Can I Use Time Machine With Carbon Copy Cloner?

As of today, I upgraded my iMac (and eventually my Macbook) to Snow Leopard. I used Carbon Copy Cloner to create a clone of my drive to my external (I did a clean install) and now that Snow Leopard is installed, I only want to put back on to my computer just certain files, such as a select selection of my documents, some of my iTunes library, etc. Given that I couldn't find that option in Migration Assistant, I just manually copied over what I wanted from the clone on my external.
Still, I would like to keep a daily backup for my iMac's HD and that's where Time Machine comes in, but there's some questions I have before I do it:
Given that my iMac's HD now has significant free space (as I only brought back, say, 10% of the stuff to my iMac from my external when I cloned on CCC), if I enabled Time Machine to back up my iMac's HD stuff, it wouldn't overwrite the 90% of stuff on my external with the 10% that's on my iMac's HD, would it? For instance, I have about 20,000 songs on my external drive, but maybe have brought back only, say, 5,000 to my iMac (for now). Given that my iMac's iTunes Music folder shows 5,000 songs on it, when TM backs that up to my external drive, it won't overwrite the other iTunes Music folder which has the other 15,000, right? The same thing could be applied for documents, photos, etc. If not, how would TM deal with that? I would hope to avoid the other extreme, which are duplicate files/folders.
I guess I just want to be able to have the ability to get into that cloned drive on my external if I need to add more stuff to the iMac or if I need it one day to boot up the machine. But I also want to be able to have Time Machine at hand to back up daily the little that is on my iMac right now. So I suppose I'm wondering how can I achieve this without the two conflicting or screwing up?
Thanks!

MM1010 wrote:
when TM backs that up to my external drive, it won't overwrite the other iTunes Music folder which has the other 15,000, right?
Correct. Time Machine won't delete anything else on the same volume.
But as Barry says, it will use all the empty space available, before it starts deleting its oldest backups, so there will eventually be a conflict. See #3 in Time Machine - Frequently Asked Questions (or use the link in *User Tips* at the top of this forum). Also see #1 there, to be sure you have enough space for Time Machine to keep a reasonable "depth" of backups.
A better bet, however, would be to use a separate external HD. If you have the Time Machine backups on the same physical HD, when it fails (and they all do, sooner or later), you risk losing both.

Similar Messages

MacPro wont back up to Time Machine or Carbon Copy Cloner?

I am running 10.6.8 on my 2 x 3 Ghz Intel Mac Pro with 10 Gb of Ram. I have been backing up my two internal drives to an external 2 Tb WD for over a year using time machine and it would lose the drive every once in a while but I could get it back. Now after multiple erasures and reformats I can't get Time Machine or Carbon Copy Cloner (not at the same time : ) ) to run any faster than 1Gb/13min. Just my big ol' music drive will take 6 days at that speed!
I know there is something wrong for these speeds to be this slow. Does anyone have any suggestions of ways to speed up transfer and get the data flowing freely like it should or even theories about what's going on? I am using USB 2.0 from the drive to the tower. Cheers.

First what interface did you use? USB2? can't and expect any decent backup performance and forget zeroing a drive. FW800? on some WD MyBook, yes.
I would if possible move it into a FW800/400/eSATA drive case from OWC.
Add a PCIe SATA + USB3 CalDigit card and use that.
Move the drive inside an option? some WD MyBook can't, were built around the external drive case.
Your profile is out of date 10.4.11 is way old and didn't include TimeMachine (10.5 Oct 2007)
Lion and ML are better at Disk Utility and managing disk drives.
I use WD Green, very inexpensive, but no MyBook (yet, maybe USB3 NAS some day).
Why keep your data on one drive that has been beaten to death and not try a WD Black or couple other drives - or do you have those just not listed? Clone your system, clone your data, and even a spare TimeMachine... but I would go with two system backup drives. That is safe, and covers anyone's important system and media and digital library needs.

I am trying to get an answer to whether or not I can successfully use Time Machine with an external HDD connected to an airport extreme? Some forums say yes, some say no.

I am trying to get an answer to whether or not I can successfuly use Time Machine with an external HDD connected to an airport extreme. Some forums say yes, some say no. I'm also curious about formatting the hard drive to work both on my wife's MacBook Pro and my PC. Any help would definitely be appreciated.

You may be going on a recollection, that I share, that at one time Apple stated this would be possible:
In fact, Apple’s Time Machine Web page touted this very capability as recently as last Tuesday, as you can see from Google’s October 16 cache of the page
Effortless meets wireless. With a hard disk connected to your AirPort Extreme Base Station, all the Macs in your house can use Time Machine to back up wirelessly. Simply select your AirPort Disk as the backup disk for each computer and the whole family can enjoy the benefits of Time Machine.
But if you look at the current Time Machine page on Apple’s Web site, that text is nowhere to be found.
That was a long time ago, it has never been officially implemented, and at present they specifically say it cannot be done.
In summary, it may work, but probably won't, and even if it does it may not be reliable.
Reference:
Disks that can be used with Time Machine
Time Machine can’t back up to an external disk connected to an AirPort Extreme, or...
and
Mac OS X v10.5: Time Machine doesn't back up to AirPort Extreme AirPort Disks

Can i use time machine with a airport extreme and a external hard drive

I have connected a hard drive to my airport extreme.
Now i would like to use time machine to back up my computers, and would like to do this on the hard drive which is connected to my airport extreme.
Next step is that i would like to be able to approach my external hard drive via the internet.
Is this possible or not?

Both are possible. However, Apple does NOT support Time Machine backups to AirPort Disks attached to the 802.11n AirPort Extreme Base Station (AEBSn). Doing so will potentially lead to data corruption and is highly not recommended. Please check out this excellent Pondini article for more details. This article also provides the Apple Support references that states Apple's position. Bottom line? If your backups are critical to you, then you may want to rethink your backup solution.
As far as accessing the AirPort Disk from the Internet, the following is the basic steps to do so:
Start the AirPort Utility > Select the AEBSn, and then, note the IP address shown.
Select Manual Setup.
Verify that Connection Sharing = Share a public IP address is selected on the Internet > Internet Connection tab.
Select Disks, and then, select File Sharing.
Verify that both the "Enable file sharing" and "Share disks over WAN" options are enabled.
Verify that Secure Shared Disks = With a disk password. (Recommended)
Verify that AirPort Disks Guest Access = Not allowed. (Recommended)
Select Advanced, and then, select the Port Mapping tab.
Click the plus sign to add a new port mapping.
For Service, select the "Personal File Sharing" option. (Note: This option would only allow Mac clients to access the AirPort Disks. If you want both Macs and PCs to connect, you would need to leave this field at its default value and enter the appropriate SMB ports to the mix of ports to be opened.)
In the Public UDP Port(s) and Public TCP Port(s) boxes, type in a 4-digit port number (e.g., 8888) that you choose. In the Private IP Address box, type the internal IP address of your AEBSn that you wrote down in step 1. In the Private UDP Port(s) and Private TCP Port(s) boxes, type 548. Click Continue.
In the Description box, type a descriptive name like "AirPort Disk File Sharing," and then, click Done.
Click on Update.
To connect to the shared AirPort Disk from a remote location using a Mac:
From the Finder > Go > Connect to Server.
Enter the Pubic (WAN-side) IP address of the AEBSn, followed by a colon and the Public port number that you choose in step 11 of the previous procedure. For example: afp://www.mydyndnsdomain.com:8888 or afp://123.456.789.123:8888
Click Connect.
You should be prompted for your user name and password. The user name can be anything you like; the password should be the Disk password for the AEBSn that you created in step 6 previously.
Click Connect.

How can i use time machine with a network drive

I have a Western Digital Net N900 wireless router with a 2TB internal H/D. How can I get Time Machine to reconize it?

Relying only on TM to me is iffy but I would bet you have clones in addition to TM like I do. I agree with everything you said but to the OP question, it is possible. A time capsule or AEBS+HD are pretty similar but one is officially supported while the later is not.
Since I'm rambling a bit I will add this. I only use TM for the times I delete something and then wish I had it back. All my restores or migrations are done from my clones. One clone is made weekly and is a snap shot of my system. One clone I keep remotely located and is updated monthly.
My system:
Internal 1TB
Ext HD1 2TB (1TB data, 1TB clone)
Ext HD2 2TB time machine backup (internal + HD1 data, not the clone)
Remote 1TB clone
I'm fully redudant with my method and it has saved me before.

I can't use Time Machine with a USB drive plugged into an Airport Extreme.

I connected an external drive to the USB port of an Airport Extreme, intending to use it with Time Machine and one of the laptops in the Wi-Fi network (call it Laptop). The drive is visible from the Disks tab of each computer’s Airport Utility but from nowhere else, in particular not to Laptop’s Time Machine preference.
Laptop is relatively new and arrived with Mavericks. Time Machine used to work on Laptop before I upgraded the rest of the network (a desktop Mac Pro and another laptop) from OS X 10.6 to Mavericks.
The drive is formatted as Mac OS Extended (Journaled). I have tried other external hard drives, with the same behavior. The desktop correctly use Time Machine to back up its internal drive to another internal drive. Another possibly relevant factor is that our DSL connection has recently been upgraded, and now uses a 2Wire modem that provides its own router, so Airport Utility’s Network Router Mode is set to “Off (Bridge Mode)”.
I would be grateful for suggestions of what to try next.

Here is one from Pondini, who was the foremost Time Machine expert in the world.
http://pondini.org/TM/Airport.html
And another from Apple. Info near the bottom.
AirPort base stations: About USB disks
And another miscellaneous from Apple:
AirPort base stations: Time Machine hard drive compatibility

Can I use Time Machine with a Network Storage Drive?

I just picked up this drive http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Macally/NSA2S350NAS/ and I would like to use Time Machine for backups, and also use a different location on the drive for sharing files on our network. But this article http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?path=Mac/10.6/en/15139.html says that network server must use AFP. How do I set that up? I just have a simple network using a 4 port wireless router. I have no idea what protocol the network is. I just use the "Network" option to connect to my new drive at smb://192.168.1.105.
Is this going to be possible or do I need to buy some other backup software???

On a Mac G4 I'm running OSX leopard with Time Machine. I have my other Mac (8600)networked. The 8600 was upgraded with a G3 Sonnet and IDE card, so it'll support OSX and large hard drives. I want TM to back up to the 8600, is this possible?
Thanks

Can i use time machine with a hard drive connected to the airport extreme?

Just wondering if there is any news on this since the last post was in 2008.
The Apple website info regarding the Airport Extreme mentions attaching a hard drive to the Airport Extreme, but I can't see whether that could be used for a Mac using Time Machine.

You can attach a hard drive, but Time Machine backups to a drive at the USB port at the AirPort Extreme are not supported by Apple, so it's not possible to say what your actual results might be.
If you decide to try this, it would be wise to have a secondary backup plan in place as well.
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?path=Mac/10.6/en/15139.html

Finder crashes when backing up time machine or carbon copy cloner

I'm trying to create backups of my system, i did have time machine running to a secondary drive internally, but that stopped working at some point and i assumed it was a bad partition.
Everytime i try to create a backup through timemachine it would crash the finder (though it would never create a crash report, just hang) i'd have to hard crash my machine to get it running again.
I verified and repaired any permissions, dumped pref files but still no joy.
I've now bought 2 new drives for clone / backups, thinking the drive is perhaps corrupt.
My plan was to use carbon copy cloner and clone the main hdd as a safety,( incase it was a time machine issue) but its doing the same with CCC-
when i hit clone the finder window pops up asking for my admin password, but beachballs and wont let me type anything. i can select anything with the keyboard (i.e. Jump between programs, or force shutdown running apps) i can shutdown using the file menu but i can close any open windows.
I can copy files manually, but i want a bootable backup of the main hdd (i'm a video editor and reinstalling an entire suite is not good when on a job)
Can anyone suggest a workaround to cloning the main hdd (even if it does have a bug in it, i'd rather have something safe before i do a fresh install)
Cheers

That should read 'CAN'T select anything with the keyboard or finder'

Back up options? Time Machine or Carbon Copy Cloner? What's Better?

Hey guys,
I'm considering performing a clean install of OS X Mavericks on my macbook pro mid 2010. I've been having a lot of lag issues with opening/switching programs and slow browser performance (Safari, Google Chrome, Firefox). I'm currently using Time Machine to back up my macbook pro, but I recently heard of Carbon Copy Cloner as a back up option from the Apple community forums. What do you guys think is a better option? When I do a clean install of Mavericks, which backup option will give me the safest and quickest file transfer?

TM is a system backup, not an archive or best idealized "all data backup"
Carbon Copy and Super Duper are for making system clones for quick recovery of your internal HD
NIETHER are close to "best" or idealized data-only backups or archives, theyre both system emergency backups / restores.
External NAS or HD data collections are for your expanding data archives and backups.
Methodology to protect your data. Backups vs. Archives. Long-term data protection
Data Storage Platforms; their Drawbacks & Advantages
#1. Time Machine / Time Capsule
Drawbacks:
1. Time Machine is not bootable, if your internal drive fails, you cannot access files or boot from TM directly from the dead computer.
2. Time machine is controlled by complex software, and while you can delve into the TM backup database for specific file(s) extraction, this is not ideal or desirable.
3. Time machine can and does have the potential for many error codes in which data corruption can occur and your important backup files may not be saved correctly, at all, or even damaged. This extra link of failure in placing software between your data and its recovery is a point of risk and failure. A HD clone is not subject to these errors.
4. Time machine mirrors your internal HD, in which cases of data corruption, this corruption can immediately spread to the backup as the two are linked. TM is perpetually connected (or often) to your computer, and corruption spread to corruption, without isolation, which TM lacks (usually), migrating errors or corruption is either automatic or extremely easy to unwittingly do.
5. Time Machine does not keep endless copies of changed or deleted data, and you are often not notified when it deletes them; likewise you may accidently delete files off your computer and this accident is mirrored on TM.
6. Restoring from TM is quite time intensive.
7. TM is a backup and not a data archive, and therefore by definition a low-level security of vital/important data.
8. TM working premise is a “black box” backup of OS, APPS, settings, and vital data that nearly 100% of users never verify until an emergency hits or their computers internal SSD or HD that is corrupt or dead and this is an extremely bad working premise on vital data.
9. Given that data created and stored is growing exponentially, the fact that TM operates as a “store-it-all” backup nexus makes TM inherently incapable to easily backup massive amounts of data, nor is doing so a good idea.
10. TM working premise is a backup of a users system and active working data, and NOT massive amounts of static data, yet most users never take this into consideration, making TM a high-risk locus of data “bloat”.
11. In the case of Time Capsule, wifi data storage is a less than ideal premise given possible wireless data corruption.
12. TM like all HD-based data is subject to ferromagnetic and mechanical failure.
13. *Level-1 security of your vital data.
Advantages:
1. TM is very easy to use either in automatic mode or in 1-click backups.
2. TM is a perfect novice level simplex backup single-layer security save against internal HD failure or corruption.
3. TM can easily provide a seamless no-gap policy of active data that is often not easily capable in HD clones or HD archives (only if the user is lazy is making data saves).
#2. HD archives
Drawbacks:
1. Like all HD-based data is subject to ferromagnetic and mechanical failure.
2. Unless the user ritually copies working active data to HD external archives, then there is a time-gap of potential missing data; as such users must be proactive in archiving data that is being worked on or recently saved or created.
Advantages:
1. Fills the gap left in a week or 2-week-old HD clone, as an example.
2. Simplex no-software data storage that is isolated and autonomous from the computer (in most cases).
3. HD archives are the best idealized storage source for storing huge and multi-terabytes of data.
4. Best-idealized 1st platform redundancy for data protection.
5. *Perfect primary tier and level-2 security of your vital data.
#3. HD clones (see below for full advantages / drawbacks)
Drawbacks:
1. HD clones can be incrementally updated to hourly or daily, however this is time consuming and HD clones are, often, a week or more old, in which case data between today and the most fresh HD clone can and would be lost (however this gap is filled by use of HD archives listed above or by a TM backup).
2. Like all HD-based data is subject to ferromagnetic and mechanical failure.
Advantages:
1. HD clones are the best, quickest way to get back to 100% full operation in mere seconds.
2. Once a HD clone is created, the creation software (Carbon Copy Cloner or SuperDuper) is no longer needed whatsoever, and unlike TM, which requires complex software for its operational transference of data, a HD clone is its own bootable entity.
3. HD clones are unconnected and isolated from recent corruption.
4. HD clones allow a “portable copy” of your computer that you can likewise connect to another same Mac and have all your APPS and data at hand, which is extremely useful.
5. Rather than, as many users do, thinking of a HD clone as a “complimentary backup” to the use of TM, a HD clone is superior to TM both in ease of returning to 100% quickly, and its autonomous nature; while each has its place, TM can and does fill the gap in, say, a 2 week old clone. As an analogy, the HD clone itself is the brick wall of protection, whereas TM can be thought of as the mortar, which will fill any cracks in data on a week, 2-week, or 1-month old HD clone.
6. Best-idealized 2nd platform redundancy for data protection, and 1st level for system restore of your computers internal HD. (Time machine being 2nd level for system restore of the computer’s internal HD).
7. *Level-2 security of your vital data.
HD cloning software options:
1. SuperDuper HD cloning software APP (free)
2. Carbon Copy Cloner APP (will copy the recovery partition as well)
3. Disk utility HD bootable clone.
#4. Online archives
Drawbacks:
1. Subject to server failure or due to non-payment of your hosting account, it can be suspended.
2. Subject, due to lack of security on your part, to being attacked and hacked/erased.
Advantages:
1. In case of house fire, etc. your data is safe.
2. In travels, and propagating files to friends and likewise, a mere link by email is all that is needed and no large media needs to be sent across the net.
3. Online archives are the perfect and best-idealized 3rd platform redundancy for data protection.
4. Supremely useful in data isolation from backups and local archives in being online and offsite for long-distance security in isolation.
5. *Level-1.5 security of your vital data.
#5. DVD professional archival media
Drawbacks:
1. DVD single-layer disks are limited to 4.7Gigabytes of data.
2. DVD media are, given rough handling, prone to scratches and light-degradation if not stored correctly.
Advantages:
1. Archival DVD professional blank media is rated for in excess of 100+ years.
2. DVD is not subject to mechanical breakdown.
3. DVD archival media is not subject to ferromagnetic degradation.
4. DVD archival media correctly sleeved and stored is currently a supreme storage method of archiving vital data.
5. DVD media is once written and therefore free of data corruption if the write is correct.
6. DVD media is the perfect ideal for “freezing” and isolating old copies of data for reference in case newer generations of data become corrupted and an older copy is needed to revert to.
7. Best-idealized 4th platform redundancy for data protection.
8. *Level-3 (highest) security of your vital data.
[*Level-4 data security under development as once-written metallic plates and synthetic sapphire and likewise ultra-long-term data storage]
#6. Cloud based storage
Drawbacks:
1. Cloud storage can only be quasi-possessed.
2. No genuine true security and privacy of data.
3. Should never be considered for vital data storage or especially long-term.
4. *Level-0 security of your vital data.
Advantages:
1. Quick, easy and cheap storage location for simplex files for transfer to keep on hand and yet off the computer.
2. Easy source for small-file data sharing.
#7. Network attached storage (NAS) and JBOD storage
Drawbacks:
1. Subject to RAID failure and mass data corruption.
2. Expensive to set up initially.
3. Can be slower than USB, especially over WiFi.
4. Mechanically identical to USB HD backup in failure potential, higher failure however due to RAID and proprietary NAS enclosure failure.
Advantages:
1. Multiple computer access.
2. Always on and available.
3. Often has extensive media and application server functionality.
4. Massive capacity (also its drawback) with multi-bay NAS, perfect for full system backups on a larger scale.
5. *Level-2 security of your vital data.
JBOD (just a bunch of disks / drives) storage
Identical to NAS in form factor except drives are not networked or in any RAID array, rather best thought of as a single USB feed to multiple independent drives in a single powered large enclosure. Generally meaning a non-RAID architecture.
Drawbacks:
1. Subject to HD failure but not RAID failure and mass data corruption.
Advantages:
1. Simplex multi-drive independent setup for mass data storage.
2. Very inexpensive dual purpose HD storage / access point.
3. *Level-2 security of your vital data.

Can time machine and carbon copy cloner use the same backup drive?

Can time machine and CCC use the same esata backup drive?

Yes, but you will need to first partition the drive so that TM and CCC will backup to their own respective volumes. This way the CCC volume can accommodate a bootable clone.
Be sure the TM volume has adequate space. A TM backup volume should have about twice the capacity of the volume it backs up.

How can I use Time Machine with my existing network attached storage drives

I am a new mac user switching over from windows and have an extensive amount of existing equipment including 2 network attached storage devices (Buffalo Technologies). I would like to use these with Time Machine, but can not figure out how to do it. When I enter time machine setup it does not show these drives while the Finder does.

As of right now we are all SOL unless you own a Time Capsule. At the very least I wish apple would offer some kind of trade-up if they are not going to release a software update.
It really doesn't make any sense why we can't do this with a standard AEBS. Any fix should just be a matter of software, and while technically apple covered its butt with that little "subject to change" disclaimer on the leopard preview page, pulling it at the last minute and expecting those who believed their advertisement to buy another device that does the exact same thing for more money is just wrong. Give us a break apple, tell us your at least working on a fix, its the right thing to do.

CAN I USE TIME MACHINE WITH A NETWORK HD CONNECTED TO MY ROUTER?

I have a 500gb hard drive connected to my wrt350n router usb port, can i use it with time machine? how can i do it?
do i need to format it for mac?
ones i format my hd would i be able to access from window?

You do not need to reformat the drive - it doesn't matter what format the drive is, as long as you can mount it via AFP, TM will create an image to write to.
See http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=5653763#5653763 for more details.
Bear in mind that this is not supported, so if anything goes wrong - you're on your own as far as Apple is concerned... furthermore, there is always the possibility that a future update will break the existing functionality.

Can you use time machine with 2 drives

I'd like to make two Time Machine backups - one per external drive - so that I can keep one in a different location. Is that possible? When I switch drives will each backup know where to pickup?
Thanks.

Yes, although that's not the best way to keep secondary backups.
See Time Machine - Frequently Asked Question #27 for details.

Can't use time machine with a network drive anymore

I am not able to use my network drive any longer now that I loaded Lion OS. Does anyone have have a work around. I tried the sharing of a folder trick that I had for snow lepard. I have a HP media smart server and 2TB of storage available it seems like a big waste not to be able to backup to a safe place.
Al

Here is one from Pondini, who was the foremost Time Machine expert in the world.
http://pondini.org/TM/Airport.html
And another from Apple. Info near the bottom.
AirPort base stations: About USB disks
And another miscellaneous from Apple:
AirPort base stations: Time Machine hard drive compatibility

Can I Use Time Machine With Carbon Copy Cloner?

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