Initial backup using reg copy of SD! taking 12+ hrs to erase an empty dest drive??
 

I've just recently purchased a copy of SD! and I'm trying to get my first full backup completed. I'm using a WD 160GB USB 2.0 drive but frankly I'm concerned somethings wrong. I've formatted the drive as HFS and yesterday I started the full backup for the first time but as of today it has been running for 12+ hours just on the "Erasing files on WD160" task. The drive was already empty when I started the backup so there shouldn't have been anything to erase. Anyone have a clue as to what the hold up was? I finally stopped it despite warnings that the WD160 would be left in an unknown state.

I've restarted the backup but this time opted for the smart update option to avoid the need for erasing all files on the destination drive. Even now it's been running for an hour preparing the Macintosh HD. I'm running version 2.5 (v84) of SD!, OS X 10.4 on an MBP. I'd appreciate any feedback folks can offer about what's going on, even if it's just to say this normal for the first backup. Thanks.

It sounds like the drive isn't responding properly, actually - it was likely refreshing your disk arbitration and failing.

Power off your Mac and all peripherals, simplify to only the drive, power back up and give it another try.

Resolved - Layer 8 problem
 

Thanks for the response. I had already gone ahead and restarted the MBP but was seeing the same problem. I noticed the lock symbol stating to allow or not allow copying without authorization this time. I had left it locked last time thinking I only needed to authenticate once at the beginning of the process. This time I unlocked it and while I still had to authenticate to make that change, once it was done the copy process fired up immediately upon hitting go. Flashed right through the preparing to copy stage and has already copied 10% of the drive so far.

Perhaps I missed the explanation in the manual about how that lock/authorization requirement applies to the copying process but if it's not in there I'd like to request it be better explained in the manual or even the options menu in the application. Thanks again for your help.

Actually, I don't think that had anything to do with it...

I'm open to suggestions. I made a simple cause/effect association that seems relevant to the situation but it's purely speculation on my part. What do you think the problem was?

I think a peripheral on your bus was not responding correctly, and -- assuming you tried it before you did the unlock -- during that time, and the time it took you to unlock the main window, it started to respond.