enough power. is it a USB powered device? Mac's should provide enough power if it is but you never know. I have a USB cable that has 2 computer connections . The second only connects to the power pins so ups the current. Having said that I've not had any problems with a normal USB connection with my MBP with USB powered drives.

Have you tried the HD again on the iMac. Does it work OK ? Hopefully it's not an impending drive failure
 
will try changing the usb. Power is fine, and i actually tried the macbook before the imac, then macbook again and imac was fine, so must either be cable or macbook (but other cables work fine for ipad/ipod and camera.
 
Ok, really getting confused now. To summarise...

One iMac and One Macbook, with One HDD. Using a USB cable, the imac does the backup no problems. Using the same cable, the Macbook comes up with an error after around 30 seconds - a box pops up with "The disk was not ejected properly..... To eject a disk, select it in Finder ....." - Interestingly the HDD Icon stays yellow when it normally turns green after 10 seconds. Now, I can go into time machine and did retrieve a pic from a few months ago, so that all looks fine. The issue seems to be it disconnects after 30 seconds ish.

The USB ports on Macbook work fine with ipad and iphone, so chances of them both not working are slim. So must be a software glitch on Macbook?
 
The problem may be a power supply one. It could be that the external drive is calling for more power than the Macbook can provide. It could just be marginal. The iMac could be on the plus side of the power requirements the Macbook on the low side.

Do you have a powered USB hub? If you do, connect the external HD to the Macbook via this. It should provide more than enough power for the HD. If it works OK then it's more than likely its a power problem rather than a software one
 
Will try it plugged into mains, although battery was 90% and have never had this problem in the past year and a half.
 
Doubt if plugging it into the mains will make much difference. Mac's are usually good with maintaining the correct voltage. My thought is that the Mac's USB ports are not supplying enough current to the external HD. The USB spec states 500mA. If however the HD needs more than this it may be that is what is causong it to shut down. As I said it may be marginally OK on the iMac but not on the Macbook. If you can use a powered hub, these normally have more current available .

It's simply a process of elimination. Try running the Macbook from the mains and see if it makes any difference. I have a Freecom external HD and when I bought it there was an offer of a free external power supply in case the computer couldn't supply enough current. I had no problem, but took up the poewr supply option, just to be on the safe side :)
 
John. Not had any issues in 18 months of backups and drive is mains powered.
 
Blows that idea out of the water then !!!!
 
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