Back Up vs. Time Machine Vs. Self Back up

Question

First off, I don't know much about macs so I need some help in backing up our computer.
We have a MacBook Pro 10.6.2. It is a little over 3 years old so we don't have Snow Leopard. My husband has been using Backup to back up our info to an external HD. We just got an new external harddrive (Western Digital Passport, 500 G) to replace our old one. Our internal hard drive has a capacity of about 120, of which we have used 91.
We would like to use our external HD as both a place to back up our computer and store things that we don't often use (such as pictures, music etc). We also just got a camcorder. So we would like to put our home video on the external drive as well.
So here are my questions. Do I need to use a program? We have backup (do we have to pay for that every year). I looked at our HD and it seems like we have Time Machine as well. Which one is better or is it not even necessary to use a program? If I don't use a program, how to I go about saving changes that are made or would i need to do frequent full back ups and erase the prior backup? Do I need to partition the drive? If so, how do I do that?
Lots of questions, sorry. I just want to do this right and would hate to lose any of our data. Thanks for helping!
M

Answer 1

missa7894 wrote:
Hi, and welcome to the forums.
We have a MacBook Pro 10.6.2. It is a little over 3 years old so we don't have Snow Leopard.
Are you sure? You've posted in the +Snow Leopard > Time Machine+ forum, and your profile at the bottom says you're running 10.6.2, which is Snow Leopard. But as long as you're on either Leopard or Snow Leopard, you can use Time Machine.
My husband has been using Backup to back up our info to an external HD.
Using Backup to an external HD wasn't a bad idea before Time Machine became available (Leopard), but isn't anymore. Time Machine is about a zillion times better, and Apple recommends it over Backup for that purpose: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1284
What Backup is still good for are backups of relatively small amounts of data to your iDisk, which gets them off-site quickly, easily, and automatically. Things like preferences, settings, address book, a fairly small amount of documents, etc., are good candidates for this.
It's also good for backing-up larger things to CDs/DVDs that you can take off-site.
Time Machine, on the other hand, backs-up your entire system: OSX, apps, preferences, settings, data, etc. It's first backup takes quite a while, since it copies everything. But thereafter, it copies only what's new or changed since the last backup, but keeps the old version. It will do this hourly, if your Mac is awake and the drive is attached. This gives you several advantages:
If you change or delete the wrong file (such as "Save" instead of "Save As"), or a file gets corrupted somehow, you have an excellent chance of recovering a previous version quite easily.
If your internal HD fails, or something else awful happens to your Mac, you can recover your entire system to the exact state it was in at the time of the last backup, once the drive is replaced or other problem is fixed, or a lost or stolen Mac is replaced.
If you install an upgrade that turns out to be a problem, such as incompatible hardware or software, you can also recover your entire system, using any prior backup, even if it's a different version of Leopard or Snow Leopard.
We would like to use our external HD as both a place to back up our computer and store things that we don't often use (such as pictures, music etc). We also just got a camcorder. So we would like to put our home video on the external drive as well.
You can do that, although it's best to partition the drive. See #1 and #3 in the Frequently Asked Questions *User Tip,* also at the top of this forum.
The other consideration is, be sure you have some other way to back-up the data on the "other" partition. You could archive it to CDs/DVDs by just copying, or using Backup.
So here are my questions. Do I need to use a program?
For most of us, it's best. Something that can be scheduled to run automatically (and/or when you attach a disk) is much harder to forget or mess up.
We have backup (do we have to pay for that every year).
If all you're using MobileMe for is Backup, and you have some way to get your most critical stuff off-site, then it may not be worth it. (If you're using the ".me" or ".mac" email address, that's part of the Mobile Me package, too.)
My recommendation would be to do something along the lines of what I do: my primary backups are full Time Machine backups, done automatically (hourly).
My secondary backup is a "bootable clone" via the CarbonCopyCloner app (similar to the SuperDuper app mentioned by NA Smith). These make a copy of your entire system, too, but don't usually contain any past items, so if you delete, change, or corrupt something and do a backup before you notice it, you can't recover it. As posted, they are "bootable," meaning you can start and run your Mac from them normally (if slower) if your internal HD fails. Mine is scheduled to run daily, to a separate HD from my TM backups. Some folks get portable HDs for this, and take them off-site so they're protected against fire, flood, theft, etc.
I also have some items going to iDisk daily, and larger ones to CDs/DVDs that I take to my safe deposit box.
But this is not a "one size fits all" sort of thing; your desires and requirements will be different, so a good strategy for you may be different as well.
For more info on Time Machine, you might want to review these:
Time Machine Tutorial
Time Machine 101
How to back up and restore your files
Time Machine Features
Apple - Support - Mac OSX v10.5 Leopard Time Machine
and perhaps browse the Time Machine - Frequently Asked Questions *User Tip* at the top of this forum.