Per Synology, wireless Time Machine backup not supported!

[drm31078]

After much frustration in speaking to both Applecare and Synology, it turns out that Synology does not support wireless backup via Time Machine. As others have posted I am getting the following message every few months from Time Machine which requires me to create a new backup.

"Time Machine completed a verification of your backups. To improve reliability, Time Machine must create a new backup for you." It goes on to say, "Click Start New Backup to create a new backup. This will remove your existing backup history. This could take several hours."

Per Synology support I received this message:

"Thanks for writing us and I apologize for the inconvenience this is causing you. I have seen this before. Please use a wired connection when doing your Time Machine backups. The reason it keeps redoing them is the sparse bundle gets corrupted. This is a Time Machine issue, not a DiskStation one however I have a link for what to try. This is NOT a supported method but should work.

http://www.garth.org/archives/2011,08,2 ... rrors.html

I’m not trying to pass the buck, just stating fact. This has resolved this issue prior.
Warm Regards,
Michael
Synology America Corp
http://www.Synology.com
"

Apparently you can only backup to a Synology NAS using a wired connection via Time Machine. It's absolutely ridiculous that wireless backup is not supported. I would have never purchased this NAS if I knew this. Both companies are throwing this issue over the fence. Apple saying they only support Time Capsule, Synology only saying they support wired connections. The web page that was posted as a suggested solution does not work.

[RobinS]

Thanks for posting this and answering my questions and I suspect lots of other people who have been struggling to get Time Machine to work on their Synology NASs. But pretty disappointing - if I'd known that it would not work across wireless I would not have bought the diskstation either. I shall put a message up on Amazon straight-away to warn potential buyers with Macs

So come on Synology, can we please have a sensible response and fix the problem? Thats a big customer base out there...

Robin

[drm31078]

Hey Robin, thats a good idea....it seems this issue needs as much attention as possible since Synology is not addressing it. I am not sure how Synology can say it's an Apple problem when Synology is the one developing the product to work with Apple products. If it doesn't work, then don't make the feature available.

[Llama]

I got this message quite a bit in the early Lion builds and the resultant beta DSM versions, but don't get it any longer. Right now I have 4 MacBook Pro clients (all on Lion) that use Time Machine every hour over wifi (802.11n 5GHz) without a problem.

To be fair, all of the clients are within sight of the router so most link up at 300-450Mbps.

[drm31078]

I have up to date Lion and latest DSM version and it has been happening to me every 2-3 months. Maybe you have been lucky. At a minimum there should be a way to repair the backup file.

[jonny72]

What is Synology's technical explanation for why wifi backups don't work / aren't supported?

Why / how does the sparse bundle get corrupted over wifi?

Why is it a Time Machine issue when it can back up via wifi to a Time Capsule? Apple support wifi, why don't Synology?

I don't see how wired vs wireless could make any difference. Speed can't be an issue, as a wired connection could very easily be slower than a wireless one. The connection shouldn't appear any differently to the Synology box either as it will be going through a router / switch first.

From the Synology site;

Synology DiskStation supports Mac OS so that Mac users can enjoy a native Time Machine experience on DSM. In addition, DSM’s upgraded support for NetaTalk 2.2 further ensures complete compatibility with Time Machine. Just enable the Time Machine service and the DiskStation will simply turn into one of the backup targets for users to choose from.

From the Apple site;

Backing up is something we all know we should do, but often don’t. And while disaster is a great motivator, now it doesn’t have to be. Because with Time Capsule, the nagging need to back up has been replaced by automatic, constant protection. And even better, it all happens wirelessly, saving everything important, including your sanity.

So Time Machine itself supports backing up over wifi and Synology offer complete compatibility with Time Machine.

Perhaps someone from Synology could comment on this discrepancy?

[drm31078]

Jonny, well said. It seems like both companies are throwing this over the fence. I spoke to a 2nd tier applecare advisor who basically said if you aren't using Time Capsule we are not going to troubleshoot this. Then Synology has the response I posted above relative to data corruption via wireless. No accountability from either companies thus far.

[jonny72]

To be fair to Apple they have a very clear line on things like this. They support their products to do what they say they will and if you go with a 3rd party that they don't support then you're on your own. With Time Machine the only network devices Apple support are their own - Synology is not supported.

So the issue comes down solely to Synology for me. They promise a 'native experience' and 'complete compatibility' and they should be delivering it. Simply saying they don't support wifi for Time Machine is unacceptable as it goes against their marketing promises. This is not a Time Machine issue nor an Apple issue, it's a Synology and DSM issue and they need to fix it.

[gd11_be]

Well .. I didn't have the problem for about 4 months .. and guess what : this afternoon. BANG again .
And this time it happened on my iMac, connected via Ethernet cable to my CISCO router, connected via Ethernet cable.

*sigh* here I go again , for 5 hours to backup 130 GB ! I have to agree: Synology says compatible with TimeMachine, and sadly enough DSM does not deliver that. It is just not stable.

[drm31078]

Good responses here...I would urge people to contact synology support with this issue by filling out a synology support form. They are actually pretty quick to respond even though their responses are not what we want to hear thus far. However, the "squeeky wheel will get the oil"...

Support form link:
https://myds.synology.com/support/suppo ... hp?lang=us

[gd11_be]

I have reported this before. I think this is now the 3rd time that I report this to Synology

[drm31078]

I have been going back and forth with Synology support since they said that the wireless connection is the problem. This happened to me a few times, but I have Time Machine logs for two of them. One on 12/27/11 and then it happened again on 3/22/12 (almost 4 months apart). Both times I have the following Time Machine log entries on the day it happened:

QUICKCHECK ONLY; FILESYSTEM DIRTY
Runtime corruption detected on /Volumes/dans time machine/Daniel McDonaldÕs MacBook Pro.sparsebundle (fsck_hfs -q termination status: 3)

The support guy (Michael) is still not sure why the file is getting corrupted, he is thinking that it could be because I have the "hibernation" option enabled or could be the wireless connection:

"This means the backup was corrupted, hfs is the mac file system and Time Machine is running fsck (a linux/unix command) to fix it. Still no mention why the sparsebundle is getting corrupted, just that it is. I’m leaning on the hibernation as a possible factor and maybe running wireless. Prolonged testing would suggest a possible solution."

Now Synology is asking me to give them admin access to my diskstation?! I told them no, but offered to give them all of my macbook/DSM settings or do a remote assist where I can watch what they are doing. I also told them they should do their own testing with their own MBP since it seems this is a wide spread problem. Still awaiting a response. It sounds from the following statement from them, if I don't give them access there is nothing else that will be done.

"With all due respect, I’m still not convinced that it’s a DiskStation issue at this point. All I have seen based on the research that I have done in addition to what I have given you in links is that while there are some Synology units affected it is the environment (their computer, the connection, etc) that is the likely cause of the issue. I have seen this myself and it was just a change in habits of how they handle their backups.

If you want us to resolve the issue in a timely fashion which I would prefer then we require remote access for escalation to one of our engineers to check out. If you don’t want this, along with not being able to perform backups wired then our hands are tied because we don’t have a baseline for testing to prove that it’s a DiskStation issue which you think it is.

Please let me know how you would like to proceed.

Warm Regards,

Michael
Synology America Corp
http://www.Synology.com
"

This is so frustrating. This needs to get bumped up to their engineering department. It's clear that the customer support people do not have the expertise to resolve this.

[gd11_be]

Hi,

Can you let me know how I can find back the Timemachine logs ? I would like to verify from my side as well.

Thanks !

[drm31078]

There are two logs Synology requested. The Kernel Log and Time Machine log. The following are instructions on how to get the Kernel Log, but I am not sure what they were looking for:

Kernel Log:

The Kernel log is a technical log file which can give us more detailed information about your system. Please see the instructions below to retrieve and download the kernel log.

1. Log into the DiskStation Manager as admin.
2. The URL will look similar to http://192.168.1.49:5000/webman/index.cgi
3. Add ?diagnose=debug to the URL so that- htp://192.168.1.49:5000/webman/index.cgi?diagnose=debug
4. Press Enter to save the debug.dat file.

For the Time Machine log they sent me an executable file that somehow extracted it. If you message me your email address I will be glad to email it to you. Unless you know of an easier way.

[gd11_be]

I have found this one for looking up the events from the TimeMachine ..

http://www.macworld.com/article/1131534/tmeye.html