I mentioned this issue in another thread, but waited for the morning to check again on my computer and see if anyone else on the net had noted it yet (and wait to see if Software Update resolved it).

I'm running a Mac Mini 1.25GHz, 1GB RAM with an external drive for Time Machine. I'm using a 24" monitor at 1920x1200 resolution. Which has worked splendidly for everything.

In Time Machine, however, and the screen flickers constantly in the sort of flicker you can occasionally see when an application tries to adjust resolution on the fly. Everything except the window in the centre of Time Machine is affected. The flicker disappears for the brief time when the animation between time states is at play or when Time Machine is 'sliding' away to close, but is present for the rest of the time.

It looks like this (click for full size):


I thought it might obviously be a problem confined to higher resolutions - when I adjusted my resolution down to 1000x800 or so Time Machine started to work without this effect, but anything higher and useable (eg 1600x1200) and the flickering was a problem again.

Is there some way of throttling down use of Core Animation or certain graphics or whatever to mean I can keep my 1920x1200 resolution and see Time Machine properly? Or is this a barrier that's impossible to overcome at my end and I'll just have to hope for a software fix?

yep just hit the same problem with time machine and the dock,

TLCAUS: What machine are you running? I'm wondering if it's something to do with the graphics in the Mini specifically or does it affect more machines?

I don't like to bump, but I find it strange that I can't find anyone talking about this problem anywhere - if it's just something happening to me and a couple of others, perhaps it would be a case for reinstalling Leopard rather than just a hardware problem with early Mac Minis.

Is anyone else having Time Machine's background so failing that it makes TM almost unusable? If so, please list your specs. If anyone can think of a way to diagnose this problem or has read about it on another forum could you let me know?

Again, the problem I've noticed is that the background in TM flickers constantly and all the graphics apart from the central window in TM is stuffed. I'm running a 1.25GHz (PPC) Mac Mini with 1GB RAM.

EDIT: I've 'solved' the problem - if I go to display and rather than shunt down the resolution, shunt down the 'colours' from Millions to Thousands then Time Machine works perfectly. For some reason I can't notice ANY graphical changes between millions and thousands.

It'll be the graphics card not coping with pumping out that much screen information I think.

That seems the obvious problem, yet you wonder why Apple didn't do what they've done in other areas and just stop the 'special effects' from appearing on computers with under-strength graphics.

I mean, they list 867MHz as being fine for Leopard, yet it seems it takes more like 1.5GHz to handle Leopard's graphics on a medium-large monitor.

Anyhow, after some careful study I have noticed some differences between millions and thousands of colours, but not enough for it to be worth trading Time Machine for millions of colours.

EDIT: Switching to thousands of colours kills off iPhoto's ability to show a slideshow. Not Preview's ability, but iPhotos.

It sucks being on a Mac Mini that now is unable with one setting to run both iPhoto and Time Machine successfully.

I dont know if this will help you as it did me, but i tossed the 10.5 DVD back in again, and used it to do a Repair Permission, and Repair Disk, and Bingo problem has Gone away, thank god

Unfortunately repairing disks and permissions from the DVD didn't work either.

Since I discovered thousands of colours doesn't run the screen saver properly, can't run iPhoto slideshows etc. I've gone back to millions. I'll just have to hope for a fix, else I can only run TM after changing resolutions.

Well a 1.25ghz Mac Mini at 1920x1200 running Time Machine is really really pushing it.

Remember you need a decent graphics processor to run Time Machine, and an even better one to run it at that resolution.

It's probably just that the mini doesn't cut it.

On the one hand I recognise that Apple's bottom-of-the-line computer from two years ago should have performance issues.

On the other hand what I've come to expect from Apple is something very different from a PC - this Mini has given me a couple of years of great service without me constantly having to upgrade the hell out of its hardware to get things to work.

What is most annoying about this Time Machine complaint is not that TM uses some cool graphical effect that my Mini can't render - that happened in Tiger already with various effects and I knew it would be happening in Leopard too.

Rather, what's annoying is that Apple has a limited range of hardware it's writing its OS for, gave the specs that would cope with Leopard, but one of Leopard's principle programs (the main reason I upgraded, actually) won't actually run on it without disabling the computer in other ways.

Since I've seen that just moving the number of colours down for Time Machine solves the problem - ie. it's a problem simply created by Apple putting a lot of pretty but unnecessary touches to the program - I'm firstly wondering why Apple didn't just write it like most other programs they make (and tell it to not add the graphics flourishes to weaker machines) and second hoping that they redress the problem in a coming patch. Because there's nothing about my processor that stops Time Machine's core functionality from working.

I shall never complain about Vista's Aero Glass being useless ever again...

The PPC Mac mini didn't support Core Animation at all so TM either runs or it doesn't. I think this is more of a software cause.

I have the exact same problem with Time Machine on my Mac Mini with the following specs:
- 1.42 GHz PowerPC G4
- 1 GB DDR SDRAM
- 23-inch Apple Cinema HD Display
- 1920 x 1200 Resolution

I work with graphics applications day in day out as part of my job so dropping the resolution or constantly switching between resolutions is out of the question.

I agree with "Maxim Litvinov", this is a software issue as my Mac Mini has been able to handle everything else I've thrown at it. Sure, it's getting a little old but Apple's minimum system requirements for MAC OSX Leopard state that it should run fine. If not, they would have said otherwise.

I'm a little annoyed as Time Machine was one of the key reasons I upgraded too, not to mention the new 750GB hard drive I purchased to use with it! Sure, I'm upgrading to a new Mac laptop in 6 months but what am I meant to do in the meantime!

Any recommendations on how to inform Apple about this post and/or problem as I have never had to contact them for an issue like this before and it's something I'd like fixed sooner than later!

I'm not sure about how to inform them, liquidamberdesign, but I can say that there are now at least two threads at Apple's own discussion forum both with multiple people that share the same problem (one started by me), so I'm imagining Apple should be aware of it by now.

I suppose there's some official way of reporting a problem - perhaps someone else knows.