Backing Up An External Boot Drive

I boot from a WD 500GB drive installed in a miniStack and have a second miniStack that I want to use as a Time Macine drive. Apple support tells me that Time Machine will not back up an external boot drive. Has anyone found a work around for this?

Your right and - I think - I'm right. My WD is my boot drive. Time Machine insists on backing up my internal drive and will treat the WD as if it's a additional, external volume. That's not what I want to do. I could care less about backing up the internal drive. Don't use it, could care less what happens to it. It's there strictly as a last ditch safety net. But I want that WD drive to be treated as if it were the internal drive. And I'm hoping that someone has found a way to make that happen. Anyone?

Similar Messages

  • How does external boot drive bind to computer?

    What mechanisms bind an external boot drive and the host computer when running? In particular, how is the user environment determined? Examples:
    1.I boot from my external drive (10.5.1) to my home mini 10.5.1) and I get one desktop with specific background (that I chose); when I boot to the mini at work (10.3.9), I get another desktop and background (which I also chose). Each mini, booted internally, has its own desktop and background. How does the desktop environment get determined?
    2. When booted to one or the other mini from the external drive, iTunes sometimes wants to authenticate permission to play a song. It always comes back with "3 of 5 computers enabled". Why does it forget, and why does it then remember the same three computers?
    Where can I find out more about the nature of these behaviors as determined by the operating system?
    Thanks,
    Fred

    If you have the same system (Leopard 10.5.2 latest and lot of fixes) you can easily set the home folder to point to another disk drive so you have the same prefs and home folder. All it is doing is using your home account.
    Normally it is /Users/home_account
    But you can unlock and change the Account control panel (Advanced option by control click on account) to any location with 'browse' on path field to...
    /Volumes/volname/Users/homeaccount
    and use the same prefs (like desktop but also email etc)
    That would allow you to use carry your home account and always use the same email and such wherever you are.
    I always keep home account on another disk drive. In Panther it was done using NetInfo Manager, now modifying home path is in Account control panel. And to me, that is what 'binds' the boot drive to your user environment that you asked.

  • Will Time Capsule back-up an external hard drive that is connected to it directly via USB?

    I'm considering a macbook air, but I have ~200GB of music and photos that currently lives on another laptop (and is manually backed up to a 500GB ext. hard drive).  Ideal set-up would be as follows:
    1. MBA (128GB) with just the OS, applications and ~ 5GB of .doc, .xls, .pdf, etc.
    2. The 500GB hard drive (loaded w/ music and jpegs' and permanently connected to Time Capsule so that I don't have to plug it into the MBA everytime I want to use music/jpegs)
    3. Time capsule (constantly backing up the MBA and hard drive via time machine).
    Does anybody know if this is possible (i.e. will the TC back up an external hard drive that is permanently attached to it, rather than attached to a Mac?)
    Does anybody have other suggestions (without having to buy any more gear) for storage/back-up that don't require that I plug that external HD to a computer every time I want to access the data?

    sixschlitzes wrote:
    Does anybody know if this is possible (i.e. will the TC back up an external hard drive that is permanently attached to it,
    No, sorry, Time Machine cannot back up from a network location.
    Does anybody have other suggestions (without having to buy any more gear) for storage/back-up that don't require that I plug that external HD to a computer every time I want to access the data?
    The 3rd-party apps CarbonCopyCloner and ChronoSync (and probably others) can back up from a network location.

  • Will time capsule back up an external hard drive

    Will time capsule back up an external hard drive?

    Time Machine will backup the drive to the Time Capsule if it is formatted in Mac OS Extended (Journaled) and it is connected directly to your Mac by USB or FireWire....and it is not "excluded" from backups in Time Machine Options.

  • Can time capsule back up an external hard drive attached to my imac and the iMac internal Harddrive

    Can time capsule back up an external hard drive attached to my imac and the iMac internal Harddrive

    In addition to Kappy's comments, the external drive must be formatted in Mac OS Extended (Journaled) in order for Time Machine to be able to back it up.

  • Is it possible to back up an external hard drive to Time Machine from two different computers without creating two different records?

    I have an external hard drive that I do my work on. I use it on my office MacPro and on my MacBook Pro. I have Time Machine setup on both computers to back up the external hard drive to a remote backup drive, but when it backs it up, the backup goes into either the MacPro record of it, or the MacBook Pro record. The effect of this is that if I'm at my laptop and I need to access an earlier version of a file that existed when I was working on my MacPro, I can't access it.
    Is it at all possible to create a universal record (or Sparse Disk Image Bundle to use Apple lingo) for my external hard drive?

    Hi BDAqua,
    Thanks for your help as always, sorry I never thanked you earlier, finally got some time to attend this.
    I'm in the mail folder in the library of my user name. Just to make sure I get all my mail boxes I'm going to archive simply the whole 'Mail' folder after going in to the library of my unsername.
    I notice you mentioned about importing there .... I've seen the .emix files you mention .... i have 30,000+ of them.
    What I find helpful in mail is that if I type a client's second name, in this case 'Lopez' I can pull up all the mails relating to him in an instant, around 450. Obviously it would be impossible to pick through 30K .emix files to find the right ones .... so could I easily import them in to my Mail on my new computer?
    Could I select the whole lot of them, then drag and drop them in to my new Mail on the new computer, and then use the search function on Mail? ... the normal desktop search function doesn't seem to look through the emix files, or emails for that matter.
    Also, just as an extra precaution, could I make a smart folder in Mail with the name of said client for example for, then archive that folder separately?
    TY
    Message was edited by: Scottishengineer

  • Using Time Machine to back up an external hard drive

    Hi,
    This has probably been asked a lot but i'm struggling to find an answer. I want to back up my external hard drive using Time Machine but i'm not sure how to do it?
    Is there a way that I can connect my external hdd and create a back up that is stored on my mac?
    If this was possible, does Time Machine take a snapshot or does it duplicate the data (in other words would this take up a huge amount of storage on my laptop)?
    I don't use Time Machine as I generally don't store anything on my laptop, but my external HDD holds all my photos.
    Any help is much appreciated.
    Thanks,
    Hannah

    Mac Basics: Time Machine backs up your Mac

  • How do I get time machine/time capsule to back up my external hard drive?

    I have been trying to find a way to back up my external hard drive (a Hitachi G-Drive from the Apple store) with time machine and my time capsule. I left it plugged in so it was visible on my MacBook Pro when I did the initial backup yesterday, but it's not showing when I enter time machine. Anyone have any ideas?

    A few things to check.....
    The external drive attached to your Mac must be formatted in Mac OS Extended (Journaled)
    Check Time Machine Options to make sure that the drive is not excluded from Time Machine backups

  • How do you back up an external hard drive with time capsule?

    how do you back up an external hard drive with time capsule?

    Will time capsule back up the machine and the hard drive that is plugged into the machine?
    Yes, if the hard drive with the video files is formatted correctly for Mac
    On the Mac with the hard drive connected....click on the Time Machine "clock" icon at the top of the screen
    Click Time Machine Preferences
    Click Options
    Here you will see a list of items that have been excluded from backups
    Click the name of the hard drive to highlight it
    Click the - (minus) button at the bottom of the list to remove the hard drive from the list of excluded items
    The hard drive will now be backed up with your Mac on the next pass that Time Machine makes

  • How do I get Time Capsule to back up an external hard drive?

    I need Time Capsule/Time Machine to back up my external hard drive. How do I do this?

    The external drive is plugged into the Mac??
    Just open the Time Machine preferences, Options, and include the external drive.. done!! (The menu is exclude.. so just ensure it is not excluded.. don't use no double negatives.. is grammar rule apple could learn).
    You cannot backup the external drive if plugged into the TC directly.

  • How can I get Time Machine to back up an external hard drive (iPhotos) that is attached to airport extreme base station. Note: Time machine is usb to macbook pro and external drive with iphotos is usb to airport extreme base station. Help please. Thanks!

    How can I get Time Machine to back up an external hard drive (iPhotos) that is attached to airport extreme base station. Note: Time machine is usb to macbook pro and external drive with iphotos is usb to airport extreme base station. Help please. Thanks!

    Once you have the drive connected to your Mac, click System Preferences (gear icon) on the dock
    Click Time Machine
    Click Options
    Be default, the hard drive will be Excluded from backups. Click the drive to highlight it, then click the "-" (minus) button at the bottom of the list to remove the drive from Excluded items.
    The drive will be backed up on the next Time Machine pass
    Everything above assumes that the hard drive has been formatted in Mac OS Extended (Journaled) as Time Machine will only backup drives in that format.

  • How to back up an external hard drive?!

    I have a 500GB external hard drive that I use to store a very large photo catalogue. I also have a 1TB external hard drive that I have set as my Time Machine volume.
    TM isn't backing up my 500GB drive, and I've verified that it's not on the exclusion list in TM preferences.
    Anyone know how to get this going? I need TM to back up that external hard drive as well as my computer's internal drive.

    Don't forget that repartitioning/reformatting will result in a blank HD; put the goodies in a safe place beforehand. If you have problems getting rid of the existing format, [check this writeup which I did for NTFS|http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=7783365#7783365], but applies to FAT32 as well.

  • Set up to save directly to external Hard Drive so cannot have separate 'back up'I now want to reverse i.e save to internal Hard Drive and 'back up' on external 'hard Drive'. Please advise me how to do this.

    Macbook Air 13 inch purchased October 2013. set up to save [mainly photos] to external 'hard drive' i.e. not saved to internal hard drive. Cannot find easy way to create 'back up'. Please advise how I can reverse i.e save directly to internal 'hard drive' and 'back up on external 'hard drive'

    For backing up your data I recommend that you use Time machine:
    http://pondini.org/OSX/Home.html
    rob at the orchard wrote:
    save directly to internal 'hard drive'
    When you import images or create other data files, file them in the appropriate places on your internal drive, don't delete them and let Time machine back them up.
    Ciao.

  • Trying to back up to external hard drive (iomega).  Instructions say to erase hard drive.  Won't entirely erase.  Can't enter iomega in Time Machine. Computer is minimac, operating system is OSx 10.6.8.

    Trying to back up to external hard drive (iomega).  Instructions say to erase hard drive.  Won't entirely erase.  Can't enter iomega in Time Machine. Computer is minimac, operating system is OSx 10.6.8.

    All you need to upgrade the iBook for Tiger is another 128 MBs of RAM. It has both Firewire and USB ports. You do want to upgrade it for what you plan to do. The problem you may continue to have, however, may be due to the fact that the age of the computer is such the disk controller does not support hard drive volumes larger than 128 GBs, which is probably the reason the drive won't mount.
    The reason you get DU errors is likely because the drive was formatted using the Intel Tiger version of DU, while you were using the Jaguar version. That's a definite no-no.

  • Can Time Machine back up an external hard drive plugged into a Time Capsule

    I have iTunes and iPhoto libraries that have outgrown the hard drive on my laptop so I've moved them on to an external hard drive. Since I'd like to move around the house with the laptop, I've plugged the external hard drive in to the Time Capsule so that the files on the external hard drive will be accessible on the network. Now that my really important files live on an external hard drive, I want to back it up.
    Time Machine is backing up my laptop's internal hard drive to the Time Capsule drive, but I can't seem to figure out how to make Time Machine also back up the external hard drive that's plugged in to the Time Capsule.
    Is this possible?

    I understand that [Chronosync|http://www.econtechnologies.com/pages/cs/chrono_overview.html] ($40 U.S.) can do that, but I've never used it.
    If you do that, you'll want to back it up to a disk image on the TC's internal HD, or a separate HD. See #Q3 in [Using Time Machine with a Time Capsule|http://web.me.com/pondini/TimeMachine/TimeCapsule.html] (or use the link in *User Tips* at the top of this forum) for details.

Maybe you are looking for