I am trying to move a Time Machine backup (backups.backupdb) to a larger drive. I am following the the instructions here:

[support.apple.com]

It never completes. During the Preparing to Copy stage, I get a message about being unable to complete the the process because there are some items that are in use. My options are Skip, Stop or maybe Cancel, or Continue. Choosing Skip causes the copy process to halt.

I forget exactly what choosing Continue does. IIRC, the copy process eventually halts due to a lack of required permissions.

Has anyone been able to get this to work?

Thanks

I just tried last week, and got the same thing you did. I eventually just started using the new drive and kept the old backupdb on my old drive (in case I need OLD backups) because I could access those files. Once I feel that I'm in the clear, I'll deleted the backupdb folder from my original time machine drive

Done it a few times w/o major incident... minor incident is having to go into archive files and delete the most recent archive prior to making copy... less than minor incident is having to walk thru the identifying new TM drive after turning TM on and off two or three times before it takes. Only done this thru Mavs, have not tried yet w/ Yos. Good luck.
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Sometimes it is what it is...
and then there's times when it's really better.



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try using Ditto in Terminal.

[www.maclife.com]

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Thanks for the tip, Decay. I'll try it tonight. Now I just need to figure out the path for each external drive.

I have found that rebuilding the directory of TM drive by DiskWarrior and using the Restore function in Disk Utility (Source: old TM drive and Destination: new drive) can greatly increase the successful rate to copy old TM backups to new drive.

Haven't had to do it for maybe a couple of years now...

Never got Apple's instructions to work twice in a row.

SuperDuper worked every time.

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I tried Ditto in Terminal last night and that failed due to denied permissions. I was planning to repurpose the existing TM drive as a clone, so perhaps it is time to purchase SuperDuper. Or maybe Carbon Copy Cloner.

Hmmm, I wonder if Disk Utility might be able to clone my old TM drive and copy it to the new drive?

[nyacomputing.com]

Quote
particleman
I tried Ditto in Terminal last night and that failed due to denied permissions. I was planning to repurpose the existing TM drive as a clone, so perhaps it is time to purchase SuperDuper. Or maybe Carbon Copy Cloner.

SuperDuper should be able to clone it in free-mode.

CCC will not clone a TM drive. It's verboten.

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Well, Disk Utility seems to have done the trick. I restored my old TM drive to the new drive. I then renamed the volume on the new drive since it now had the name from the old TM drive. I opened TM preferences and pointed to the new drive. I had some initial concern because TM show no backups were present. Since I had nothing to lose, I turned on TM and performed a backup to the new drive. It completed and now shows the correct information, e.g.. the oldest backup date was displayed.