Is there anybody out there that can answer the question about the backup on the external hard drive?

I need some help please. I have been using an external hard drive to keep my itunes on because the file was so big. I understand that Itunes backs up all of the text, photos, contacts, ect.. everytime you sync your phone. Is this where itunes is storing all this information and if so how do I find it?

Hi,
I agree that the back up file is big and the file you saved was your iTunes Library (%USERPROFILE%\Music\iTunes) but, your iTunes saves your backup data in a different location.
if you are on Windows XP: %USERPROFILE%\Application Data\Roaming\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup
if you are on Windows Vista/7: %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Roaming\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup
so i suggest you also back up those folder(s) in your computer to your external hard drive.(I recommend that you backup the iTunes & MobileSync folder found in AppData as you may need if in the future.)
as for the iTunes Folder found in Music/My Music folder, that is your iTunes library and you should also backup that folder so that in the future, if anything happens to your computer, you will be able to still sync you iDevice on another computer with the same library.
Note: In the Backup Folder, there will be a folder with a very long name. If you have several iDevices backed up, you will find it useful to know that each iDevice has a Identifier (UDID) and that the long name of the folder is your iDevice Indentifier (UDID) and the "-" next to the UDID is the Date followed by the time.
eg.2b6f0cc904d137be2e1730235f5664094b831186-20101016-222905
Meaning UDID was 2b6f0cc904d137be2e1730235f5664094b831186
the Date was 16/10/2010 (20101016)
and the Time was 22 Hours 29 Minutes 5 seconds (222905)
to Find your iDevice UDID, refer to this page: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4061
Hope this helps.
Cheers,
Blueloony

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Is there any way to create a time machine backup to an external hard drive with content already on it? I have a hard drive that i have used for pictures but when i try to run a backup it says i need to start from a blank drive. Can i get around it?

Is there any way to create a time machine backup to an external hard drive with content already on it? I have a hard drive that i have used for pictures but when i try to run a backup it says i need to start from a blank drive. Can i get around it?

It would be much better if you had separate drives for the pictures and Time Machine backups.....but, if you want to use the same drive for both purposes, temporarily move the folder with the pictures to another location for safe storage.
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The instructions on that are here
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Hi
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How can I use Time Capsule for backups and an external hard drive?

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Thanks.

1. Mount the Time Capsule as a drive and drag the application over to it. If the application requires system components, those won't be transferred; if those are only data files, you may be able to drag them over as well and then create a symlink or alias to a folder enclosing their current location.
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(66649)

I plugged in my external Hard drive everything was going fine, I dumped lots of music into it. Now I can find the external hard Drive Icon. I have done a search using spotlight and WD My Passport doesn't show up.

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jnrmendonca
It had 4 years of photos and videos on it.
To what did your camera record those photos and videos - camera's internal memory, inserted memory card, other?
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ATR

Can I put the Bridge Cache on the external hard drive for images being located there?

Hi,
I'm on a MacBook Pro retina.
While I have a 500 Gb hard drive, I notice that the Bridge CS 6 cache is getting larger quickly (looking forward to 1 Terabyte SSDs).
I have most of my images on external hard drives, but Bridge CS6's cache seems to be on my computer.
Can I store the Bridge cache locally?
So, if I have 1000 images on hard drive A, the cache for them would be on hard drive A.
And for 100 TIFFS on hard drive B, the cache would be on hard drive B.
And for the 100 most recent TIFFs I keep on my computer's hard drive, the Bridge cache would be on my computer.
It this what checking the box next to "Automatically Export Caches To Folders When Possible" does or am I misunderstanding this - and this option only puts COPY of the cache files on the external hard drive, but the Bridge cache file on my computer still contains all the images, not matter on which hard drive they'd be?

Pacific 29 wrote:
"Automatically Export Caches To Folders When Possible" puts COPY of the cache files on the external hard drive, but the Bridge cache file on my computer still contains all the images, not matter on which hard drive they'd be?
That is correct as stated above. In efffect you will now have 2 cache the central cache and the folder cache. Purge only affects the central cache. To purge the folder cache you have to click Tools/cache/purge cache for xxx folder.
You can locate your central cache anywhere you want in edit/preferences/cache. You will want to purge the cache before doing this and then change location. THe entire cache will have to be rebuilt.

My Mac is telling me that my disk is full. I have bought an external hard drive and have just listened to a youtube tutorial on how to move iTunes library to the external hard drive. If I do this can I still load new media on my Mac without the external?

my Mac is telling me that my disk is full. I have bought an external hard drive and watched a youtube tutorial on moving iTunes library to external hard drive. Will I still be able to use iTunes on my Mac for new media or will this now only work through my external hard drive?

To do this you need to learn the details of how iTunes works. For example, you just said, "leave my iTunes on my computer". iTunes is the application itself so of course it has to be on your computer. That said, I therefore don't know what you mean when you say leave iTunes on your computer. The phrasing of your question suggests to me, if I may be frank, you don't understand how iTunes works fully and we can't just give you a "do this" answer and have it work out. It would be too easy to make a mess of things.
What are the iTunes library files? - http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1660
More on iTunes library files and what they do - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITunes#Media_management
What are all those iTunes files? - http://www.macworld.com/article/139974/2009/04/itunes_files.html
Where are my iTunes files located? - http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1391
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Another possibility is to make a second iTunes library for material you are archiving and only use that library when the computer is using the external drive. There are tricky aspects to dong that but it is a possibility too.
The simple solution for most people with computers with tiny drives (as most seem to be these days) is to put their whole iTunes library on an external drive and use it from there.

I threw out 24 time machine backups from an external hard drive into my desktop trash and now I can't empty my trash.

I threw out 24 time machine backups from an external hard drive into my IMac desktop trash and now I can't empty my trash.

Since you didn't mention what type of error message you were seeing, I'm going to guess on what is happening.
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Tom

When ever the power goes out or I restart my iMac the external hard drive that is used by Time Machine for backups is dismounted ?

When ever the power goes out or I restart my iMac the external hard drive that is used for backups by Time Machine is dismounted and all backups are gone. I can reselect it and it will start working again, but I am worried if the iMac hard drive should fail will I be left without a backup ?

fzgy wrote:
"Mac OS X can't repair the disk. You can still open or copy files on the disk, but you can't save changes to files on the disk. Back up the disk and reformat it as soon as you can."
It's possible a heavy-duty 3rd-party disk repair app can fix it, but they're expensive (DiskWarrior is about $100), and there's no guarantee it can do it.
Am prompted to reformat but I don't have a good understanding of what this means and how to do it.
That will erase it. See Time Machine - Frequently Asked Question #5.
It sounds very much like the disk is beginning to fail, although it's possible there's a bad port, cable, connection or power supply (if it has its own).
I'd suggest getting a new one, and using it for your Time Machine backups; once you have a good backup there, reformat the old one (and select Security Options to write zeros to the whole drive -- if that fails, you know the drive is toast). Use it for secondary backups, per FAQ #27. If it has failed, get a second new one for secondary backups.

I want to put my iTunes library on an external hard drive but leave my favourite songs on the computer to access without the external hard drive and when using iMovie. Is there a way to do this?

I have filled my hard drive, half with music, half with photos. I want to take my music off, and put it onto an external hard drive. However, I would still like to have access to favourite songs and playlists when the external hard drive isn't plugged in. I would also like to access this music to use with iMovie. Is there a way to do this?

You will have to engage a split library which means you will have to start answering questions on this forum because you will need to learn a lot about how iTunes works in order not that have a big mess at the end of it all. It also won't be easy when the time comes to relocate it all to different drives.
You can go to advanced preferences and turn off organize media and copy to items to media folder when adding items to library. Next read about how to selectively consolidate items to the external drive.
Sept. 2010, Consolidate selected content - https://discussions.apple.com/thread/2589812 and April 2014, https://discussions.apple.com/message/25414357
"...selected the new tracks directly in iTunes, Control-clicked on the selection, and saw that now you can consolidate selected items." - http://hints.macworld.com/article.php?story=20090919000326840
Remember that when you start iTunes without the external drive turned on iTunes will present you with a bunch of broken links. If you have automatic downloads enabled with iCloud you may have to turn that off to prevent iTunes from repopulating your drive trying to deal with those "missing" tracks.
If you add tracks in bunches to iTunes and want them to go to different media folders you will need to either add them by holding down the option key while dragging if the desired media folder is not the one set in preferences, or by changing the media folder in preferences. Changing media folder preferences only applies to new files added, not old ones.
Okay, I am going to stop typing because you might just reply to me, "Oh, okay, forget it," and I don't need the exercise.
What are the iTunes library files? - http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1660
More on iTunes library files and what they do - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITunes#Media_management
What are all those iTunes files? - http://www.macworld.com/article/139974/2009/04/itunes_files.html
Where are my iTunes files located? - http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1391

I have an IMAC and I'm running OSX 10.9.2. I'd like to store my Aperture /IMovie Libraries to an external hard drive. In addition, I'd like to partition the external hard drive so that Time Machine can use it to both back up my IMac and the externa

I have an IMAC and I'm running OSX 10.9.2. I'd like to store my Aperture /IMovie Libraries on an external hard drive. In addition, I'd like to partition the external hard drive so that Time Machine can use it to both back up my IMac and the external library drives. Is this possible? Can I set up a RAID 5 format for redundancy?

I'd like to store my Aperture /IMovie Libraries on an external hard drive.
That is fine and recommended.. use the fastest disk you can afford.. ie Thunderbolt>USB3>FW800>USB2.
In addition, I'd like to partition the external hard drive so that Time Machine can use it to both back up my IMac and the external library drives.
Let me be clear.. you want to partition the one disk.. use it for TM and move your files to the external disk.. and then backup to the same disk.. You can do it.. but that is not a backup.. that is an experiment in how long you can get away with running files and backups on the same disk before you lose everything.. like Russian Roulette.. pull the trigger enough times and laws of probability will do you in.
You must have backups on a different disk .. otherwise it is pointless.
Can I set up a RAID 5 format for redundancy?
No.. you can buy special USB and Thunderbolt external drives that support RAID..
BUT that is still not a backup.. let me show why.. you make a silly move and corrupt your file in aperture.. it is not that rare.
Raid will corrupt all copies of the files.. it is replicated across all disks.
Delete a photo it is deleted across all disks.. you have no recovery.
Alway, always consider RAID system one disk.. backup onto another disk.. and if the photos or movies are at all important to you.. ie your family .. make another copy and store in a relatives house.. There is no such thing as too much redundancy.

Is there anybody out there that can answer the question about the backup on the external hard drive?

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