Time Machine Drive not showing up anymore

<p>Older Intel iMac, 500 GB WD drive dedicated to Time Machine. The Cylon eye is moving back and forth, I switched around cables but just have a blank spot where it is supposed to show up. Not found anywhere on the computer. Is it time for a trip to Best Buy. Can any hard drive for Mac be used for Time Machine. The defective one is more than a few years old. I'm looking to do this on the cheap.</p>

<p>if you can take the drive out of the 'container' it's currently in, you can try a new container (ie. the interface) or cable and see if Disk Utility finds it. Or plug the drive into a different Mac and see if it finds it (turn off TM on that other machine first ;) ).</p>

<p>Chances are pretty good the cable or drive itself died. They do that after a number of years. You can get any of the small WD self-contained drives, reformat it to HFS+ and use it for TM.</p>

<p>I'm no expert, but a couple things you might try if you haven't: restart the computer? replace the USB cable with a known good one and restart everything? </p>

<p>It finally did show up and turn green but the message said disk repair couldn't repair it. I tried the obvious tricks but I think a replacement is the best way to go for a non-technical person.</p>

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<p>It finally did show up and turn green but the message said disk repair couldn't repair it</p>

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<p>Was that Disk First Aid (Disk Utility)? Don't give up, especially if you have other disk repair produces such as DiskWarrior. I've had the Apple utility fail only to find others fixing the disk, after which you want to back it up and reformat it. </p>

<p>I've given up on this one. I put a big black "X" on it and stuck it in "the drawer" never to be seen again until I move.</p>

<p>DiskWarrior costs $100, a new 500gb drive costs less than $50. Seems like a better investment if the disk is old.</p>

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<p>DiskWarrior costs $100, a new 500gb drive costs less than $50. Seems like a better investment if the disk is old</p>

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<p>The worth of the data is what is an important consideration here. One would probably end up trashing the drive if it's iffy, but the question is, what is the data you recover worth?</p>

<p>I'm no Mac guy. - 500GB used to be available as IDE (outdated!) and SATA drives. - The to me unknown issues of formating for Mac and also "what's time machine?" aside I would take the faulty drive to the shop where I am getting replacement just to be sure it will fit.<br>

Data recovery? - the OP sounds backed up.</p>

<p>Jochen, TM saves lots and lots of files all the time. I too have found it can be taxing on drives. IOW, I've had more issues with a TM drive (which I was later able to fix can keep using) than any other drive use. As for backing up, TM is a complex backup dating back as far as one can commit drive space for. It's a very different kind of back up:</p>

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<p><em>What makes Time Machine different from other backup applications is that it not only keeps a spare copy of every file, it remembers how your system looked on any given day—so you can revisit your Mac as it appeared in the past. Time Machine keeps hourly backups for the past 24 hours, daily backups for the past month, and weekly backups until your backup drive is full</em>.</p>

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<p>Why I'd try to recover that data is in the event I wanted to go back a year and find a file I had edited multiple times over that year and go back 5 versions of a total of 10. When my TM drive went south, I wanted to recover over a year's worth of such backups and I was able to do this. Of course, if the OP doesn't need that, just start TM with a new drive from scratch. </p>

<p>I have backups of photos and files in three other places so Its not a disaster. It might be fun to see what you had on your desktop five years ago though. Time Machine does make me somewhat lazy and careless as think I'm covered. The initial backup might take an hour or two but the hourly and daily backups only take a few minutes after that as only changes from the last backup are recorded.</p>

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<p>I have backups of photos and files in three other places so Its not a disaster.</p>

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<p>I kind of figured that. I too have multiple backups but TM has saved my butt many times. Not from a disaster but still so useful that when my TM disk acted up, I wanted that data back. I'd never use TM alone but along with regular backup's that are circulated in location and on many drives, it can be real useful to go back months and find something you wish you had. Email is a perfect example, you can use TM directly in Apple Mail and get back email you might have deleted and then wanted back. </p>

<p>To bad we can't call back sent emails.</p>

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<p>To bad we can't call back sent emails.</p>

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<p>In the very old days you could (was it AppleLink or Compuserve, can't remember). At least you could up and until the recipient received it. <br>

Maybe Apple will come up with a real Time Machine... ;-)</p>

<p>Outlook and Exchange servers allow message recalls. It only works for people connected to the same Exchange server, although this is true for pretty much any mail system that allows it, i.e., if it was Compuserve, messages couldn't be recalled outside Compuserve. I don't know anyone using Exchange servers outside enterprises so it's very limited.</p>

<p>As long as your primary source still had the data, a new backup sounds like the way to go. However, as you've learned -- all disks fail. It is a good idea to have multiple backups -- they probably won't all fail at once, though that can happen too.</p>