I have recorded how I upgraded my Mavericks based Mac to Yosemite newest OS which was released not too long ago.
However, right after I upgraded, I found a strange thing happening with my Time Machine.
My Time machine isn’t working anymore. When I plugged in my external hard drive to my Mac, it was detected on Finder, (if not, this link might help) but it was circle-ing all the time, and in my menu bar on the top right, showing “Preparing Backup” or “Backing Up from xx to xx GB”, it takes forever than usual.
So as usual, I went to Google, and see if there are someone else who had this problem.
And yes, I wasn’t alone, however the fix is easy, this forum gave me at least the working direction.
Try this if your Time Machine isn’t Working
What I did: (Hard Drive is connected as Time Machine)


1. I entered the Time Machine. Just to check if I could see the backup. I would probably be dead if I didn’t see my backup 🙂
2. Then I hit cancel, because I didn’t want to restore anything.
3. And after I visit my Time Machine, I click “Back Up Now” button, and the backup process started as usual.
Sometimes, it’s that simple, and I hope, if you have the same problem, it will be solved simply by entering your TM.
Thank you so much!
I had the same issue and solved perfectly after doing exactly what you did. 🙂
Hi Sean, you’re very welcome! I am glad that the issue is solved the same way 🙂 I was scared too to loose my backup files.
Happy 2015, Kindly
Kim.