External hardrive/time machine

Hello,
I am a little new to the imac world.
I am a photographer and have lots and lots of files that need to be backed up without me having to worry if I am going to loose them or not.
I am confused right now by having to do this manually.
Can you guys recomend a good/big external hardrive that will work with both pc's and macs? and that will hold up thousands and thousands of raw files?
Also I am trying to figure out how to set up time machin and I am not sure how, can anyone give me some advice on this? will it save EVERYTHING stored on my mac? I want to make sure all files on Finder, Aperture, iphoto, imovie etc are all backed up into time machine.
Thank you for any help you can give me!
Delfina

First, if you wish to share the external drive across platforms, it cannot be formatted for Mac (HFS+) or Windows (NTFS).
Common formats are FAT32 and exFAT (aka FAT64).
FAT32 will work with Mac and Windows systems back into the mists of time. However, the format has a limit of around 4GB per file, which may be a problem.
exFAT works with later versions of Snow Leopard and subsequent, and with current Windows systems (I believe it can be added to XP too). There is no file size limit (for all practical purposes).
In your case I would suggest a minimum 2TB drive formatted exFAT if both your systems support it. (NOTE; format the drive on the Windows machine and check it works satisfactorily on both before commiting important files to it).
Getting the files there will require third-party software if you wish to do scheduled incremental backups, but there could be problems there if the contents are modified on Windows and the drive subsequently backed up from the Mac.
I would endorse the idea of using a multiple drive station either directly connected or NAT, with a mirrored pair of drives. I wouldn't use a striped array.
Time machine cannot be used in this way - it needs to be formatted for Mac only. It will back up selected categories, including the entire drive if you so specify, but it's not intended for use as a storage drive - restoring files from TM should be done within the TM environment.
Read Pondini's FAQ on TM; http://pondini.org/TM/FAQ.html
Note that you'll need a HD at least twice the size of the internal for best results with TM.

Similar Messages

How to use an external as Time Machine backup that was previously a Time Machine backup

My MacBook Pro drive died a few months ago. Thankfully it was fully backed up to an external with Time Machine. I seem to grab something from the backup every week from various libraries, but I now need to back up my new drive. I am cheap and do not want to buy yet another external especially as the older backup is a TB and nowhere near full. Does anyone know if I can use the old external with the old HD back-up as a back-up for the new drive without having to erase and reformat (i.e., keep the old HD back-up in tact)? Thanks in advance for a response.

You can use it, provided there's enough space, but to be safe you really need more than one backup.

External Harddrive, time machine issue

alright im sure this is gonna seem sorta confusing but here it goes. right now i have a 160GB hard drive, and 40 GB of stuff on my 250GB external harddrive. all of it is full. and now i was wondering if i could back up the 200 GB of info (160 on hard drive and 40 on external) onto my external hardrive using time machine because i have i still have 210 GB left on my hard drive. hopefully this makes sense. thanks!

First, if you have 210 GB of free space and wish to backup 200GB of data, it won't work - the TM backup drive should be about twice as big as what you want to back up to allow for expansion as newer backups are made.
Second, I'm not totally sure about this, but I don't think you can have a TM backup drive that contains the backups AND other data and have that other data backup as well. In other words you can't have TM backup data from an external drive to the same drive (otherwise it will backup the backups).
You can have files on your external drive and also use the rest of the external's free space to backup your 160GB internal drive.

Migrate Data from External (non time machine) backup to new HD

I have a late 2007 iMac that HD went bad. Only 51 sectors were bad and I was able to Carbon Copy off 99% of the data onto an external drive. I have gotten a new HD installed and have restored the Lion OS. My question is, How do I migrate all of the data that I was able to save to new system so everything is there? For example, all of my saved emails, Pictures, desktop, etc, etc.
Thanks for any help that you can give.
P.S. I tried renaming the Applications and System folders out of the way, starting the new drive at a "T"arget drive on the iMac and then copying those two folders (What would copy) onto the new HD on the iMac ... unfortunately it didn't show any success.
Thanks again!

Okay, I have finally completed the task that I set about trying to complete a week ago.
I reformatted the drive s instructed above as one partition of GUID Mac OS Journalled format.
I then wanted to clone my Time Machine back up hard drive to the new hard drive in Disk Utility. When I tried using the restore function, it would copy all the back-up's that had been created using "Backup", but would error out on the first app when copying the time machine backups.
Confused, I then tried Carbon Copy Cloner and it too errored out, but on the third app in the apps folder of the first time machine back up file.
Before giving up I tried to clone the hard drive using Super Duper!
11 hours later I now have a perfectly working cloned hard drive. I redirected my time machines to the new hard drive and it backed up to the correct folder as if nothing had changed. So all is good now and I just wanted to thank everyone for their advice.
Thanks.
PS. I have no idea why DU and CCC errored when copying... but at this point, I don't really care. It worked with Super Duper!

I just backed up my 1TB (mostly full) internal hard drive to an external 1TB Time Machine drive, and it says I'm fully backed up. Why is the Time Machine drive only half full?

I have a 1TB internal drive in my MacBook Pro (15", mid-2009, running Snow Leopard). A couple days ago I decided to format my unused 1TB external drive and use it for Time Machine, so I could wipe/format my internal drive for the Mavericks upgrade I've been putting off. Time Machine backed up the entire drive, and it appears to have successfully worked! Except that Finder shows 157 gigs free on my internal drive and 463 gigs free on the external... I'm hesitant to erase everything in case some stuff didn't get backed up and might disappear. A Google search tells me that Time Machine doesn't compress files at all... so where the heck did those 300 gigs go? Is there really 300 gigs of stuff on my internal drive that Time Machine just decided didn't need to be backed up?

By default Time Machine will not back up all files, i.e. temp file, cache, and system files. Also you can set Time Machine to exclude some folders/files, take a look at this link for more information. http://pondini.org/TM/11.html

External drive (Time Machine) password is spontaneously incorrect

I've been making Time Machine backups to a Seagate 1.5TB USB-2 attached external drive for about 2 years, and about 3 weeks ago the backups began to fail due to "incorrect password" for the external drive. I thought the drive connection might have just gotten dropped, so I plugged in my administrator's ID and pwd only to get that rejected. I then rechecked the appropriate fields in my pwd manager, re-entered the same data, failed again, tried permutations of the ID and pwd, tried other adminstrative identities in case something had gotten wrongfully plugged in, and it has all failed. I looked in my keychain and found that there have been several pwd changes to the drive in the last couple of years, all numeric pwd's vs. my alpha-numeric pwd, so I tried the most recent of those (from July 2012) and it too failed. I have had Sophos anti-virus running for at least the last 2 years plus our system is behind a router, and after this password problem, I ran a Sophos scan to see if malware was present -- all was okay. At this point, these are my concerns/questions:
I can't access my Seagate external drive at all.
Does anyone know what is going on with the spontaneously changed pwds?
How can I correct the pwd changing problem and regain control of my external drive?
TIA,
Bradley

A powered hub connected to your Mac should be fine. There are rare complaints about hub incompatibility but they are not specific to Time Machine, just equipment in general.
If it doesn't work you will know right away.
Read this post that I just answered for more information on AirPort Extreme and Time Machine:
Airport extreme back up problem

Using external HD & Time Machine

Obviously cannot leave the external HD plugged in all the time on portable laptop so Time Machine can do its hourly backups so will Time Machine still work if I do twice weekly manual backups?
I have read Time Machine can do snapshots when on battery power is that only on batt power or does it do them anyway and then when the external HD is plugged in again then transfer the snapshots to the disc?
First time Mac owner so all is new, wonderful & confusing!!
Thanks

Read the link below for more information on snapshots.
http://support.apple.com/kb/ht4878
Allan

Lacie external drive time machine error

I'm using my Lacie external drive (2TB) for my time machine. And it has this problem that every time after I put my macbook to sleep, the time machine won't work, it keeps showing this message "error occurred during back up" (but it doesn't not specify what kind of error). And the time machine can't recognize the history backup from the drive.
However, it will function again if I eject the drive and replug it in.
It's not a major problem, but it's kinda annoying and I wanna know what's causing it.
Thanks yall.

Hi George,
The one way I found to get the TM back on the rail is to access my back up disk from finder, choose the sparse disk image. Hit cmmd-delete and banish it.
Start over again. Be sure to be connected by a wired connection as on a wireless network it will take a while. But I guess you have the HD attached via firewire or usb so it should not be a major issue.

Transferring iPhoto Library to External Drive/Time Machine

Hi LarryHN and Terrence Devlin (and any others who can answer my questions);
I have successfully transferred my iPhoto Library for the first time to an new external drive (thank you LarryHN and Terrence Devlin for your awesome threads). Would I be able to do this again when my iPhoto Library on my laptop requires another transer without changing the first transfer?
However, another part of LarryHN's thread is that the iPhoto Library transfer to an external drive is not a back up, why is it not considered a back up? I am trying to utilize Time Machine (also for the first time) but they are recommending I use an external drive with nothing on it (as they would be wiped out). Luckily I haven't wiped out my iPhoto Library on my laptop and am willing to re-do that after I set up Time Machine.
I appreciate your recommendations!

If you're running the library on the EHD as your working library then it's not a backup, it's your working copy.
To have a backup you must have two copies of the the working library on different hard drive. so to use Time Machine you need a dedicated HD just for it. When set up TM will backup your MB Air hard drive and any other EHD connected to it.
If you need to run your library from an EHD because your MBA doesn't have enought room and you want to use TM to backup your files including the iPhoto Library you'll need to have 2 EHDs.
So where do you want to run the library: on your MBA or on the EHD?
If you intend to run the library on your MBA make sure it's up to date and then reformat the EHD as OS X Extended (journaled) with Disk Utility. Connect it to the MBA and launch TM. It will ask if you want to use that drive for you backup and click yes. From there it's automatic. The first backup will take a while so have your MBA plugged in to a power outlet and let TM do it's thing.
This website has the best information on TM available: Apple OSX and Time Machine Tips
An alternate solution would be to use a backup application that can make incremental backups like Synk Pro. It will copy only those new or modified files from your working library to the backup copy on the EHD. I use it and have it configured to do the copy as soon as I quit out of iPhoto to keep the writing to disk at a minimum. Synk Pro will backup any selected file or folder you select so it doesn't have to be the entire hard drive if you don't want it. Personally I think TM would be a better solution for you as it will backup other files that may be important to you, i.e. music, documents, movies, etc.
OT

Partition of external HD - Time Machine & Aperture

Good day all,
I bought an external HD (1TB) and I formatted it in FAT 32, so I can use it for both Window and Mac.
I also copied all my files in it.
When I tried to select it as Time Machine disk, I received the message that the HD needs to be re formatted as it is formatted for Window.
In order to use the same external HD for Time machine, can I make a partition in it and use it?
If I am going to create the partition, should I be worried about the data in the disk? I do not have a backup of them yet.
In order to use it also for Aperture 3, should I create a third partition?
Many thanks
Marco

In theory, Time Machine can back up to a Mac-formatted volume on a drive with the MBR partition scheme.
In practice, it often doesn't work well, if at all.
Your best bet may be to get another drive and use it only for Time Machine. Also note that Time Machine cannot back up the other drive, with the FAT32 format.

Brand-new 2TB WD external for time machine

Hi, all, and thanks for the help in advance.
I've got a 1-month old iMac backing up currently to a 500GB external, which I am planning to replace with this new 2TB drive. It is going to connect via firewire, and I am planning to use the whole thing just for time machine.
A couple of questions:
1) I've never had a drive this big, and was planning just a single partition - are there strong reasons why I shouldn't do that?
2) This drive is "supposed" to be ready for Mac use, but I have no confidence, and all the info is pre-loaded on the drive. Once I plug it in, can I just go through the standard disk utility steps to reformat/ repartition?
3) Have others used the large MyBook drives in this fashion? I'm batting 50% currently on bringing over my 500GB drives from the PC and really need this new one to work more smoothly.

Apple sells MyBook drives at the Apple Store, so they must work, at least most of the time.
I would also look at some options from a Mac-specialist vendor, such as OWC.
http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/firewire/
(1) If you need the full 2TB size for the Time Machine backup volume, then it should be one big partition. If you only need about 1.5TB for Time Machine, it may be useful to have a separate partition (volume) for general storage use or as scratch space. Note: You can use the Time Machine volume for storing other files and folders.
(2) Mac-ready just means it is pre-formatted for Mac, using +Mac OS X Extended (Journaled)+. A drive that is formatted for Windows can be made Mac-ready by using the Partition tab in Disk Utility.
Once I plug it in, can I just go through the standard disk utility steps to reformat/ repartition?
Yes, with one exception - if this drive is a RAID that uses two 1TB drives.
If it is a normal single drive external drive, just go to Partition tab in Disk Utility. Reset the +Volume Scheme+ to the desired number of partitions. Click on the Options button to make sure +GUID Partition Table+ is selected. Back on the main window, name the volumes and set their format to +Mac OS X Extended (Journaled)+. Apply the change. It should take less than one minute.
If you are having issues with one of your PC-formatted drives, and you did not do all the steps noted above, you should try it again.
(3) As I mentioned, I have seen these WD MyBook drives (versions that come with Mac formatting) being sold at the Apple Store, so Apple must have tested them. For a FireWire drive, I tend to trust the Mac-oriented vendors more (OWC, LaCie, Macally, etc.). For USB 2.0 drives, just about any drive should work fine with a Mac.

External Drive Time Machine and other files

I want to use an external drive for time machine and storing other files. Does time machine need the external drive exclusively or can one also put other files on the drive?

A backup strategy is one of individual choice. By having more than on HDD for your data, you are distributing the risk
I have 5 external HDDs. One is dedicated to Time Machine, the others have data that simply takes up too much room on the internal drive in the MBP (mostly video). Some of the data that I have on these HDDs is redundant copies of what I have on the MBP and in Time Machine. This is data that is important to me. This may seem excessive but I would argue not.
Ex: my iTunes is on the internal HHD, Time Machine and also on my secondary MBP (and the iPod). That for me is important an I do not want to lose it.
I have seen too many instances on this forum where individuals have lost data without adequate backups looking for answers on how to retrieve that information only to be disappointed. Please don't let that happen to you. Given enough time, ALL HDDs will fail!
Ciao.

External HD/time machine back up

How do I look at data that was backed up on an external HD? The application cannot be opened because it is in a time machine back up.

Did you use iMovie or import them with iPhoto?
iPhoto by default stores imprted item deep in its library folder structure. So the movies might be there but they are in the iPhoto Library.photolibrary Package (which is really just a folder with many sub-folder but Apple does like users looking in it so they make it a Package).

365 gig used, 1TB external HD-Time Machine bu fail -claims to need 1.3TB...

I have an iMac with a 500 gig internal hard drive. We have used close to 365gig of that.
I originally tried to set Time Machine up with a couple of older/smaller external HD's. Time Machine told me that it needed 800gig to back up.
I purchased a 1TB LaCie external hard drive.
Tonight when I tried to set up Time Machine it failed and said it now needed 1.3TB.
I have now read through various discussions on sizing the drive for backup and generally it is suggested that 2 to 3 times is fine.
It is also noted that there is no way to restrict this size other than by excluding items. I would prefer to not do this as the point is to back up our entire music, photo and video libraries.
Also, it appears that once set up Time Machine works with the size of back up drive you have and deletes older backups.
I am reluctant to now purchase an additional hard drive, to find that it now needs even more space as the space required seems to be growing exponentially.
I seem to be locked into a catch-22 situation of Time Machine requiring space at a faster rate than I can buy a hard drive.
Any advice?
My ideal solution is telling Time Machine to restrict the size of the back up somehow. I realize, based on previous discussions that this does not seem possible.
1.3TB of back up for a 365gig seems excessive.

How many disks are connected to the system?
Is it possible that Time Machine is trying to backup more than
one disk (if there is more than one)?
Dave

3 TB external for Time Machine backup of /new/ 2 TB HD

i feel like i finally got things to stop moving around with my 2 year old move to mac and i am wondering the following:
i have a 3 tb external that is backing up my MacPro internal Snow Leopard drive that is 1 TB. I also have an additional 1 TB internal drive that is running a clone backup using CCC.
i would like to upgrade to Lion and have 2 - 2 TB Black Caviar drives that i am considering using to replace the 2 - 1TB drives listed above.
should i start my TIME MACHINE backup to the 3 TB drive /fresh/ and should i expect problems with a new 2 TB primary drive?
I just can't see dropping more cash on an even bigger drive but at the same time i could use the extra space with the 2TB primary drive.
TIA

Not to worry.
See item #E3 of the Time Machine - Troubleshooting *User Tip* at the top of this forum.

External hardrive/time machine

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