The media on this iPad cannot be backed up because there is not enough free space on this computer to hold all of the backed up files (31.30 GB required, 3.57 GB available). Would you like to continue to update this iPad? Continuing will result in the loss of all media on this iPad.
I hate you! My external disk drive has 214.03 GB available. Now what?
I think what I’ll try is move all my existing backups from ~/Library/Application Support/MobileSync/Backup/ to my external drive and link the new location to the old location.
- it did not work – even though this is what other people suggest as well
- tried it with a symbolic link instead of the links Finder creates, but it didn’t work, either
- tried moving !MobilSync to the external disk and symbolic linking it, but it didn’t work, either
iTunes keeps telling me that there’s not enough space. >}}
I noticed that you might have to call this repeatedly because at particular points in time the process might not be writing backup files.
Anyway. What does this tell me? iTunes checks the available disk space on the default drive where it thinks the backup will be created, even though I moved the directory to an external disk. 👎
Well, I was hoping this fixed the stupid problem, but not so:
An error occurred while backing up this iPad (-50). Would you like to continue to update this iPad? Continuing will result in the loss of all contents on this iPad.
Now what? Retry? I wonder what that means, exactly: Loss of all in-app purchases? What if the app is no longer supported—are the in-app purchases that I am unable to download lost forever?
Another question poses itself: Do I need a backup as part of this upgrade process? When I sync the iPad before doing the upgrade, I see that it is doing a backup. When I check iTunes Preferences → Advanced → Devices → I see “Alex Schröder’s iPad – Today 11:20” (not quite what I expected but close enough). Perhaps I can just upgrade the iPad and then restore this backup?
Googling for this error leads me to a thread where a user is saying “I had my MobileSync folder symlinked…” This is exactly what I did to avoid the first error. Needless to say, this makes me very unhappy.
What I’ll try next is deleting the symlink without moving the backup data back to the main drive and upgrade. We’ll see about the various backups after the upgrade. Perhaps the 31.30 GB required are just a temporary thing. I sure hope so.
It worked! When I came back this morning I saw Syncing Photos to “Alex Schröder’s iPad (Step 6/6)—Copying photo 16600 of 19540”
ok:
