After partitioning external drive network Time Machine instance can't back up

This is a re-post with additional background information requested by several responders:
I recently added a G-Speed Q RAID array to my MAC PRO to use exclusively for back-up with Time Machine. I purchased this RAID array from the Apple store, so assume that means it's acceptable to use for this purpose. Maybe that's a bad assumption on my part. In any event, it worked great with Time Machine on my MAC PRO. The G-speed array is connected to my Mac Pro via Firewire 800 port for now. I am awaiting delivery of an eSATA expansion card for the Mac Pro which I intend to switch to when it arrives. In any event, it is not configured or capable of acting as an NAS device. It is a shared external drive on the MAC PRO.
My next step was to share the external device over my hardwire gigabit LAN with my wife's iMAC so she could back-up with Time Machine as well. It also worked great. Both Macs are connected via hardwire gigabit, supported by an Actiontec Q1000Z router. The LAN performs flawlessly for all other purposes, including over 30 network devices connected via either hardwire or 802.11n. Both machines are running Lion 10.7.4. (not server)
I then started reading posts that suggested the two Time Machine instances would compete for space on the back-up array and eventually it would fill up and I'd have problems. The solution, everyone says, is to partition the external drive and assign one to each Time Machine back-up. It makes perfect sense to me. I did this following the step-by-step instructions (#22) from Pondini's site. Both partitions are formatted with MAC OS Extended (journaled). Everything seemed to be working great until the remote client tried to run back-up. The remote Time Machine instance fails with the "Disk does not support AFP featues" error message.
Current status is as follows, local time machine back-up works fine on its partition. Remote machine finds and connects to its assigned partition once I provide correct user name and password, but fails while Time Machine is "searching for backup device" with the AFP error message. The remote (sending) machine is connecting as a dedicated user and not as "Guest".
I can write test files directly to the remote back up partition from either mac and I can read, modify and save files directly to this partition from either mac.
Please let me know if any additional information related to configuration is needed. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

In my "dispute" with Pondini in the other thread, I came across some information that will certainly explain things, but not in a good way.
Apparently you cannot use an external drive as a Time Machine repository. People who use Snow Leopard and Lion Server to provide Time Machine services have already discovered this.
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3327294
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/2472139
It may work better when your eSATA card comes in. My theory is that a Thunderbolt RAID would show up as an internal drive and would be useable as a Time Machine repository. There is a chance that an eSATA card would do that too. You'll find out. Apparently, one of the things you get with Lion Server is a warning pop-up if you try to use an external drive with Time Machine.
While I'm a big fan of Time Machine, I still consider it Apple Black Magic. You can use it, but don't get too clever. I don't like to take chances with backups. Simple is usually better. Time Machine isn't simple, but it is so convenient that I like to ignore the incredible complexity of it.
If the other machine were a notebook with local snapshots I might say you could manually plug it in to do backups. With two iMacs, I would recommend just getting another external drive.
Perilous to us all are the devices of an art deeper than we possess ourselves.
- Gandalf

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Had to wipe my drive so I could do a clean install of snow leopard Now I look every where on how to move bookmarks, address book and I cal settings. I have them back up on a external drive with Time machine but can not move, copy or restore my old sett d

Had to wipe my drive so I could do a clean install of snow leopard. Now I have look every where on how to move bookmarks, address book and I cal settings. I have them back up on a external drive with Time machine but can not move, copy or restore my old settings. The instructions I have found or no help or needs more clarafication on what to do.

Use migration assistant to move your files. http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4889

Re-partition external drive for Time Machine

When I originally connected my external drive to my iMac I partitioned it for Time Machine and a media library for my iTunes. I decided to put iTunes back on the main drive to increase space on the external drive for my Time Machine backups. I have deleted the Media partition but the iDisk Utility will not allow me to increase the size of the Time Machine partition. (There is no "drag" graphic/option). Any help would be appreciated. I do not want to lose the backups I currently have on the external drive.

I've gone thru steps from this link I posted in a different forum.
http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=11538480#11538480

Partitioned external drive for Time Machine and Daily storage

Now that I've partitioned my I Terabyte external drive to two partitions using the disk utility with one partition for Time Machine and one partition as my new "hard drive"...my internal drive on the MacBook almost filled....I wanted to move...pix, movies, music..etc to the new drive and have all future storage pointed to that drive not the internal drive....need to have space available on the original drive on the MacBook....How do I move existing stored data and point ongoining saved music..files...etc to the new drive...???
Thank you...Bob

Yogabob wrote:
Now that I've partitioned my I Terabyte external drive to two partitions using the disk utility with one partition for Time Machine and one partition as my new "hard drive"...my internal drive on the MacBook almost filled....I wanted to move...pix, movies, music..etc to the new drive
You could use an application like CarbonCopyCloner or SuperDuper to copy them to the new partition, but it's probably just as easy to drag the files/folders to the new partition, then delete the originals.
and have all future storage pointed to that drive not the internal drive
You probably don't really want to do that. Files you're using will be accessed much faster if they're on your internal HD.
Another consideration is, you really should have backups of the moved files somewhere, in case you have a problem with the new drive. Although TM will back them up unless you exclude that partition, if the drive fails, you'll lose both copies.

Partition external drive for time machine

This deals more with Time Machine in general rather than Time Capsule, but this seems like the place to post the question. Is is possible to make Time Machine only use a certain amount of space on your external drive for backups? Basically, I use the same external drive for my backups and for storing other large files and videos. Time Machine always uses up every last bit of spare space, so every time I want to add a new file I have to go in and manually delete an old backup to create space for the new files. Is there a way to allow Time Machine to only use a certain amount of space for backups, say 300GB, and leave the rest of the drive available for my other uses?

Hello coltonbh. Welcome to the Apple Discussions!
Yes, but you will basically only have two choices to do so:
1) Temporarily remove the TC's internal drive (voiding your waranty); repartition it, and then, reinstall it, or
2) Create a disk image on the TC's internal drive the size you need for file storage. Time Machine backups should leave this image alone. The only problem is that Windows/Linux will not be able to access these disk images ... so this would only work for Mac clients. You would create a disk image using the OS X's Disk Utility, not through the AirPort Utility.

I've used an external drive for time machine which has important files on it. After trying to back up my computer, it suddenly needed to be "repaired" by utilities. Now it's not being "seen" at all! How do I recover my important files off the drive?

I've used an external drive for time machine which has important files on it. After trying to back up my computer, it suddenly needed to be "repaired" by utilities. Now it's not being "seen" at all! How do I recover my important files off the drive?

If the external drive can be seen at all in Disk Utility, follow the instructions for repair here.

Brand new iMac 23.GHz Intel Core i5. Mounts external drive for time machine, then dismounts after backup is complete.

brand new iMac 23.GHz Intel Core i5. Mounts external drive for time machine, then dismounts after backup is complete.

The warranty entitles you to complimentary phone support for the first 90 days of ownership.
If you bought the product in the U.S. directly from Apple (not from a reseller), you have 14 days from the date of delivery in which to exchange or return it for a refund. In other countries, the return policy may be different. If you bought from a reseller, its return policy applies.

Here's a very basic question about 2 TB external drives and Time Machine.

Here's a very basic question about 2 TB external drives and Time Machine.
Ihave a Mac Pro with a .75 TB and 1 TB drive. It also has a 1 TB 2ndinternal drive. My current external drive is too small so I'll begetting a 1.5 TB or 2 TB drive.
Obviouslythe new larger 2 TB drive will backup everything on the Mac Prointernal drive with Time Machine. But there will be 1 TB of space leftover going to waste.
ShouldI partition the external drive so that the TM portion will be 1 TB andthe use the remaining extra partition for additional file backups withCarbon Copy?
Thanks for any insights.
I tried searching around on the new Apple discussion forum, but I find it much harder to use than the old forum I used to use.

The problem with terabyte drives is that that a 3 TB is about as big as you can get without going into RAID territory. Ideally, a Time Machine drive should be 3 times as large as all the drives you are backing up. So, if you have 2.75 TB of internal storage, you should have 8 TB of Time Machine space.
Of course, that is "should". If your TB drives are mostly empty, then you can get away with something 3 times the size of your used disk space. Just remember that you are pushing it. Linc is right about Time Machine needing space to work.
It is unlikely that you have regular churn on 2.75 TB of disk. I suggest identifying which drives and folders have the most activity and excluding those drives and directories that don't change much. It would be better to archive the data that doesn't change often and keep it out of Time Machine. Then you may be able to get away with a 2 TB Time Machine drive.

Question about 2 TB external drives and Time Machine.

Here's a very basic question about 2 TB external drives and Time Machine.
I have a Mac Pro with a .75 TB and 1 TB drive. It also has a 1 TB 2nd internal drive. My current external drive is too small so I'll be getting a 1.5 TB or 2 TB drive.
Obviously the new larger 2 TB drive will backup everything on the Mac Pro internal drive with Time Machine. But there will be 1 TB of space left over going to waste.
Should I partition the external drive so that the TM portion will be 1 TB and the use the remaining extra partition for additional file backups with Carbon Copy?
Thanks for any insights.
I tried searching around on the new Apple discussion forum, but I find it much harder to use than the old forum I used to use.

John,
I'm not sure why you posted in the iMac forum so I'm going to attempt to get you to the correct spot. I would recommend reposting in the Time Machine Forum, this is part of the OS X forums (Leopard or Snow Leopard) because you are using Snow Leopard (your profile indicates you are) please click Apple Support Communities and type Snow Leopard. Then you can narrow the search down by clicking Refine this List.
Roger

Adding a Dedicated External Drive for Time Machine

Hello,
I want to use a dedicated external drive for Time Machine backup and another drive for a SuperDuper backup. Before even adding another drive, I'm already pulling and replacing usb connections from the back of my computer.
Can anyone tell me if a splitter is a workable solution? Something like this:
7-Port USB High-speed Hub with Splitter Cable -- http://www.shop4tech.com/user.htm?go=view_item&id=8997&r=183 -- or perhaps other recommendations ..
Thanks.

...I recall reading that USB 2 was faster ... but I think they said faster than FW 400, but the drive I have is FW 800.
USB2 is 480mbps and Firewire400 is 400mbps. On paper, this would appear that USB2 is faster than Firewire400. But USB2 cannot handle large data transfers very effectively. I can't explain the technicals, but suffice to say that the figures I gave of 40min-versus-2-hours-for-25GB is typical of Firewire400 versus USB2.
Firewire800 is 800mbps, so would potentially be even faster. However the physical hard drive that's installed in the Firewire enclosure would be the bottleneck as a normal "platter" hard drive is much slower than Firewire400 or 800. If it were an SSD drive, then you'd likely see a very significant difference.
But regardless, USB2 cannot keep up with a large data stream like Firewire can. Potentially USB3, which is up to 5Gbps, would be faster than either Firewire 400 or 800, although I suspect would be on par with Firewire3200 in the real world. However since there are no adapters for either USB3 or Firewire3200 for the Mac, it's a moot point for now. (Your drive is not USB3, there are only a few USB3 drives available, and you'd need a Mac Pro to add the adapter in anyway, if they existed.)
So are you saying that FW 800 is faster than USB 2.0 -- and that I should be using the FW connection to get better throughput? And that I can resume daisy-chaining multiple external drives through the one port?
Definitely Firewire would be faster than USB. And I have 5 external hard drives daisy-chained through a single Firewire800 port on my Mac. So daisy-chained Firewire is the way to go.
Like I said, for the small, incremental, hourly Time Machine backups, the speed difference is insignificant. But when the day comes that you have to restore your hard drive, (i.e.: hard drive dead so you buy new blank hard drive. Or you just want to replace with a larger drive,) if say your Time Machine backup is 80GB, that restore would probably take several hours over USB2. On my Firewire400 drive, my 100GB Time Machine restore of my Macbook Pro took about an hour and a half. (The data transfer was about an hour, but OSX took awhile after that to finish up the restore.) YMMV, of course, but IMHO, use Firewire over USB2 as much as possible. If you're lucky enough to have a Mac Pro or iMac and can use multiple internal hard drives or eSATA, then that would be even faster than Firewire800. Only owners of a Macbook Air or non-Firewire Macbook should resign themselves to USB2.

External drive to time Machine

Can I backup an external drive in Time Machine if it's directly connected to Time Capsule? I thought that I could but in checking my Time Machine backups, I don't see the external drive.

Time Machine cannot backup any network drive.. that means the TC internal drive or a USB plugged into the TC or anywhere else on the network.. it can backup an external drive plugged directly into the computer.. so you need to relocate the drive from the TC to the computer.

My 320GB external drive for Time Machine now only has enough capacity to keep a backup of one day. All my other backups are gone. What can I do to fix this situation?

I've been using a 320GB external drive for time machine for the last several years. The backups always worked fine and when necessary I was able to look at & restore older data from the time capsule. Recently, I keep getting the message that a backup cannot be completed and an older backup will be deleted. Usually this wasn't an issue because I still had several months of information on disk. Now a one-time backup takes up 315GB and therefore I only have a backup of the previous day. I don't understand this because I thought that the backup only saves information that has changed and doesn't copy everything everytime. What do I need to do to get my backups to a reasonable size so that I can keep at least 1 month data stored on it.? Please don't tell me I need a larger drive ... that would be too easy.

Get a larger drive for your TM backups.
The recommended size is 3 times what you are backup. So if 315 GB is a backup then you need a 1 TB drive.
Allan

Do I need to use all the hard drive for time machine or can I partition it

Do I need to use all the hard drive for time machine or can I partition it

You cannot partition a TC disk.
See pondini about mixing data and backups.. but remember this.. the TC has no way to back itself up and TM cannot backup files on the TC. Anything not backed up on the TC will be lost at some future point.
http://pondini.org/TM/TCQ3.html

Using the same external drive with Time Machine on new mac?

I recently got a new mac because my old one broke. Thankfully, I had a fresh backup on Time Machine ready to restore onto my new computer. But when I try to use Time Machine with my new computer, it keeps wanting to do a whole new backup. It won't recognize the latest backup to only add new or changed files.
Here's a breakdown of my events:
new computer
restore Time Machine on new computer at install
want to continue using the external drive with Time Machine from where I left off (only adding new files since the last backup) on my new computer
Time Machine wants to do a whole new backup
Question: How can I continue to use my existing external hard drive with Time Machine on my new computer, picking up where I left off (not a new, complete backup)?
My old computer was Snow Lepoard, my new one is Lion.

Bergers wrote:
new computer
restore Time Machine on new computer at install
That should have left a "trail" in your SystemMigration log, so Time Machine can figure out what happened and automatically "inherit" the old backups. But sometimes, obviously, that doesn't work.
Since it didn't, there's a chance you can do it manually. See #B6 in Time Machine - Troubleshooting.

Can I use a 2tb external drive with Time Machine to backup my Mac Mini (256gbSSD + 2tbHDD)?

Can I use a 2tb external drive with Time Machine to backup what I have on my Mac Mini?
My Mac Mini has one 256 SSD and one 2tb HDD. I want to use Time Machine to do a backup of everything.
Would an external 2tb My Passport Drive by Western Digital work for the backup?
It seems like it would not work because the total storage on the Mac Mini is 2304 gigabytes (SSD + HDD).
And the external Western Digital drive is only 2048 in gigabytes versus 2304 gigabytes the Mac Mini has.

No. A Time Machine backup drive should have at least twice the capacity of the drive it backs up. You would need at least a 4 TB backup drive for Time Machine.
Might I suggest as an alternative that you not use Time Machine but a third-party backup utility that simply overwrites older files with new ones such that the backup drive can be the same capacity as the drive backed up.
Suggested Backup Software
1. Carbon Copy Cloner
2. Get Backup
3. Deja Vu
4. SuperDuper!
5. Synk Pro
6. Tri-Backup
Others may be found at MacUpdate.
Visit The XLab FAQs and read the FAQ on backup and restore. Also read How to Back Up and Restore Your Files.

After partitioning external drive network Time Machine instance can't back up

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