Randomly got an error while using Time Machine software for Mac

Asked By Armando S 0 points N/A Posted on - 11/25/2011

Hi,

I was using Time Machine software to backup files in my Mac machine. 

One time, I got this error message (see below) when I started to do backups.

Time Machine Error

This backup is too large for the backup volume. The backup requires 102.7 MB, but only 849.8 GB are available.

To select a larger volume, or make the backup smaller by excluding files, open System Preferences and choose Time Machine.

I knew I had enough space for the backup. I deleted some more files to get enough space but when I tried doing backups again, I still got the same error. I didn’t know what to do next. 

Any advice how to fix the problem?

Thank you in advance!

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Answered By LINDA B 0 points N/A #114145

Randomly got an error while using Time Machine software for Mac

Hi Armando S

This is a very annoying error, I know because it took me about three days to sort out the reason.

I had about 250 GB of hard disk available and Time Machine was giving the same error for backing up 80 GB of data.

Surprise.

I worked on all the provided solutions, like formatting the disks in HFS + etc. but without any success

However, I found that the 'too large' message was due to my local free disk space (25 GB).

And the workaround done by me which was successful was that on the Time Machine's settings I added a lot of folders to its 'exclude' from backup rules. When I reached around 40 GB (initial backup file size) it created its backup without any errors!

Then I simply removed folders from the 'exclude' list and Time Machine kept on adding all additional folders to the remote backup without any problems

LINDA

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• Posted on - 11/26/2011
• Question Category: Misc Software