What size should the back-up drive be?

I'm using a lacie 1TB External firewire drive to back-up my 250gig iMac, I mostly use the mac for email, photos, home use etc. (The drive is almost full, using 230 gig). (Yes I know that's too full and I plan to put in a 500 gig drive). I upgraded to leopard about a month ago and set up time machine recently. There are 17 backups- "lines" in the time machine "star wars" screen- on the external drive totaling 700 gig of data!!
I have not added any pictures or large files since beginning to use Time machine. Should the time machine backups use that much space? I thought after the initial back-up time machine only keeps record of the changes.? Using CCC I could have cloned the hard drive three times and still have room left!
Does the large amount of HD space used to back-up sound ok for only a 250 hard drive?
Joe

Many users here recommend that your TM volume be about two and a half times the size of the data on your main hard drive. So, if you have 400GB of data to back up, you should give TM a 1GB volume for backing up.
But in my experience, how much space you need really depends on your computer usage patterns. My weekly backups go all the way back to January 2008, when I first started. My main hard drive has 115 GB used of 148 GB total. My TM backups of that disk total 168 GB on a 212 GB partition. So I have never needed to have nearly as much backup space as the 2.5 multiplier recommendation.
I try to manage my computer use so that Time Machine is not backing up files I do not want backed up, and is not backing up stuff twice if I move files to a different location. I rarely work with large files (no photoshop, no Final Cut Pro, etc). When I do have large files, they usually start in my Downloads folder. If I want to keep something I download, I eventually move it to a different location. To prevent TM from backing it up twice and unnecessarily using up space on the TM drive, I exclude my Downloads folder from being backed up. I'll let TM back it up after the download is in its new permanent location.
I don't really consider it a big deal to not have backups of the contents of my downloads folder. I figure that if my hard drive breaks and I lose all of my downloads, I can just download them again.

Similar Messages

What size should external back-up drive be for use with Time Machine?

I am very new to Macs.
My iMac has a 500GB hard disc - not much on it yet.
I want to back the hard disc up daily and automatically to an external hard drive using Time Machine. So that I could restore everything if the iMac failed.
1. Does the external hard drive that I buy need to be larger than the iMac's hard disc, e.g 1Tb? Or is 500Gb enough in my case?
2. Should it be pre-formatted for Mac when I buy it? Or do I have to do this?
3. Should it use firewire or USB?
4. Presumably I need to leave the external drive plugged in all the time? Or will this stop the iMac from switching on and off?
I really want the easiest solution possible as I am not very techie and I want the minimum amount of fiddling with it. So I am confused between whether to choose a Western Digital My Book Office edition or Studio edition, 500Gb or 1TB, firewire or USB, or maybe a Lacie?
Would be grateful for advice.
Thanks very much.

Welcome to the Apple forums. If you have a 500G external disk, that will work fine for quite a while with hourly, daily and weekly backups, but sooner or later it will fill up, but then it begins to delete weekly backups. The same will happen with whichever size of external disk you buy: sooner or later. . . . Nonetheless, that disk will be fine for most purposes. I have 250G and use a 200G partition for my MacBook Pro and while that was fine, it tends to delete weekly backups so I have about 6 months of backups stored. (I also make other backups of all data).
It may be preformatted, but that is unlikely. Use Disk Utility (in Applications>Utilities) and use MacOS Extended, which is selected in the Partition tab (you do this even if you only use a single partition).
The system works with either Firewire or USB 2..
You do not need to leave it in all the time. If it is connected, it will make the backups, if not, nothing will happen and it will indicate that the next backup will occur when the disk is attached. To disconnect, you would highlight the disk in a Finder panel and press the Eject icon (not while TM is running of course) then disconnect the cable.
I am not able to suggest which disk is best, although my LaCie one has not missed a beat. Others may have a different idea. Try a Google search with the disk manufacturer's name and "problems" or somesuch. No disk is perfect of course.

What size should the original image be for 100% width so it is responsive?

What size should the original image be for 100% width so it is responsive?

Please check these documents for details :
https://helpx.adobe.com/muse/how-to/muse-optimize-graphics-assets.html
https://helpx.adobe.com/muse/how-to/muse-size-resolution-graphics.html
Thanks,
Sanjit

What size should the podcast picture sent itunes be?

I sent a podcast out and the picture was either too big or too small.
Please take a look and let me know what you think.
Here is my url if you want to take a look.
http://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?id=21276337
Any advise would be great!
Thanks
Pepe

I tried to look at your podcast but iTunes said that it is not current available in the U.S. store.
Anyway, if you are referring to your podcast series "artwork", in Apple's Technical Specification here:
http://www.apple.com/itunes/store/podcaststechspecs.html
...it says:
"iTunes prefers SQUARE .jpg images that are at least 300 x 300 pixels, which is different than what is specified for the standard RSS image tag."

What size should still photos be so no cropping or stretching occurs?

Hi, I want to prepare photos for a slideshow in iMovie HD. What size
should the photos be so no cropping or stretching occurs??
It's the photo prep that is a problem. The photos are like scrapbook
layouts done in Photoshop. They have edges, like borders that I do
not want cropped. I want them to fit exactly. I tested a 12x8 size
and it is letterboxed in iMovie.
I wish I knew the dimensions in iMovie so I can make my photos that
exact size. I have looked everywhere!
Also, I am doing this slideshow to be shown during the half-time show at a
charity football game. They said they need it in AVI format. I
suppose I just make a DVD with the movie as an .AVI exported from iMovie
or via QT.
Thanks!

If you want no black borders to the imported still images in 4:3 video projects, their aspect ratio must be NTSC 720x528 or PAL 788x576 or some larger multiple of those figures (NTSC 1024x751, 2048x1502, 2095x1536 etc, or PAL 1024x749, 2048x1497, 2101x1536 etc).
If you want no black borders to the imported still images in 16:9 video projects, their aspect ratio must be NTSC 875x480 or PAL 1050x576 or some larger multiple of those figures.
See also:
http://www.sjoki.uta.fi/~shmhav/iMovieHD_6bugs.html#stills

I just bought an external hard drive. What files should I back up?

I just bought a 60gig external hard drive and I wanted to know what files should I back up?

The easiest is to drag /Users/<yourhomefoldername> to the backup drive.
Only the files you've created can't be replaced. The rest is on CDs, DVDs, or can be purchased again if need be.
I don't bother with clones because there's always the possibility of trouble down the line if you have to restore from one. (Something could be wrong with the clone, or it could be altered if you have to boot from it.) Why take the chance, when the OS and apps are expendable? And, if you don't test that the clone is good (by restoring to a blank drive), you're just fooling yourself as to its viability.
If the internal drive dies, you take the time to install a new one, load up OS and applications, then copy your home folder back. So your computer will be unusable for a half-day---big deal. This doesn't happen every day.
The main thing is that you've backed up your home folder.

Since installing Lion, I have not been able to utilize Time Machine (does not recognize the back-up drive); my wireless mouse does not function properly; I have experienced unreasonable delays in the system. Is there a fix or upgrade coming?

Is there a fix or upgrade to deal with the many problems I am experiencing since I installed Lion? I can no longer utilize Time Machine (Does not see the back-up drive); my wireless mouse does not work properly; my iMac has slowed down considerably. I am reminded of having a PC machine again. Bummer!

Either downgrade to Snow Leopard or try reinstalling Lion.
Reinstalling Lion Without the Installer
Boot to the Recovery HD: Restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the COMMAND and R keys until the menu screen appears. Alterhatively, restart the computer and after the chime press and hold down the OPTION key until the boot manager screen appears. Select the Recovery HD and click on the downward pointing arrow button.
Repair the Hard Drive and Permissions: Upon startup select Disk Utility from the main menu. Repair the Hard Drive and Permissions as follows.
When the recovery menu appears select Disk Utility. After DU loads select your hard drive entry (mfgr.'s ID and drive size) from the the left side list. In the DU status area you will see an entry for the S.M.A.R.T. status of the hard drive. If it does not say "Verified" then the hard drive is failing or failed. (SMART status is not reported on external Firewire or USB drives.) If the drive is "Verified" then select your OS X volume from the list on the left (sub-entry below the drive entry,) click on the First Aid tab, then click on the Repair Disk button. If DU reports any errors that have been fixed, then re-run Repair Disk until no errors are reported. If no errors are reported click on the Repair Permissions button. Wait until the operation completes, then quit DU and return to the main menu.
Reinstall Lion: Select Reinstall Lion and click on the Continue button.
Note: You can also re-download the Lion installer by opening the App Store application. Hold down the OPTION key and click on the Purchases icon in the toolbar. You should now see an active Install button to the right of your Lion purchase entry. There are situations in which this will not work. For example, if you are already booted into the Lion you originally purchased with your Apple ID or if an instance of the Lion installer is located anywhere on your computer.
Downgrade Lion to Snow Leopard
1. Boot from your Snow Leopard Installer Disc. After the installer loads select your language and click on the Continue button. When the menu bar appears select Disk Utility from the Utilities menu.
2. After DU loads select your hard drive (this is the entry with the mfgr.'s ID and size) from the left side list. Note the SMART status of the drive in DU's status area. If it does not say "Verified" then the drive is failing or has failed and will need replacing. SMART info will not be reported on external drives. Otherwise, click on the Partition tab in the DU main window.
3. Under the Volume Scheme heading set the number of partitions from the drop down menu to one. Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.) Click on the Options button, set the partition scheme to GUID then click on the OK button. Click on the Partition button and wait until the process has completed.
4. Quit DU and return to the installer. Install Snow Leopard.
This will erase the whole drive so be sure to backup your files if you don't have a backup already. If you have performed a TM backup using Lion be aware that you cannot restore from that backup in Snow Leopard (see below.) I suggest you make a separate backup using Carbon Copy Cloner 3.4.1.
If you have Snow Leopard Time Machine backups, do a full system restore per #14 in Time Machine - Frequently Asked Questions. If you have subsequent backups from Lion, you can restore newer items selectively, via the "Star Wars" display, per #15 there, but be careful; some Snow Leopard apps may not work with the Lion files.

What happens when the Time Machine drive is full?

I'm on my second iMac. My first one (G5, 1984) died, and I replaced it early 2010 with an Intel mac. The transition when exceedingly well largely due to Time Machine. I just hooked the Time Machine drive to the new system, and I was soon back up running!
My home folder has 70GB of data. The Macintosh drive has 105GB of data and 395GB free. The Time Machine drive has 220GB used and 30GB free.
1. What happens when the Time Machine drive is full?
2. Do I have control over what backups get deleted?
3. If lightning strikes twice, will I still be able to restore my Intel mac like my G5 mac, even if backups get deleted?
4. Is there anyway to control what backups/backup files get deleted?
5. Any other thoughts?
Thanks.

maxseven wrote:
i have deleted the time machine folders and they are now in my trash. when i try to secure empty my trash it will delete everything but the t/m folders. how do i delete them?
Do you mean all of them? The entire Backups.backupdb folder?
That's a large mess. First, even a normal delete will take a very long time, as there are probably hundreds of thousands, or even millions, of files. Your best bet by far is to simply erase them with Disk Utility -- that will only take a few moments. If your TM drive has a single partition, see #1 in [Formatting, Partitioning, Verifying, and Repairing Disks|http://web.me.com/pondini/AppleTips/DU.html]. If there are other partition(s) on the drive, see #2 there.
If not, and you only deleted some of the folders, you have a different, worse problem. Unfortunately, Apple doesn't do a very good job of warning folks: +*Never move, change, or delete anything in your backups via the Finder or Terminal.+*
You shouldn't have to delete backups at all, since Time Machine will do that automatically when the disk/partition gets full. But you can do it without harm via Time Machine. See #12 in [Time Machine - Frequently Asked Questions|http://web.me.com/pondini/Time_Machine/FAQ.html] (or use the link in *User Tips* at the top of this forum).
A normal delete will take a very long time, as there are probably tens or hundreds of thousands of items, each of which must be individually deleted. A secure delete will take much, much longer, as each deleted file must be overwritten with zeros.

What size should i save my pictures to make a good high def. DVD?

Ok, I am using Elements 10 with Premere 10 to create a DVD high definition movie of our trip to Rome to display on our hi def tv. What I want to know is what size should I save my pictures after fixing them. The JPEGS are usually saved to around 2 mb while the NEF's are saved around 6-11 mb's. I am afraid that the 2 mb files will not retain enough data to show well on the high def TV and maybe the 11 mb pictures may be overkill resulting in long rendering times and larger movie sizes. Anyone have any information on this. Both the Elements 10 and Premere 10 manuals don't address this. The only thing I could find was that they support up to 4086 x 4086 size pictures. Thanks in advance

Hi,
I am not an expert on this subject but since nobody has replied yet, I thought I would give you my current thoughts on the subject so then someone can either confirm it or shoot me down in flames.
If we are talking about a HD TV, they have a screen resolution of about 1920 x 1080 or 1360 x 768 so if your images are greater than that, something has to do some down sizing.
I think that a normal DVD can has a limitation on size of 720 x 480 (NTSC) or 720 x 576 (PAL). To get a greater resolution than that you need to talk about Blu-ray.
The important thing to think about is the aspect ratio. The widescreen TVs are 16:9 and your photos are probably 4:3. If you want a full screen picture without black margins each side then I suggest that you do some cropping first.
I tend to crop to 16:9 aspect ratio (using crop tool) and then resize the image to 1920 x 1080 (using image resize). I use a larger size if I know I want to use pan & zoom effects. I use that size, even though some pixels will be lost, just in case I switch to Blu-ray in the future and it might save a bit of work then.
Hope that helps (and is correct)
Brian

HT4854 What size does the recovery partition need to be for Lion or Mt Lion?

What size does the recovery partition need to be for Lion or Mt Lion?

Maybe I'm approaching the problem the wrong way. My problem is that I installed a new HDD in my laptop after cloning it to a backup drive, and I wanted to install the OS after formatting the drive using Disk Utilities from my desktop machine. Since I had Lion installed from the App Store as a paid download, I thought I'd start with a freshly downloaded install of Lion, but I can't access the internet directly with my laptop since it has no OS or apps. So I'm downloading Lion to my desktop machine hoping to install it on my laptop as a Target HD. Is that possible? Does the App Store download allow choosing which drive to install on?

What happens in the back ground when you schedule a Sales Order?

Gurus,
What happens in the back ground when you schedule a Sales Order?
Assemble to Order scenario.
Edited by: 792050 on May 17, 2011 3:24 AM
Edited by: 792050 on May 17, 2011 3:24 AM

If I merge libraries and then back the merged libraries up onto an external drive or DVD, do I just back up the libraries themselves, or do I also back up the original files?
If you're running a Managed Library, then backing up the Library also backs up the original files.
I ask because my HDD is getting pretty full. I want to reduce the amount of stuff on it, and the iPhoto libraries are the biggest single consumer of space at the moment (Nearly 100GB).
1. Quit iPhoto
2. Copy the iPhoto Library from your Pictures Folder to the External Disk.
3. Hold down the option (or alt) key while launching iPhoto. From the resulting menu select 'Choose Library' and navigate to the new location. From that point on this will be the default location of your library.
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Regards
TD
P.s. If you're running a Managed library, then it's the default setting, and iPhoto copies files into the iPhoto Library when Importing
If you're running a Referenced Library, then you made a change at iPhoto -> Preferences -> Advanced and iPhoto is NOT copying the files into the iPhoto Library when importing.

HT5117 I am producing an ibook with video and jpg images, what sizes should they be?

I am producing an ibook with video and jpg images, what sizes should they be?
<Image Edited by Host>

I and others answered a similar question only yesterday.
There are also many other similar posts and it is advised we first check out "our" problem by doing a search.
I also suggest you download "iBookstore Asset Guide 5" its a pdf and contains all the information you ask for.

HT1366 What size are the two audio ports on an older model MacBook, not MBP?

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What format should my external audio drive be?

Sorry if this has been answered many times before, but I couldn't get a concise answer in my search.
What format should my external audio drive be?
Mac OS Extended (Journaled)
Mac OS Extended
Mac OS Extended (Case-sensitive, Journaled)
Mac OS Extended (Case-sensitive)
Thanks.

Mac OS Extended (Journaling off)
pancenter-

HT5534 What size is the download ? - my router is limited and could not download IOS6

What size is the i work update 9.3?

A few hundred Mb, not sure exactly, just let it run.
It will get there eventually or else go hang off someone else's free WiFi.
An AppleStore is good.
Peter
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What size should the back-up drive be?

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