Can I use the same external hard drive for time machine and storing other files

I have a 640GB external hard drive that I have been using for over a year for time machine backups. My mac hard drive is now starting to fill up and I am looking to move audio, video and picture files to my external hard drive. How do I do this without messing up my time machine backups? Can I do both on the same external hard drive? Do I just make new folders on the external hard drive to move the files I want? Thanks for the help.

If you move the files you will need to get another disk to back the files up to. You don't want to have only one copy of certain files (personal, professional etc.).

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Can you use the same external hard drive for Time Machine backups and as an additional storage drive?

I have an external HD that I've been using exclusively for Time Machine backups. I need to clear space on my hard drive, so I was thinking to move music & photos to an external drive. Wondering if I can use the same one I have (which I'll aslo keep using for Time Machine) or if I need to get another drive.

Hi Jossydtaylor,
Time Machine can use either an entire external disk or a partition of that disk:
OS X Mountain Lion: Disks you can use with Time Machine
http://support.apple.com/kb/PH11171
You can use Time Machine with a Time Capsule, and with USB, FireWire, and Thunderbolt disks. The backup disk can be directly connected to your computer or be on a network. If the backup disk has been divided into partitions, you can use one of the partitions.
If the disk is partitioned using the Master Boot Record (MBR) partition type, some partitions may not be available for use with Time Machine. The GUID Partition Table (GPT) partition type is recommended.
For more info on partitioning, see this article:
Disk Utility 12.x: Partition a disk
http://support.apple.com/kb/PH5845
Cheers!
- Ari

Can I use one 2tb external hard drive for time capsule and file storage?

I would like to use time capsule, but also keep the hard drive on my desktop for file storage. Can I do this?

Apple advises against doing that.
Any data stored on the disk that Time Machine is backing up to can not be backed up.
Plus the data outside of the Time Machine backup database cause problems when Time Machine starts cleaned up old backups to recover space for new backups.
For these reason it is advised that the Time Capsule disk be used for one or the other but not both.
Allan

I have just upgraded from a Macbook to a Macbook Air. I have been using a iomega external hard drive for Time Machine, which use a Firewire. However, Macbook Air's do not have a Firewire port and i cannot find an adaptor anywhere. Can anyone help?? Thanks

I have just upgraded from a Macbook to a Macbook Air. I have been using a iomega external hard drive for Time Machine, which use a Firewire. However, Macbook Air's do not have a Firewire port and i cannot find an adaptor anywhere. Can anyone help?? Thanks

There has never been a reliable firewire ---> USB adapter suitable for external high speed storage. This was a major issue when the MacBooks lost the firewire port a number of years ago (Apple subsequently brought it back).
The only high speed port on the Air is the ThunderBolt port. There are external ThunderBolt drive options out there, but they're somewhat more expensive than traditional USB/FireWire options.

I want to use my 1TB Seagate Hard drive for time machine and transferring files from Mac to PC.

For about a year I've been using my 1TB external hard drive for only time machine. To be honest, it wasn't until today that I tried to connect my hard drive to a PC and realize it isn't compatible. I read about partitioning the hard drive so that it can work both for time machine and transferring files between pc and mac. I'm not what you would call tech savvy, so I was wondering if I can get some advice on how to do this.
Thanks in advance.

To do it, you have to partition the hard disk, so you will have one partition for Time Machine and another one to store files and use them in a PC and Mac. To create the partition, follow these steps > http://pondini.org/OSX/DU3.html
In order to read and write in the external disk on the PC, you have to select "MS-DOS (FAT)" as "Format". If you choose any other option, the PC won't be able to read your external disk. Apart from that, note that you can't use files bigger than 4 GB with FAT. If you want to use the external disk with files bigger than 4 GB, you have to format your new partition in exFAT, and you have to do it on a PC

Is it not recommended to use a partitioned external hard drive for time machine?

1. i hv a 1 tb seagate back up plus hard disc ..,,i want to make partitions for using it for time machine, mac, and window repectively . is it not recommended to use a partitioned drive for time machine? some where i have red that time machine wont be able to restore data from external partioned hard drive in case internal hard drive crashes.
2. if i use the seagate back up plus 1tb for mac only and use time machine to take backup (roughly 250 GB) , then the rest space i cant use to transfer movies, pictures from a PC
3. how should i best use the seagate back up plus hard drive (not seagate back up plus for mac) in a way that i use it for back up , and to work with both mac and PC?

I use a partitioned external drive for Time Machine as well as other things.
How you partition it is a function of yoru needs.
Barry

Can I use a PC's hard drive for Time Machine?

I have upgraded my Apple iBook G4 to Mac OS X Leopard and want to take full advantage of all the applications on the OS. I am wondering if it is possible to use a Microsoft Windows PC's hard drive as the medium upon which Time Machine can use to back up my data. I know that external hard drives will work with Time Machine and so will wireless hard drives, such as Time Capsule.
So, would it work if I was to:
1 - Partition the existing C drive in my PC
2 - Share this partitioned C drive on the Network (my PC has wireless card in-built)
3 - Set up Time Machine to recognise this hard disk as a medium which it can use to back up my data
Sorry if this seems like a stupid question, but if there is a chance I can use a PC's hard drive, especially when the existing PC is hardly ever used, as something which Time Machine can use, then it would make sense to use that then spend money on an external or wireless hard drive.

No. This is not possible on the PC drive without wiping the drive.
Requirements to use Time Machine
Time Machine is only available with Leopard (10.5.x)
1. External FireWire or USB 2.0 drive
2. Time Capsule
3. Drive shared by a Mac running 10.5 or later using File Sharing
4. Drive shared by a Mac running 10.5 Server
5. SAN volume managed by Apple's Xsan file system
A TM drive must be partitioned with either APM (PPC) or GUID (Intel) and formatted Mac OS Extended (Journaled.)

Can I use an external drive for Time Machine and storing other data?

At the moment I have one external drive, a 500gb LaCie. My internal drive is 160gb. I don't think I'll be using all 500 of those gigabytes for a while, so I want to put them to good use. Can I make a partition on this drive and use that for Time Machine, leaving the rest of the drive for my documents and other files? If so, how would I partition the drive? I'm not fluent in Disk Utility and even though I'm pretty sure I know how to do it, I don't want to screw up. Also, how big a partition would you recommend?
While we're here, I have a second question, somewhat relevant to the first. Could I move my Time Machine backups to a second drive if I wanted to? Also, if I used a big drive (say 1tb) could I use Time Machine to backup my current LaCie to a partition on that drive? Thanks in advance.

videoCWK wrote:
Does that also mean that I could back them both up on a very big drive?
Yes. Time Machine will, by default, back up all of your external drives unless you specifically exclude them.
Also, will Time Machine backups eat all my space after a lot of usage?
It depends on what you do on your Mac. If you work often with very large files (video editing, heavy photo editing, big disk images, Microsoft Entourage data file, Parallels disk image file, etc) then your backup drive could fill up very quickly.
I use my Mac mostly for e-mail, web browsing, iTunes, iPhoto, and the occasional iMovie project. I have 92 GB on my main hard drive (60 GB of which are my iTunes and iPhoto libraries, and one iMovie project.) My Time Machine backups consume 155GB on my backup drive, and that's after using Time Machine for a full year.

IMac can't find my attached external hard drive for Time Machine. Any ideas?

I have a Seagate for Mac external hard drive I have been using for my Time Machine backups. Last week it was no longer backing up. I unplugged it, reattached but Time Machine doesn't seem to be able to find it.

Sounds like the external disk drive has died.
If you have access to another computer, try testing it there. If not, you might be able to get the Apple Store to test it for you.

Partitioning 1.2T External Hard Drive for Time Machine and PC backup?

We have a 1.2T Seagate external hard drive. I partitioned it so that I could use part of it for my Time Machine backups and want to be able to use the rest of it for the PCs in the house. I formatted the rest of the space using the Disc Utility and the MS-DOS option. Was this the wrong choice? I can't use the PC space on the hard drive on my PC. It says there are 0 bytes available.
Help?

Fred Elmendorf wrote:
We have a 1.2T Seagate external hard drive. I partitioned it so that I could use part of it for my Time Machine backups and want to be able to use the rest of it for the PCs in the house. I formatted the rest of the space using the Disc Utility and the MS-DOS option. Was this the wrong choice?
no, that was the right choice. I don't know what's going on there. you just might need to reformat the whole drive. also check the partition scheme for the drive. it should be GUID. if it's not GUID repartition the drive with GUID partition scheme.
I can't use the PC space on the hard drive on my PC. It says there are 0 bytes available.
Help?

How to use the same external hard drive for OSX and XP

Hello to all. First off, thanks for all of the helpful comments that have been posted in the discussion board, they have helped me a lot with my problems and curiosities. My question has been touched on in the past, but nothing concrete so I figured I'd ask a bit more specifically.
I recently loaded Windows XP (FAT32)onto my MacBook. Everything is running smoothly, but I was just curious how I could format my external HD so that both operating systems can read it, i.e. I only have 20 GB's partitioned for Windows XP, and i'll be using it to download music and movies. I would like to be able to play these straight from my external rather than use up the disc space. Let me know if anybody can help! Thanks.

Unfortunately, Disk Utility doesn't just move everything around. It has to erase everything, and then resize. I find it a little odd, seeing as other disk utilities can resize everything just fine. Anyway, yes, you will have to erase your drive to reformat it as FAT32. What I usually do is try to copy everything from the drive to free space in the internal drives. I haven't had too much data on my drive yet, so I've been lucky so far. I don't know if you have enough free space on whatever drives you have, but that's probably the best way to do it.
1) Transfer everything over to a folder on the internal drive
2) Use Disk Utility to reformat the drive as FAT32
3) Transfer everything back to the external drive
2.0GHz MacBook 1st Gen Mac OS X (10.4.8) 2GB RAM

Would I be able to use the same external hard drive for Windows and OSX?

I plan to get an external HD to put a lot of my multimedia files on and for backups but I don't know if I'll need an individual one for each operating system. I am going to be running a MacBook Pro with both Windows and OSX through Boot Camp.

jengwall,
No, you won't need more than a single drive. There are several options to meet your needs.
OS X can partition your external, and the formats for the various volumes can be HFS+ (the native Mac format) or FAT-32 (Windows format). While OS X cannot create NTFS volumes, and it cannot write to them, it can read them. Any FAT-32 volumes created in OS X can be converted to NTFS by Windows, if and when you like.
Windows cannot natively read HFS+ volumes, and only the FAT-32 format will be both read and write for both Windows and OS X. However, there are some third-party solutions.
"Macdrive" is a Windows utility that allows it to access HFS+ volumes as read/write. On the Mac side, there is "MacFuse," which gives OS X the ability to not just read, but write to NTFS volumes.
Scott

Mac mini as an external hard drive for time machine??

I have a mac mini from a few years ago and it is never used. I was wonder if it could be used as an external hard drive for time machine. If this can be done how do I go about setting it up for this type of useage?

Thanks for starting this thread. I too am trying to use my old mac mini in target mode to utilize it's hard drive for Time Machine.
I hope to strip it down to just it's OS (10.5) and use the remaining hard drive space for Time Machine backup.
Is it possible to just have it running at certain times for regular back in target mode? Or do I have to keep it on constantly?
I fear having to restart using the "T" command each time. Isn't there a way to just have it sleep and then have the ability to wake it up as I backup or restore?
thanks in advance for any help.
Vince

Can not fine external hard drive for time machine sence lion was installed

I can not fine external hard drive for time machine sence lion was installed, it don't reconise it at all.

I have a Mac Mini (late 2009) and I have an iomega 1TB external hard drive connected to my mini via firewire and usb (usb allows me to use the usb ports on the external 1TB drive to daisy chain other devices). Since I installed Lion, my Time Machine and this 1TB drive (and its partitions) is finicky. Sometimes it is mounted and sometimes it is not. This issue has only surfaced post Snow Leopard and in the Lion era. I am not the first to say this but the whole reason I went Mac was b/c of Vista. I am beginning to think that Lion is the new Vista. Sorry for the latter, just venting... b/c this ain't the first issue with Lion.

Is it possible to use an external hard drive for time machine backup and also as a regular hard drive?

Is it possible to use an external hard drive for time machine backup and also as a regular hard drive?

I am using an external drive in the exact way that you described. You just keep it plugged in to the computer when you want to access the movies and files. In order to put files on it, just go to finder open up the drive under devices and drag and drop files onto the drive. It is just like using a usb drive with a terabyte of space.

Can I use the same external hard drive for time machine and storing other files

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