Time machine not recognizing sparsebundle

Question

I've created a sparsebundle just as suggested at http://www.readynas.com/?p=253; however, Time Machine fails to recognize the mounted image. The sparseimage is stored on an external drive, and I already executed:

defaults write com.apple.systempreferences TMShowUnsupportedNetworkVolumes 1

I have also verified that the naming format of the sparsebundle is: MachineName_.sparsebundle. I'm running the latest version of Snow Leopard (10.6.7).

Answer 1

Time Machine backups are a nightmare on NAS, however this is what I did with a NetGear Stora:

In Finder -> Go -> Connect to server.

enter your NAS address including username and password, like this:

smb://username:password@192.168.0.1/ *or whatever your volume's IP is.*

then select to mount the volume of where you want to keep your sparse bundle image.

Now open the disk utility, and create a sparse bundle with the following settings:

• Name: Backup (or whatever)
• Size: 300GB (or whatever)
• Format: Mac OS Extended (Journaled)
• Encryption: none
• Partition: No partition map
• Image Format: sparse bundle disk image
• Save As: yourcomputername.sparsebundle (e.g.: Toms-MacBook-Pro.sparsebundle)

After you've done all that copy it to your backup volume and open Time Machine's preferences

Click on Select Disk and choose the volume that you want to backup to.

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A couple of suggestions:

1. Follow this screencast that i made to auto mount your volume on start up http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2vhcmEd0Y8o

2. Do not upgrade to OSX Lion when it comes out, since at least for my Netgear's Stora the Time Machine did not work and i ended up buying a Time Capsule, check first on the ReadyNAS forums.

Answer 2

As far as I know, the name of the bundle must be MachineName_MACAddress.sparsebundle, not MachineName_.sparsebundle.

Answer 3

The Sparsebundle should be called [Machine name].sparsebundle. No trailing underscore.