Create Full HD Backup to encrypted bootable external drive

I have used SuperDuper to copy my internal HD to a bootable external drive configured with a 300 GB partition. Now I want to go one step further by creating that same backup but this time I want my external data to be encrypted for added security. I do not care if the OS and Applications files are encrypted as long as I can encrypt my home folder.
1) Does SuperDuper have an encryption feature?
If yes, how do you activate it?
2) If not, can I accomplish what I want using a Macbook Pro utility e.g. Disk Utility and perhaps
turn on FileVault?
3) Can I simply just turn on FileVault encryption and use Finder to drag my internal HD to external?
If yes, will my external drive now be bootable still?
Thanks in advance.

Turn on Filevault, then use SuperDuper.

Similar Messages

HOw to backup photos on an external drive

I have an Imac and i store my photos on an external drive.
I just purchased a second external drive to use as a backup for the photo external drive. I plan to use Time Machine to backup the Imac.
How do I backup the photos on the external drive to the second external drive
thanks

Yes, dragging them over should do nicely. As for formatting, this is the procedure I use and an explanation as to why. It's slanted toward preparing a drive for Time Machine backups, but it doesn't hurt to do the same for any drive you will be using with the Mac OS. "Glasses", Kappy, and V.K. might have some other suggestions as well.
*_How Should a Time Machine Hard Disk be Prepared?_*
For Time Machine to work properly, the hard disk must be formatted “Mac OS Extended (Journaled)” and its’ Partition Scheme should be either GUID or Apple Partition Map.
Time Machine is incompatible with disks partitioned as Master Boot Record (MBR). Unfortunately, this describes nearly every hard drive you can buy because MBR is a Windows partition scheme. (Naturally, this DOES NOT apply to Apples’ Time Capsule.)
For some, Time Machine begins to perform as expected with a new external hard disk. But then the initial full backup or subsequent incremental backups fail. The user only later discovers the hard disk was still partitioned as Master Boot Record (MBR).
One article on Time Machine made this observation: “Virtually everybody will have to open Disk Utility and repartition the disk as APM or GUID. It doesn't really matter which one because the Time Machine disk will not be bootable anyway. APM allows a disk to boot a PowerPC, GUID allows the disk to boot an Intel processor but both are easily digestible by Time Machine on either kind of processor.” [http://www.girr.org/mac_stuff/backups.html]
It’s been recommended by many here that your reserve +at least+ double the size of your primary hard disk, that way Time Machine backups have room to grow as the size of your data grows. Additionally, the more space you give Time Machine the more history it can preserve. The less space you reserve for Time Machine the sooner older backups & deleted items will disappear.
One poster recommended this regarding multiple partitions: “If you do create multiple partitions (half and half would be a good place to start), make sure you use the first partition for Time Machine, and the second for your own stuff (the first one will be on top in the graphical representation shown in Disk Utility; you'll understand when you see the partition tab). This way, you can expand the Time Machine volume at any later time by deleting the second partition. Disk Utility allows this dynamic re-sizing of volumes, but volumes can only be expanded toward the end of the drive, when a volume that comes after is deleted to create the room.” [http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1712437&tstart=0]
Procedure
Connect the hard disk you wish to use for Time Machine backups.
Launch Disk Utility.
It will appear twice in the pane on the left. (Make sure you recognize that it is different from the 2 icons that represent your Macs' internal drive.) The upper entry represent the device as a whole, including the controller inside. The lower entry represents the hard disk contained within the device.
Click on the upper icon of the external hard disk.
Select the "Partition" tab.
For "Volume Scheme" choose "1 partition". (Choose 2 partitions if you intend on storing other data on the disk besides your Time Machine backups. Ensure that the two partitions have different names.)
Name the disk.
Format should be "Mac OS Extended (Journaled)".
Click "Options".
Select either GUID or Apple Partition Map. (See above for significance)
Click "OK".
Click "Apply". Then click “Partition”.
Once the external hard disk is repartitioned, select it again in Time Machine preferences and use it for your backups. If you chose to create 2 partitions, then select the first partition for Time Machine backups, and the second for additional files/folders.
Let us know if this was helpful.
Cheers!

Unable to complete Time Machine backup to Iomega 1TB external drive

I've read through all the posted topics related to Time Machine failing. I've run Disk Utility without errors; ensured that the external drive is formatted correctly GUID; 1 partition; Mac OS Extended (Journaled); downloaded TimeMachineBuddy; and still cannot get my new Iomega 1TB hard drive to complete a backup. My prior external drive, a LaCie, had no such difficulties but is now full.
Here is the TimeMachineBuddy error report. I am hoping one of you can help me understand what my next steps should be and thank you, in advance:
Starting standard backup
Backing up to: /Volumes/Iomega-BU-02/Backups.backupdb
Ownership is disabled on the backup destination volume. Enabling.
Error parsing SystemMigration.log to determine source volume of system migration.
Backup content size: 82.2 GB excluded items size: 1.2 GB for volume Macintosh HD
No pre-backup thinning needed: 97.28 GB requested (including padding), 930.58 GB available
Waiting for index to be ready (101)
Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandleOperationException:* -[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: Input/output error
Error: (-36) SrcErr:NO Copying /Applications/Adobe Flash CS4/AIK1.1/runtimes/air/mac/Adobe AIR.framework/Versions/Current/Adobe AIR to /Volumes/Iomega-BU-02/Backups.backupdb/Lydia Mann’s iMac/2010-04-06-211444.inProgress/A0522F91-AE77-4536-BE6F-654DA7F2F4B5/Macintos h HD/Applications/Adobe Flash CS4/AIK1.1/runtimes/air/mac/Adobe AIR.framework/Versions/Current
Stopping backup.
Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandleOperationException:* -[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: Input/output error
Error: (-8062) SrcErr:NO Copying /Applications/Adobe Flash CS4/AIK1.1/runtimes/air/mac/Adobe AIR.framework/Versions/Current/Adobe AIR to /Volumes/Iomega-BU-02/Backups.backupdb/Lydia Mann’s iMac/2010-04-06-211444.inProgress/A0522F91-AE77-4536-BE6F-654DA7F2F4B5/Macintos h HD/Applications/Adobe Flash CS4/AIK1.1/runtimes/air/mac/Adobe AIR.framework/Versions/Current
Copied 23.5 GB of 81.1 GB, 36103 of 932234 items

Thanks, Pondini.
I attached a new drive last night. Time Machine prompted me that it needed reformatting, which it did internally, without going to Disk Utility. It then started a backup but hung on "cleaning up" where I found it this morning.
Again, the finder was taken out with the TM hang and I had to hard reboot (on/off button - restart doesn't work nor does force quitting finder).
Here is the sad log from last night's attempt. Since it mentions an entirely new set of failures I am now ready to point to my computer as the faulty party. $180 worth of external drives into this, I am reticent about sinking anymore money into this until I rule out the computer itself. This line "NSFileHandleOperationException:* -[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: Input/output error"
seems to be the essential problem.
Starting standard backup
Backing up to: /Volumes/Time Machine Backups/Backups.backupdb
Ownership is disabled on the backup destination volume. Enabling.
Error parsing SystemMigration.log to determine source volume of system migration.
Backup content size: 176.6 GB excluded items size: 90.1 GB for volume Macintosh HD
No pre-backup thinning needed: 103.69 GB requested (including padding), 930.58 GB available
Waiting for index to be ready (101)
Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandleOperationException:* -[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: Input/output error
Error: (-36) SrcErr:NO Copying / WORK/clientname/pdfs.zip to /Volumes/Time Machine Backups/Backups.backupdb/myname’s iMac/2010-06-29-220723.inProgress/EFF47981-66BF-4C86-BA7F-7F802EC954F2/Macintos h HD/ WORK/KeriGans
Stopping backup.
Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandleOperationException:* -[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: Input/output error
Error: (-8062) SrcErr:NO Copying / WORK/clientname/pdfs.zip to /Volumes/Time Machine Backups/Backups.backupdb/myname's iMac/2010-06-29-220723.inProgress/EFF47981-66BF-4C86-BA7F-7F802EC954F2/Macintos h HD/ WORK/KeriGans
Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandleOperationException:* -[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: Input/output error
Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandleOperationException:* -[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: Input/output error
Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandleOperationException:* -[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: Input/output error
Copied 12301 files (7.4 GB) from volume Macintosh HD.
Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandleOperationException:* -[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: Input/output error
Copy stage failed with error:11
Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandleOperationException:* -[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: Input/output error
Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandleOperationException:* -[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: Input/output error
Error writing to backup log. NSFileHandleOperationException:* -[NSConcreteFileHandle writeData:]: Input/output error
Error: (-36) Creating directory myname’s iMac 2
Error: (-36) Creating directory myname’s iMac 3
Error: (-36) Creating directory myname’s iMac 4
Error: (-36) Creating directory myname’s iMac 5
Error: (-36) Creating directory myname’s iMac 6
Error: (-36) Creating directory myname’s iMac 7
Error: (-36) Creating directory myname’s iMac 8
Message was edited by: lkmweb

While trying to setup a time capsule backup to my MyBookLive external drive, I got the following error message: The network backup disk does not support the required AFP features. What's up with this?

While trying to setup a time capsule backup to my MyBookLive external drive, I got the following error message: The network backup disk does not support the required AFP features. What's up with this?

This means that your NAS does not support the required encryption. Update your NAS to the latest firmware or ditch it and buy a Time Capsule (they are the most reliable when using TM).

Re-Creating Entire System on New Mac From External Drive Using Time Machine

Hi all -
Sorry if this question has been posted, I've look extensively and haven't seen it in this exact form, and I'm paranoid about this stuff. I also can't get a straight answer from Apple store employees.
I travel extensively with my MacBook, and when I'm home, I use Time Machine to back up all data from my MacBook onto an OWC external hard drive.
My question is, if my MacBook is ever lost, stolen, or damaged, and its internal hard drive is no longer accessible, and I have to buy a new MacBook, can I use Time Machine to access the backup data on my external drive and transfer it to my new MacBook's internal drive, thus re-creating my entire system on my new MacBook, including all settings, preferences, files, absolutely everything exactly as it was on my old MacBook?
This is by far the most likely need I'll ever have for this backup data, so if Time Machine doesn't help me to re-create my system exactly as it was on a new laptop, it's not of much use, and I'll switch backup software.
Related question - I read somewhere that Time Machine keeps making backups on your external hard drive until it runs out of space. Does that mean it literally uses up every bit of space on the external drive? Because overstuffing my old external drive is what killed it, and cost me a huge chunk of change and several weeks to get the recoverable data off the drive. Or does Time Machine know enough to stop backing up when there is only "X" amount of space left on the drive, and if so, at what amount of remaining free space does it stop?
Thanks for your help!

If you need to restore everything to a new Mac, you simply have your TM drive connected when you start up the new Mac and during the Welcome routine that runs when you start up a new Mac for the first time you will be presented with the option of migrating your user info, settings, files, applications, etc., from a Time Machine backup. You just click "Yes" and all your backed-up info will be transferred to your new Mac.
Time Machine continuous "cleans up" backups so you do not need to worry about TM pushing a drive to its capacity limits, or even close to that.

Do I need a previous partition for encryption of external drive

and how is it done ?

Without a partition in your external drive, you can't encrypt it. All drives come with at least one partition, so don't worry about it. If yours is not, you can create one with Disk Utility > http://pondini.org/OSX/DU1.html
Respecting to encrypt an external drive, you can do it through Disk Utility. It will give you the option to format it using a special "Mac OS Extended" encryptated format. You can also encrypt it by opening a Finder window, right-clicking it in the sidebar and pressing Encrypt

Holding down the option key when booting my iMac lo longer shows me my bootable external drives, the system just boots up to the main system. Also, holding down command, option,P,R no longer zaps the p-ram. the system just boots up.

Holding down the option key when booting my iMac lo longer shows me my bootable external drives, the system just boots up to the main system. Also, holding down command, option,P,R no longer zaps the p-ram. the system just boots up normally. Why do these key fonctions no longer work?

It could be your timing if on a bluetooth keyboard. I find it best to hit the keys as soon as i hear the chime, release and hit them again but this time holding them before the chime ends....like a fake pump in football.
But....you can always open up system preferences, startup disk, and select your bootable clone for booting. If it doesn't show up there, the Mac doesn't think it's bootable.

Can i resume a Time Machine backup of an attached external drive (no system, just data) on a different laptop?

I am trying to find out if I can use a Time Machine (specifically on a 2013 Time Capsule) backup of an external drive (only data, no system) attached to a laptop, and then connect that same external drive to another laptop and resume the backup? Or is the Time Machine backup of an attached external drive a laptop "dependant" backup?
Additional info: The laptops in question are 15" MacBook Pro and a 17" MacBook Pro from 2011 running OSX 10.9 (Mavericks)

You are welcome.
I don't think there is a need to start a new discussion unless you want to.
You should have more than one backup of each computer. Hard drives do fail. Time Machine can alternate drives or have a Time Machine and a clone.
The concern arises because i was told that when a wireless Time Machine backup is interrupted the sparsebundle gets sort of "locked" or "damaged", and although the backups can be accessed, no further Time Machine backup is possible. One must that a brand new backup.
Apple support article. Don't let the title bother you. Look at Additional Information, which explains what happens when a backup gets interrupted. I also am including a link for troubleshooting. C3 explains what you can try if the backup is interrupted.
Time Machine First Backup Interrupted
Time Machine Troubleshooting

Bootable external drive file removal query.

How do I remove all the stuff from a bootable external drive that require permissions I don't have? Thanks.

The Sharing and Permissions are greyed out. When I unlock the padlock I can only check the "Ignore Ownership on this volume" - Will this do what I want? I am using Tidy up and do not want to delete everything (using for eg. Disk Utility) ... I just want to get rid of much of what I cannot get rid of. Hope that makers sense. Thanks.

Need help repairing bootable external drive permissions

I, like some of the other posters I have read, have messed up the permissions on a bootable external drive.
I don't have direct access to my home computer right now so I set up an external bootable copy of my personal account, so I can basically run a copy of my own personal computer from anyone elses mac. And when I get back home I will be able to copy back across any new files.
The set up was working great till I realized that my external drive was completely readable, and writeable by anyone who turned it on as a peripheral disk while logged in on the main computer if the computer was booted up on it's own startup disk.
If my external was set as the startup disk, then my password and account kept everything secure.
So anyway, not really knowing what I was doing I, using the show info command, changed the group permission for the whole disk/volume from admin to my username. Now unfortunately I cannot startup using my external disk; the whole system goes straight to Kernal. And all my files are still totally assesible to any one logged in on the computer using its own start up disk.
Can you help me with the commands, to first repair the group permission so my disk is bootable again, then second so that I can prevent anyone with out my password access to any files on the disk?
Thanks alot!

Can you help me with the commands, to first repair the group permission so my disk is bootable again, then second so that I can prevent anyone with out my password access to any files on the disk?
On another machine, open the Disk Utility in the /Applications/Utilities/ folder, select your drive in the list of disks, and then click on the Repair Permissions button; other solutions are available if this doesn't work.
Your two goals are mutually exclusive; there is no way to restrict access to an entire disk to yourself while maintaining the ability of that disk to boot Mac OS X. Your home folder can be protected in this way by changing the permissions on the item inside /Users/ with the house icon, or by turning on FileVault in the Security pane of System Preferences.
(11310)

Can I use Time Machine to backup to partition on external drive and a Time Capsule?

Trying to plan in advance...
I was wondering if I can (with a laptop) use Time Machine for both:
1. Creating Time Machine backups on a partiion of an external drive. My plan was going to create 2 partitions: one to be used for Time Machine backups of another external hard drive (that holds all of my media) and then the other partition was going to be a bootable clone of my internal drive (totally separate from Time Machine)
and
2. Also use Time Machine for my Time Capsule, to create Time Machine backups of my internal drive.
Is this possible? I had heard that you can't use TM to make backups to a partition on an external drive, AND use it for another drive (like Time Capsule) at the same time. But I would think that this should be possible-
Thanks everyone-

Yes you can, and if you are using Mountain Lion it's easy.
If you are using Snow Leopard (as in your profile - this is the Mountain Lion forum), you have to manually select the backup volume each time. Tedious, but possible.
Read Apple Support Communities contributor Pondini's FAQ on that subject: "Rotating" Time Machine backup disks

How to format and backup Mac & Windows to external drive

I have a LaCie 1 T external drive. I want to use it to backup both my Mac partition and my Windows 7 partition. The Windows 7 partition was created using Bootcamp. I formatted the drive with exfat from within Lion and then divided the drive into two equal partitions, one for Mac and one for PC. I tried to use Time Machine to back up the Mac data and it seemed to blow away the Mac partition which is no longer visible to Finder and consequently cannot be backed up to. I haven't tried to do anything about backing up the Windows 7 partition. As an aside, one online source I saw said I need to do this setup routine of the external drive from within Windows 7 in order for the drive to be accessible to both operating systems?
Thanks for any help,
Paul Hand

PaulHand wrote:
I have a LaCie 1 T external drive. I want to use it to backup both my Mac partition and my Windows 7 partition. The Windows 7 partition was created using Bootcamp. I formatted the drive with exfat from within Lion and then divided the drive into two equal partitions, one for Mac and one for PC. I tried to use Time Machine to back up the Mac data and it seemed to blow away the Mac partition which is no longer visible to Finder and consequently cannot be backed up to. I haven't tried to do anything about backing up the Windows 7 partition. As an aside, one online source I saw said I need to do this setup routine of the external drive from within Windows 7 in order for the drive to be accessible to both operating systems?
Thanks for any help,
Paul Hand
You need to find a Windows backup software that will work with Apple's Bootcamp partition.
On a Mac, Apple does a hack to "fool" Windows into thinking it's on a PC with a Master Boot Record Partition map.
Mac's can only boot from a GUID Partiton map, so there is a hybid MBR installed into the Bootcamp partiton when you set it up.
Traditional Windows backup software won't work when you try to restore Windows because it expects to be a PC with a MBR and runs Linux to restore Windows with. (a Mac can run Linux if Linux knows it's talking to a GUID)
And You can only image backup Windows, not make it a bootable copy on a external drive like you can do with OS X.
So the external drive needs to be formatted with a GUID Partition map and 2 partitions.
1: OS x Extended (J) so you can use Carbon Copy Cloner to clone Lion to it.
2: exFAT so you can save the Windows image file to it.
Now you need to find software that will run in OS X, take the Windows image of the Bootcamp partiton and restore it. There used to be great free software that did this, but since Lion rolled around a lot of good software wsn't updated anymore, guess people figured Apple is closing up like iPads and didn't see the sense in it.

Partitioning bootable external drive.

I just ordered a 2 TB Mercury Elite-AL Pro Qx2 Desktop RAID setup from Other World Computing (https://eshop.macsales.com/item/Other%20World%20Computing/MEQX2T2.0S/) and would like to create a partition for Snow Leopard on this external drive. I plan to use the drive in a RAID-5 configuration, primarily to serve files for video and audio. The Snow Leopard partition that I would like to put on this drive is mainly to use for testing and troubleshooting my iMacs and Macbook Pro, and for a bootable drive in the event of a drive failure on one of my Macs. Can anyone tell me how large the partition should be and the best way to set this up? Thanks

mstrammd wrote:
I am already using a Time Capsule for backups. I have over a year's worth of backups on the TC. Yes, I could clone the internal HD, but it is 750 GB and >would require the purchase of another drive.
I see. The size of a clone is related to the space used on the drive rather than the drive size.
Besides, current iMac is going to be replaced by one of the new i7 Quad core machines with a 2 TB HD. I am buying the RAID solution to have redundancy of important files and primarily HD video, audio, and RAW image files. What is the >advantage of cloning when I'm already using the Time Machine/Time capsule.
You might as well wait until you get the new machine. Personally, I don't trust TM very much. There are a variety of cases where it fails to do the desired job. A clone is much less likely to be a problem.
I suppose clone would allow a rapid rebuild of the internal drive, but only as a snapshot of a given period of time when it was made. I read some recent reports of some Time Capsules dying after 16-18 months, which is really disconcerting. Apparently there are some bad power supplies out there on some units. That is >what got me thinking about additional ways to protect my data.
I like TM because it provides the opportunity to restore to different dates, but, as indicated, I am not impressed with its reliability. A clone, on the other hand, is, IMO, very reliable. And, using, for example, SuperDuper one can make incremental clones (which really shortens the time required for subsequent cloinings) and schedule clonings. The best procedure, I think, is to use both TM and clones (ignoring also having an off-site backup). I use both, but they are on different drives. So, you may want to get that additional drive.

Disk Utility: Backup to partition on external drive?

Hi people. Would be glad of an answer and any comments on this.
I have 3 Macs at home, a new G5 dual core and 2 G4 imacs, networked wirelessly. At this point I only backup my G5 to a second internal HD, by using Disk Utility's 'Restore' function.
My preferred plan is to get an external Firewire 400 drive, make 3 partitions on it, and do the Disk Utility 'Restore' for the 3 respective Macs. That way it's not only a backup, but a bootable solution if one of the machines dies.
My second choice is to add one of those generic network hard drives to the router and try to back up to that(essentially as an FTP/Samba disk), but it would be slow and not bootable at all.
Question: Will disk utility allow a partition, either on a firewire drive or network drive, to be the destination for a 'restore'? Or will it only recognise whole volumes?

Hi, Daniel.
You wrote: "Question: Will disk utility allow a partition, either on a firewire drive or network drive, to be the destination for a 'restore'? Or will it only recognise whole volumes? "Disk Utility will recognize a volume (partition) on a FireWire drive as the destination for a Restore.
Using the Restore function for backup is quite time-consuming as it has to backup everything every time you perform a backup. You will get much faster results by using a proper Backup and Recovery solution that supports incremental backups, i.e. backing up just the changes from the source to the destination (backup) so that the two are synchronized. For advice on the backup and recovery solution I employ, see my "Backup and Recovery" FAQ.
People have had mixed results using NAS (Network-attached Storage) for backups. I frankly think that it's still a bit early to try that route. Using an external FireWire drive has always given be good results.
Good luck!
Dr. Smoke
Author: Troubleshooting Mac® OS X
Note: The information provided in the link(s) above is freely available. However, because I own The X Lab™, a commercial Web site to which some of these links point, the Apple Discussions Terms of Use require I include the following disclosure statement with this post:
I may receive some form of compensation, financial or otherwise, from my recommendation or link.

HT201250 How can I revert to my internal drive for time machine backups after using an external drive?

Hi. I've been using an external drive for time machine back ups and decided to revert to my internal drive, but it isn't available in the time machine options. The only available option is to set up a time capsule, which I don't own.
Is it because not enough space is available on my internal drive (approx 50GB)?
Thanks!

50 Gb free on your internal drive is relly very low and of course not enought for a any kind of backup.
How big is your internal HD ? If you have left only 50 GB free it is probably 90% full. Let's imagine you have a 500 Gb. This means 450 Gb data and 50 Gb free. How can you backup 450 into 50 ?
Second point. The backup on your internal HD is a nonsense evenif it is big enough. If it stops working you will have no bakup.
Do you have an iMac or a portable ?
The portable automatic uses the internal HD if the external is not connected, but this is intended for a short time.
This could give you some more links to read about https://discussions.apple.com/message/20726927#20726927

Create Full HD Backup to encrypted bootable external drive

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