Can Time Machine Backup to Two Different Drives?

I have many Apple Computers, and I was wondering if it were possible to have time machine backup to two different drives.
I want it to back up My documents, Mail, and other files/folders that I access often to a partition of my internal drive every minute.
And
I want it to back up Everything on my Mac to my external each night upon connecting it to my mac.
I take my MacBook everywhere with me and I need to make sure that the files I work on the most stay Perfectly Accessible no matter what, and I don't want to sacrifice too much space for that procedure. I would rather just be able to do constant backups of my most used files and folders, and then do a system backup each night to make sure I always have what is needed.

Let me add some more observations. I use two disks, one at home (its a mounted volume on another Mac at home) and the other is a portable disk that I attach to my MBP at work. This works fine.
About your details - TM backs up every hour. If you look around you'll find some posts that give instructions on changing the frequency (I haven't paid attention to these, so I can't help you). However, backing up to another partition on the same drive is not what I'd recommend. If the drive dies, you may lose both partitions.
As for doing constant backups of the most used files and at night doing a system backup - it seems to me you aren't "getting" TM. This sounds like the type of backup strategy one uses with "regular" backup software. I don't think I'd recommend backups every minute, but for short intervals, why not just do a default backup of everything. It doesn't really back up everything, just things that have changed. The only time it does a complete backup is the first time you use it with a specific drive. After that it no longer does complete backups, unless you reformat the drive and start from scratch.

Similar Messages

  • Can Time Machine backup to two USB drives

    Hi,
    I have an iMac 250 gig drive with about 240 gig in use and own 2 250 gig USB external drives. One of which I am currently using for Time Machine to backup to, but that is now full. I was wondering if there is any way that I can have time machine make use of both external USB drives as target backup drives?
    I'm guessing I need to buy a much larger USB drive, but wanted to explore this option first.
    Thanks,
    Kyle

    No. TM can only backup to a single drive at one time. You can designate the second drive as a new TM backup drive, but then TM will do a completely new backup to that drive, not "add on" from the old backup.
    There really isn't any backup utility for the Mac that will span backups over multiple hard drives except possibly Retrospect.

  • Can time-machine backup the boot camp drive?

    can time-machine backup the boot camp drive?

    can time-machine backup the boot camp drive?
    No. Use third-party software such as WinClone to do that.
    Time Machine can backup a Windows image file used by an emulator such as Parallels Desktop.
    (50538)

  • Time Machine backups to two external drives?

    Hi,
    I'm wondering if there is a way to use Time Machine to back up the same data to two or more external drives?
    For that matter... I only have certain folders I need backed up. Can it be set up to do this?
    I don't have it yet and couldn't find a definitive answer.
    thanks,
    Andrew

    I'm wondering if there is a way to use Time Machine to back up the same data to two or more external drives?
    You can use Time Machine to backup to multiple drives, but you'll have to manually switch target drives in Time Machine Options when you want backups to go to a different device.
    For that matter... I only have certain folders I need backed up. Can it be set up to do this?
    Not easily. Time Machine backs up everything unless you exclude each item that you +do not+ want to be backed up. SuperDuper or Carbon Copy Cloner may do what you need to do a lot more easily.

  • How to restore a Time Machine Backup onto two Hard Drives?

    Hey guys,
    configuration as following:
    I got a SSD, which contains all system stuff as well as apps. Further there is a HDD on which all kind of Multimedia is stored. I've put a symlink from my Home Folder to that Multimedia-HDD: Users/IceThunder -> Volumes/Multimedia.
    Before my Mac crashed - I still don't know what was causing that - i backed up everything, so now I find two folders (System and Multimedia) in my .backupdb folder. If I use Time Machine to restore the state before it crashed it only offers to restore everything(?) on one specified disk, which is not what I want to.
    Is there a way to get back an exact copy of the former state? How can I tell Time Machine to restore folder "System" on my SSD and folder "Multimedia" on my HDD?
    Thanks in advance
    IceThunder

    Time Machine should restore to the disks from which the backups were made as long as each has the same name as before. For more help on this see Pondini's Time Machine FAQ for help.

  • Multiple Time Machine backups to one external drive

    I have a MacPro with an external hard drive that I use exclusively for Time Machine (the external drive is mirrored RAID).
    I now have a MacBook Pro as well. Can I set the Time Machine on the laptop to backup to the same external hard drive that I currently use for my desktop? When I look at the Time Machine set up on the laptop I can see the desktop's external drive but don't know if I can have Time Machine backups from two different computers writing to the same external drive.
    Thank you

    yes you can do that. this is a supported configuration. although it's better to keep TM backups for different drives on separate partitions. probably not an option here though. the remote backups will be stored in a sparse bundle. while remote ones are stored directly in a folder on the drive.

  • Can I turn off Macbook while Time Capsule is archiving Time Machine backup to a USB drive?

    My Time Capsule is archiving my Time Machine backup to a USB drive attached to it. I have initiated this process on my macbook (on the same lan with the Time Capsule), on which I am monitoring the archiving progress on the Airport Utility. Still almost a couple of days to go... Can I turn off my Macbook, or will that interrupt the process of archiving?

    If LaPastenague is willing to do a "test", then we will all know more.
    Opened my big mouth.
    The archive is happening.. I turned off the computer it was setup from.. running Mavericks and latest utility once I got it started. I have been checking from v6 utility on Mountain Lion.. and it is excruciatingly slow. But is running.
    I can check the progress but v6 utility is utterly and completely useless.. it continually shows the same numbers.
    v5 utility does show it is crawling along.
    v6
    20min later..
    Look, look, there is a tiny blue fleck in the progress bar!!
    v5 utility shows the actual progress. Actually tells you total and amount backed up so far.
    Amazing how advanced v5 utility is over v6.
    The estimate of 10hours is probably correct at the present rate of progress. I suppose for 500GB, around 50GB/hr is about what we expect from TM backups etc.
    I will post another picture in an hour and probably kill it then before I die of watching paint dry.

  • I have time machine saving onto two usb drives.  The backup is 4.6TB.  Each drive is 6TB.  Why is time machine only updating one drive?  (The other has been the same for two weeks.)

    I have time machine saving onto two usb drives. 
    The total size of the files being backed up is 4.6TB. 
    Each external USB drive is 6TB.   So I have 12 TB of space for Time Machine.
    Why is time machine only updating one USB drive?  (One drive has been the same for two weeks.)
    I have selected both drives in the Time Machine settings panel.
    My understanding was that it would do a full backup, and then incremental backups of changed files, getting rid of old copies as needed, and alternate between the two drives.
    But it looks like drive A has one complete backup, dated two weeks ago, and drive B is the only one getting action.
    There is a red icon on drive one that says the drive needs 120GB more space to do a backup -- which is strange since the whole backup set is only 4.6TB in size, and the drive is 6TB in size...

    You could try a clone instead.
    Clone  - Carbon Copy Cloner          (Often recommended as it has more features than some others)
    Clone – Data Backup
    Clone – Deja Vu
    Clone  - SuperDuper
    Clone - Synk
    Clone Software – 6 Applications Tested
    Time Machine Versus Clones and Archives
    Commonly Used Backup Methods

  • Can Time Machine backup Windows 2003 servers?

    Hi,
    Before anybody casts any stones, I'm Pro mac. I'm currently working at a company that only has Windows 2003 servers. We need a new DR & Backup system for our Windows servers. Can time machine backup and restore to Microsoft Windows 2003 servers?
    Anybody have an experience on this topic?
    Thanks,
    Chris.

    Time Machine can not back up remote drives of any kind. also, in can only back up directly attached drives if they are formatted mac os extended. that excludes any windows drives in any shape or form.
    you should consider a different backup solution. You can try CCCloner. It might be able to backup a windows server.

  • Time Machine Backups Not Recognized When Drive Added to Airport Extreme

    Since January, I have been taking backups of my Mac Pro with Time Machine and a SimpleTech external drive plugged into a USB port.
    Recently, I purchased an Airport Extreme router and decided that plugging the SimpeTech drive into the router would provide access all the times. After plugging the drive into the router and providing the correct password, Voila!, instant access.
    Later, when it became time for the next scheduled backup, initially TM could not find the drive. No problem... in TM preferences, the SimpleTech drive was listed as available, and so it was a simple matter to telling TM to use that drive.
    So far, so good... but now the issue.
    Instead of creating the next incremental backup in the set, Time Machine created a new folder and started taking a full backup of the entire HD as if it were the first backup being taken. Incidentally, the name of the computer in the original backup set was "Ron's Computer". Now, TM says that it is backing up "Ron's Computer 78989018975923789637289795278957928". Obviously, I would like TM to continue taking backups of "Ron's Computer" using the original set of incremental backups.
    Have I incorrectly added the drive to the network?
    Was there something I failed to do in the TM setup?
    I interrupted the full backup assuming that (a) it could not be merged with the original set of incrementals and (b) I would not/should not do so anyway.
    Anyone else have this issue? Resolution?

    I commented on another thread and came to a surprising revelation:
    Time Machine backups are created differently depending on if the target drive is connected locally or if it is connected as a network attached storage (NAS) device.
    Your initial backup was via a local HDD. Once connected to your AXBS, TM treats your external HDD as a NAS. Now TM will create a sparsebundle backup which is DIFFERENT than your initial local backup. It cannot add to your first backup even though it's right there on the drive. I believe you can still access the backups (ctrl-click the TM icon -> Browse other TM disks). If the old backup doesn't have too much important info, just continue with the new backup as the wireless backup option is functional. I don't know if the old backup will be deleted without warning if space starts to run out, though.
    If you are intent on continuing with the old backup (January is a long time), check out these links (not really for the faint of heart):
    http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=7860904&#7860904
    http://rolf.haynberg.de/?p=83
    Good luck and welcome to Apple Discussions!

  • Transfer Time Machine backup from one external drive to another

    Surely this has been covered, but I can't find it.
    If you have your time machine backup on an external drive and get a new (larger) external drive, what is the best way to transfer the backup from one drive to the other (and define the new drive as the backup drive)? Straight copy ? Then to define the new drive, rename old drive to something else and name new drive the backup name?

    I haven't tried this yet but a few other methods are described at http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20071128055047339

  • Errors when transferring my Time Machine backup to an external drive.

    Hello,
    I need some help transferring my Time Machine backup to an external drive. Let me explain what happened.
    I have a Mac OSX Mountain Lion that was upgraded to Mavericks when the upgrade came out. Prior to upgrading, I've been backing up  WD Passport Mac with the proprietary software "WD Unlocker on it". It worked flawlessly but after upgrading to Mavericks, I decided to backup and noticed that once i inserted the WD Passport, my screen will flicker, windows will close and reappear.
    I decided to read up on this and discovered that Mavericks is not compatible with the "WD Unlocker " program on the Passport drive. Since I already have a backup in place, i decided to restore my computer to factory settings and when I attached the Passport drive with my backup on it, My device will see the backup but it will keep spinning for hours without restoring my backup. I decided to read further on this and I got the same Mavericks compatibility conclusion.
    I then copied my entire backups.backupdb folder to my Mac desktop and formatted my WD Passport external drive and got rid of the proprietary software "WD Unlocker".. Once this was completed, I then tried to copy my backups.backupdb folder to my external drive within finder. Each time i tried, i get error messages and permission messages. Even when i changed the permission on the backups.backupdb folder to read & write for everyone, i still get the permissions error.
    Please helppppp. I have over 500gb of vital data in my backup.
    Thank you.

    Since you don't really have a question, I will give you a very broad information source for the next time you have a Time Machine question.
    Please visit Pondini's Time Machine FAQ for help with all things Time Machine.
    Oh, you cannot use a computer whose only disk drive is the target of a an OS X cloning operation regardless of what software is used for the clone. You can, however, use the source drive except if you try to clone using Disk Utility.

  • Transfer Time Machine backups to a new drive

    Is there an automated or an easy way to transfer my current Time Machine back ups to the new Time Capsule (I am sure I will inevitably buy it]. Looks like a great system for notebook users but I wouldn't like to start again with time Machine I like having the security of back ups I have already accrued. My current drive is certainly not full and won't be for a while.

    So far not very many people have had much success in copying their Time Machine backups to a new drive although the Restore option in Disk Utility ought to be able to do this. However, SuperDuper will support that capability when their new Leopard compatible version is released which should be in a week or so.
    http://www.shirt-pocket.com/SuperDuper/SuperDuperDescription.html
    http://www.shirt-pocket.com/blog/

  • Does Time Machine backup other external hard drives?

    I am using a Seagate 500 GB to backup my data. Will Time Machine backup another external hard drive on which I store my iMovie projects? If so, how do I access them in the Time Machine mode? Thanks in advance.

    nachdenki wrote:
    strange, my external HDs were added to the exception list automatically. maybe because they wouldn't fit on the time machine volume.
    It seems to depend on when the drives were connected. When you first turn Time Machine on, it only excludes the TM drive itself, and any drives not formatted HFS+.
    If you connect a drive later on, that drive will be excluded automatically.

  • Can Time machine backup an aperture datatbase ?

    Hi to all of you,
    I am new to Mac and new to aperture 3.
    Can Time machine backup an aperture datatbase ?
    I have set up time machine to back up my mac an though I was out of trouble until I heard someone saying this is not the case.
    So can TM backup the database ? When is it open?
    If not what else can I do ?
    Dag

    Ailish Eklof wrote:
    Inside the Aperture Library, there are a few large databases that are marked as changed anytime you do many common things inside Aperture. Even a very small change can cause several of these large files to be backed up, and it will consume a fair bit of space.
    One of the big changes under the hood in Aperture 3 is that the main database file has been split into several smaller ones, but more importantly the thumbnail file that existed for each Project and was changed each time any adjustments were applied in that Project has been split into a number of smaller files.
    Using TM to backup the Library is still going to use space relatively fast, but not as fast as it did with Aperture 1 & 2.
    Ian

Maybe you are looking for