You can make a difference in the Apple Support Community!

When you sign up with your Apple Account, you can provide valuable feedback to other community members by upvoting helpful replies and User Tips.

Looks like no one’s replied in a while. To start the conversation again, simply ask a new question.

User profile for user: patriziord
patriziord Author
User level: Level 1
8 points

disk utility backup looks stuck creating image

Hi,


2010 iMac, last sunday begun crashing finder, then stopped booting at all.

Accessed recovery mode and tried First Aid, which failed repeatedly.

Yesterday I started a backup via creating image from folder and this is the situation after 15 hrs:

  • Prompt title is Creating "foldername" ...
  • not a single detail has been written in the show details box
  • in the beginning progress bar worked its way up to the half, but in the latest 10 hrs it stopped there

The folder is about 200Gb.

Should I keep it running, or is it a lost cause at this point?

Might the issue be related to the hard disk, trying to back up not the whole user folder and others instead, one by one, could be a solution?


Thanks in advance


iMac 27″, OS X 10.11

Posted on Jul 14, 2020 12:26 AM

Reply
Question marked as Top-ranking reply
User profile for user: HWTech
HWTech
User level: Level 9
60,062 points

Posted on Jul 14, 2020 4:26 PM

Where are you storing the the created .dmg image file? Do NOT store it on the iMac's internal drive as it causes the drive to work so much harder and if the drive is failing it will accelerate that failure where even a professional data recovery service will be unable to recover any files. Transferring 200GB of data over USB 2 will take a long time. At the very least image smaller folders for each .dmg file.


I would be concerned about a failing hard drive so proceed cautiously because failed attempts at accessing files can cause the failure to get worse.


Can you access the Apple Diagnostics or Apple Hardware Test? Even if the tests pass it doesn't mean the hard drive is healthy. The diagnostic only has meaning if it identifies a failure.


@BDAqua's suggestion of installing macOS to an external drive is a good one as it makes it so much easier to troubleshoot the issue including checking the health of the hard drive.


FYI, you should always have good verified working backups for situations just like this.

View in context

Similar questions

2 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply
User profile for user: HWTech
HWTech
User level: Level 9
60,062 points

Jul 14, 2020 4:26 PM in response to patriziord

Where are you storing the the created .dmg image file? Do NOT store it on the iMac's internal drive as it causes the drive to work so much harder and if the drive is failing it will accelerate that failure where even a professional data recovery service will be unable to recover any files. Transferring 200GB of data over USB 2 will take a long time. At the very least image smaller folders for each .dmg file.


I would be concerned about a failing hard drive so proceed cautiously because failed attempts at accessing files can cause the failure to get worse.


Can you access the Apple Diagnostics or Apple Hardware Test? Even if the tests pass it doesn't mean the hard drive is healthy. The diagnostic only has meaning if it identifies a failure.


@BDAqua's suggestion of installing macOS to an external drive is a good one as it makes it so much easier to troubleshoot the issue including checking the health of the hard drive.


FYI, you should always have good verified working backups for situations just like this.

Reply

disk utility backup looks stuck creating image

Welcome to Apple Support Community
A forum where Apple customers help each other with their products. Get started with your Apple Account.
Learn more Sign up