Hi anybody/everybody.

I have just tried to back up my MacBookPro (2011 I think), osx 10.6.8 to a W D My Passport external HD (I have done this once before to this HD using SilverKeeper), but it will only back up a couple of GB before giving up because of 11 errors.

I checked out a few of the bad items, all "Apple Apps & Utilities - Oh and of course an Adobe Installer", checking the "Get Info" and in each case the "Sharing & permissions boxes were greyed out.

I have checked "Get Info" on many more applications and it would appear that all the "Apple Installed" ones are greyed out. "Third Parties" appear to be OK!?

I also checked out various "baddies" on my previous back up and Time Machine
back ups and they seem to be suffering also.

I have run Disk Utility and DiskWarrior but neither fixed the problem.

The Laptop as such appears to be running fine and I have tried unsuccessfully to find anything similar on Google, so I am hoping the old faithful (FTM that is)
might be able to assist me once again.

Hope you understand what I am trying to get at.

Breaking News! Just before I hit "Submit" I thought I would check some non application type files and folders, and lo and behold it would appear that anything to do with the original or latest installation (even an old Classic folder or 2 that for some reason I have not trashed). Does this make it less or more complicated? Tomorrow (actually today now zzzzz) I will check out some back ups on different externals.

Regards. Mike

Please copy, paste, and post the error messages.

The first thing to try is boot from an OS X 10.6 install DVD or another bootable drive and run Disk Utility → Repair Disk and see what, if any, errors are found and which, if any, were fixed. If there are uncorrected errors then re-run Disk Utility → Repair Disk as sometimes volume errors can be repaired on the second or even third pass. If that fails you are probably going to need an industrial strength volume repair utility such as Diskwarrior, TechTool Pro, or Drive Genius. if you have to purchase one of these utilities be sure to get the version that was compatible with OS X 10.6.8 and that is highly unlikely to be the latest version available.

They are greyed out on your local hard drive, or on the backup drive?

From the description of the symptoms you are describing, it sounds like the backup drive is formatted for use in Windows PCs, not Macs. Macs can use Windows-formatted disks, but there are limitations: some files can't be copied to a Windows disk (if they contain "illegal" characters in the file names; Windows has stricter limits on file names than Macs do) and you can't change permissions or sharing to the same extent you can on a Mac.

Thanks everyone for your comments.

Earlier today I tried to back up to a different external HD, but got the same results i.e. backed up about 6 GB and then aborted with 11 errors!!!!

I then tried again, but this time upon opening SilverKeeper it advised me that I had to "authenticate", which was just two OK's, and lo and behold the complete back up was completed.

I tried it once more on the WD HD, just to double check, and again the back up was carried out without a hitch.

I'm none the wiser what caused the glitch, but thanks again for your time.

Regards. Mike