Is Time Machine necessary in my case?

Hi, I'm new to Mac, and don't fully understand the "Time Machine" feature.
If my computer got some horrible virus and/ or crashed, could I just use the installation CD to fix it? I know I would lose all of my personal files, but I mostly just use the internet and only keep a couple of important files saved on my computer (which I back up regularly on a USB key anyways).
I don't mind starting from a clean (ie. freshly installed OS) computer and losing all of my personal files, I just want to know whether this would actually work in the event of a system crash, or whether there is some special reason why I would also need to have Time Machine.
The Time Capsules seem expensive, and it would be a waste to buy one if all it is not necessary in my case.

Do you need TimeMachine? No. You are absolutely right - if something totally trashes your hard drive you could restore everything using the grey DVD plus all the other 3rd party software you'd have to install separately. And if you actually backed up all your important stuff to a USB flash drive you'd be fine once you manually copied it all back. BUT I'm betting you aren't actually backing up all your important files - email? Safari bookmarks? your keychain? preferences? Address book contacts? Plus there's no telling when disaster will strike so you may spend a good bit of the day online without saving that cool stuff you just located and then bam the drive dies. Oops.
You may just be underestimating how much is involved in setting the computer up again. The last time I started from scratch, installing from the installation DVD plus my other software discs, it took me most of Saturday. Not all of that time was spent sitting at the computer but about half of it was. Entering all the serial numbers was especially a PITA. Last week I installed a new drive in my MacBook and restored from TimeMachine. Total time to complete: 4 hours. Time I spent sitting in front of the computer working: less than 15 minutes.
The great thing about TimeMachine is that it is doing its work every hour without any intervention from you and there's no need to buy an expensive TimeCapsule. An external drive is all you need - depending on how big the drive you choose you may spend $50 - $150 for a decent drive. A FireWire drive is faster than a USB drive but either is fine and the speed isn't that important once the first big backup has finished. I strongly recommend that you let TM backup the entire computer but you could just have it back up your personal drive space. Figure out how much data you need to back up, add a little extra for 'wiggle room' and then double it. That's the smallest drive you should buy. Triple it and that is about the biggest drive you'd need.

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Is "Time Machine" necessary if you have iCloud?

Is "Time Machine" necessary if you have "iCloud" installed on your Mac?

Peatree2 wrote:
iCloud does not actually back up any of your data. Time Machine is never "necessary", but is useful if you want to have a backup of your data.
Time machine may not be necessary, but some form of backup is always necessary, drives fail, laptops get stolen, etc. Operating without backup is just waiting until you lose your stuff!

Time Machine backup failure on case-sensitive disk?

Hello,
I just started getting a Time Machine backup failure error that says "A disk you are backing up is case-sensitive, but the backup disk is not."
None of my external disks have changed and I've not added any new ones.
The error seems to be stemming from the fact that I'm logged in as multiple users on my system, all with MobileMe accounts. When I "get info" on all mounted disks, the only ones that are reporting "Mac OS Extended (Case-sensitive, Journaled)" are the mounted iDisks from the other use accounts that I'm currently logged in as.
Does this mean I cannot use Time Machine while logged in as multiple users, all with the iDisks mounted? That would be a major annoyance to either have to log out/log in to each user as I need them or to disable iDisk syncing in my MobileMe prefs.
Regards,
Terry

That seems odd to me; my iDisk shows WebDAV as the format and doesn't interfere with backups, but I don't have any other users' iDisks, either.
Another possibility would be to reformat your TM drive as case-sensitive. That would, of course, erase all your backups so TM would start over from scratch, and some possible troubles when restoring (see the pink box in #5 of the Frequently Asked Questions *User Tip,* also at the top of this forum, for details); but you'd no longer have the backup problem.

How to erase a dead Time Machine: Necessary? If so, how?

Are Time Capsule Time Machine backups encrypted by default, and if not, how can I erase the Time Capsule if the power supply is dead?
Details:
I bought one of the early Time Capsules (1 GB) two years ago, and it finally died. It just wouldn't light up or start. Presumably, this is due to the well-known early power supply issues, and presumably the hard disk is still in good shape.
I brought it to my local Apple store, and they were great. Although I do not have Apple Care, due to the design flaw with these very early units, they said they will replace it with a refurbished unit for free. (Nice!) It will take a few days. Meanwhile, I have the old dead drive. It occurs to me that I have my whole life on that hard drive, and if someone were to be able to resurrect it and restore the backup to an empty Mac, they would have much information that they shouldn't have.
Yes, I could drill through the case and into the drive, but I don't think Apple would then accept it as a swap. Yes, I could take a big magnet to it, but how do I know it's big enough? (I've been to some sites that claim hard drives are very hard to erase because they case protects them magnetically.)
Someone I spoke with today reminded me that you need an overall disk password to be able to get to the data, and that is true when the HD is working right and you are logging on to the Time Capsule. But does that mean the data is (even lightly) encrypted, or is that just time Time Capsule firmware arbitrating access such that any barrier would go away if you could mount the disk physically?
Any suggestions would be welcome.
Thanks.

Thanks. That's what I'm in the process of doing. I already opened the case, and I'm going to take the drive to work tomorrow where my IT department has an eSATA cable that I can use.
I hesitated in doing this because I felt Apple would consider the case breached and say they couldn't take the unit in swap. However, I spoke with the Genius Administrator at my local Apple store today, and she told me that it is OK if I do that. She was very understanding that I would want to erase the drive before returning it. She just told me to make sure I return the unit as close to original as possible. I used a hair dryer to warm the bottom before peeling it off, and everything will go back together pretty perfectly.
So, this is fully acceptable to me.
Thanks.

Time Machine and a CRY for Help!!!!

Hi
After 25 years being a windows user I finally came over to Apple this month. I bought a IMAC 24" intel 2.88(OS X 10.5.3) and thought I might as well get a Time Capsule (500GB). I absolutely love the IMAC and wish I had got one years ago. My problem lies with the Time capsule. My setup is a Ethernet cable from the IMAC to the Time Capsule and then the same from the capsule to my broadband modem.
Followed the instructions for backing up, which it did after much trial and effort. Only backed up 21GB. Checked that there was a file in the capsule folder. Great I thought I will try the time machine. Screen drops and the stars are moving but that's it. I cant click on cancel or press escape. The only way I could get out of this was to do a hard reset.
I looked back at the Time machine preferences and no sign of a last back up. Checked that the file was still there in the capsule folder and it was. Sorry for wittering on but can someone please help.
thanks in advance
iroth8

While there certainly isn't enough evidence to say for sure, I have to say that I don't think your issue is at all unique to your Time Capsule or your specific configuration. I also just purchased an iMac after using a PC for most of the 25 years or so of home computing (I did have a Mac for a while back in the mid-to-late 80s). I felt like the original thread poster did, I might as well have a backup drive and take advantage of Time Machine. In my case I watched the Apple.com OS 10.5 video and went online and purchased the same G-Drive Q from G-Technology that the Apple Store representative was using. After connecting up the new Ext. Drive using Firewire 800, the popup asked if I wanted to use the drive for backup ... I did want to so I answered yes and sat back and observed my entire Hard Drive being backed up. After several hours, I came back and depressed the Time Machine icon on the Dock and everything worked just like the Video indicated that it would. Unfortunately after 48 Hrs., I came downstairs and noticed my Ext. Drive light was on, but it wasn't making the usual drive sounds it typically had been making every ten minutes or so during the day. I depressed the Time Machine icon and the popup progress indicator said it was connecting to the Server and to Time Machine. This progress bar just kept moving and moving but was actually just "not responding". To make a long story short the only way I could get out of the situation was by learning about a "Force Quit". After doing that procedure, I ultimately had to hold the Power button to shut down the iMac. When I tried to Power back up, all I got was the startup tones and then a white screen. Finely I had to turn off the Ext. Disk Drive and turn it back on again, where upon, everything worked again. I have now gone into the Control Panel and Power Management and unchecked the "Put the External Drive to sleep..." box. We will see over the next few days if that solves the issue or not. In any case my lock up situation was similar enough to your that I thought I would let you know it may not actually have anything to do with your Ext. Drive or its configuration.

In Lion, Time Machine seems to be perpetually running - and running slowly

Up through Snow Leopard, Time Machine did its incremental backup every hour quickly and stopped.
Since upgrading to Lion back in July, Time Machine seems be be running almost all the time - and very very very slowly. There doesn't seem to be any exessive Spotlight indexing going on anymore. That was long ago. So I don't think that's it.
Preparing for backup takes a long time. It take hours to eke through the backup itself, even if there weren't many changes, and finishing backup takes a long time.
I would say each backup, no matter how small, takes more than three hours.
At these forums there seems to be lots of discussion threads about this, and help pages linked to, but the suggested solutions seem to be a jumble, with some people saying they worked and many saying it didn't.
I did do a disk repair on the Time Machine volume just in case. And there is nothing else on that drive except for Time Machine backups. The drive is directly connected to my iMac (3.06 GHz Dual Core Duo, 12 GB RAM). While not vital, I'd rather not reformat the drive and lost all my old backups, which go back over a year. If I knew for sure that was the solution I'd do it. But in the discussions here there are people who seem to have tried that and reported back that it didn't help.
Right now it says it's backing up 3.5 MB of 132.9 MB - and taking forever to do it.
I know that since the last backup I haven't changed anywhere near 132.9 MB of data. Unless Lion is making massive behind-the-scene changes.
Something definitely seems to be wrong with Time Machine in Lion.
Have there been any additional thoughts on this? Is Time Machine just buggy in Lion?
Thanks,
doug

I feel ya, dawg, as they say. Right now I'm running a backup that has taken 43 minutes thus far. On an idle machine, it backed up 29.8 MB (17,949 files) followed by 19.5 MB (17,256 files). 12 min. for the first batch, 11 min., for the second. 13 min. of "Finishing backup" until it transitioned to "Cleaning up," which just completed after 12 min. Each backup typically goes 70–90 minutes. So backups are running for 65% – 80% of the time, if I leave TM running. I don't; instead, I turn on backups before going to bed, and turn them off on the first happy occasion when I notice that TM is idle.
TM backups have been behaving this way for about 2 months. Before that they were as speedy as Snow Leopard, for a couple of weeks. Before that they were taking 3 hours with the dreaded "Waiting for index to be ready" messge repeating for on hour or more. I fixed this latter problem by "trying everything" from http://pondini.org/TM/D2.html (a fine resource but, as you say, all over the map as all of the suggestions are).
TM in Lion is hosed. It's as simple as that.

How migrate from older time machine backup (not the latest)?

My old Snow Leopard Mac had a dying hard drive. In the last few days, files were disappearing left and right.
I bought a new Lion Mac, but I don't trust the Time Machine backup for the last few days and I would like to migrate the backup from just before the problems started.
I can't figure out any way to do this. Migration Assistant only offers to import the latest backup
And the full Time Machine Restore feature, which DOES allow you to pick a backup, only works on the original machine, which will not boot any more.
Can I somehow trick Migration Assistant by deleting the last few backups from the Time Machine drive and renaming the one I want to use to Latest? (I've made a copy of the entire Time Machine folder just in case...)
Any other way to do this? I'm sure many people are in this situation.

I have this same question. My hard drive died, and the last few Time Machine backups appear to be incomplete or corrupted. New hard drive installed now. Migration Assistant and Setup Assistant first refuse to even recognize my backup drive, then insist on migrating data from the newest backup instead of an older (but definitely complete and reliable) backup. So I haven't migrated anything and am still using my old (OS 10.4) computer until i get this straightened out. Ideas?

Time Machine deleted all the back up files on my TimeCapsule

My computer required an erase and install. I was using 10.5.8. I reinstalled the OS but I did not do a restore from my Time Machine when I first booted it up. However, I wanted to continue to use my time machine back up (basically continue to add files to the existing backup), but it would not allow me to point to the existing Time Machine back up.
As a result, Time Machine tried to create a new backup folder. I thought this would be fine, and that I would worry about why I could not use the current back up file on my Time Capsule later on. Well, Time Machine has deleted my old Time Capsule and all the information that was inside it and now I have only a back up of one day.
What happened? How could Time Machine over write a backup that I had previously?

I updated to 10.5.8 and then I got a blue screen. I tried to do an erase and install and then I could not get beyond the grey screen. I took it in to the genius bar and had to get them to start things working again. They used their external drive to boot me up from 10.5.8.
I did not use my time machine backups to put my information back on my computer. I used the files for documents movies and photos which I had dragged and dropped on to a USB external HD (A Western Digital Passport).
I did not want to lose all the incremental past back ups on my Time Capsule (the white 1 TB box with the apple logo - definitely a time capsule). I wanted to keep using the old time machine back ups in case I ever needed to restore an odd file here and there.
Well, that day has come and I can not restore from my Time Capsule. I actually deleted this entry (albeit too late) and I have realized I do have 700 GB backed up.
You were right, if I do #17 I can access the old "sequence" of back ups, I suppose that TM thinks that I have a new computer after my erase and install.
So when I click and hold on TM in the dock I can browse other time machine disks. However, whenever I try do do a restore, computer hangs and I can't actually use the back up.
How can I get my MBP to go back to the old sequence TM files? If I go to system preferences, it says that my oldest back up is January 8, 2009. That would make me think TM machine knows those files are there. BUT! When I click on TM in the dock and I start TM, when I get to the Star Wars style screen where you can see the windows go back in time, it only has backups as far as yesterday.
So ultimately, my question is, how do I permanently get back to that old sequence of back ups and why does it always hang on the restore?
Thanks so much for your help - my lost files depend on it!

Time Machine slowing to snail pace, md root, mdworker, backupd spikes

Running a fresh time machine backup, in this case a 480GB from MBPro to cleanly formatted 1TB Time Capsule over 1GBe, backup commences at a decent (though still too slow) clip of about 40GB an hour, then slows to a painful drip at 430GB complete when I rechecked in the morning.
Looked at apps and processes, seeing 99% cpu usage spikes varying across mds root, mdworker and backupd. When they back off, transfer picks up, though still really slow compared to what it should be.
Guess is an imbalance in how Spotlight interfaces with Time Machine on indexing. I would expect a 30% CPU constant level during the Time Machine job to keep up on indexing during file transfer rather than a spikey machine slowing, backup stalling methodology which appears to be happening.
Open to ideas, its not a memory or process leak or thread runaway, since a restart of the machine and return to the backup solves nada. I have 2GB of RAM with 1GB free during the job. I closed all other main apps, nothing else is placing a burden on the machine.

Gregory Lynn wrote:
Found a decent summary of how TM works in OS 10.5 http://www.girr.org/mac_stuff/backups.html which shed a little light on the operation and where one would expect slow downs.
That's more than a bit outdated. It refers to 10.5.1, the very early version.
See #D2 in Time Machine - Troubleshooting (or use the link in *User Tips* at the top of this forum).
One cause of apparently slow backups is actually extra-large backups. If yours seem too large for the amount you've done between backups, see #D4 there.
And you might want to browse Time Machine - Frequently Asked Questions (or use the link in *User Tips* at the top of this forum).

Time Machine Vs Clone

What if I wanted to restore to a past date with Time Machine - I mean the whole enchilada, OS and everything!
It appears that restoring everything can only be done from the most recent backup. What good is that if I want to go back in time to a fully functioning OS. Is something like Carbon Copy the only solution and Time Machine only good for filling in the blanks?
I can't find a method to restore everything from a specific earlier date using Time Machine.

In the rare case I had malware or screwed up something deep in the OS, it would be nice to pick an earlier date to do a complete restore. That is one big advantage of having a mirror image. I'm not sure picking my "Macintosh HD" folder and highlighting all the folders would be equivalent to doing a mirror image backup. Are there things that aren't restored using the above method? I could have been more clear in my original question.

Restore Time Machine backup on 2nd hand Macbook Pro

Sorry if this seems like a stupid question, but I'm not entirely sure how time machine works.
I just sold my Macbook Pro 5,1 and bought a second hand Macbook Pro 9,2.
My MBP 5,1 was on the latest version of OS X Mavericks and the MBP 9,2 is on OS X 10.7
I'm currently updating the MBP 9,2 to OS X Yosemite, but I'm wondering how the Time Machine migration will work. Will it just add files and programs over the current installation? Or will it also replace settings, such as admin password etc. ?
My main question is if I should do a factory reset before migrating, so I can set up my Admin password and Apple ID, or if I should simply migrate over the current installation?
I have a CCC backup as well as a Time Machine backup, so in case something goes wrong I can always boot from that.
NOTE: The second hand Macbook Pro was bought at a trusted second hand chain here in the UK. It had been factory reset and thoroughly tested, which is why it would feel a bit redundant to factory reset again.

You may find this useful;
http://pondini.org/OSX/Setup.html
Ciao.

Time Machine external disc formatting

OK, quick question about formatting an external drive. Let me explain what I would like to do with the drive, then we can even see if it is possible.
In the grand scheme of things, I would like take the drive, reformat it and partition it, so that I can run 3 Time Machine backups and the rest of the drive extra space. The first 3 partitions, would be 3 time machines, 1 intel and 2 ppc. The 4th partition, I want to put all of my photos, music and such on it and share that with all computers, including a Windows computer. That way, when we travel, I can just grab that drive and take it with us
Ok, I took the drive, plugged it into an intel mac, formatted it with 4 partitions as a GUID scheme.
Partition 1 - for intel time machine - Mac OS (journaled, case sensitive)
Partition 2 - for PPC Time Machine - Mac OS (Journaled)
Partition 3 - for PPC Time Machine - Mac OS (Journaled)
Partition 4 - Used to bring photos and music when traveling, also used
with windows (MS-Dos)
That did not seem to work.
THEN, I did this:
I took the drive, plugged it into an intel mac, formatted it with 4 partitions as a APM scheme.
Partition 1 - for intel time machine - Mac OS (journaled, case sensitive)
Partition 2 - for PPC Time Machine - Mac OS (Journaled)
Partition 3 - for PPC Time Machine - Mac OS (Journaled)
Partition 4 - Used to bring photos and music when traveling, also used
with windows (Free Space).
Not working. So, first off, is this even possible? Can I use Time Machine, with an external drive hooked up through my Airport Base Station, with partitions? From reading, it doesn't really seem so, but there are scripts to run in terminal, and things like that.
If I can't run it with partitions, I am fine with that, I would just use the one drive, put my photos, music and such, and the 3 sparse bundles all on it, no partitions. It's quite a large drive and I can manage the backups pretty well so space isn't an issue. If this isn't the case, how do I format the drive so both all 3 Macs (1 Intel and 2 PPC) and Windows machines can read it?? Also, I would assume I would need to use the Intel Mac to do the formatting and not the PPC ones.
Make sense? It always seems like I am trying to do something too complicated with things to make it easy on myself.
Thanks

Are any of your Macs desktop models?
If so, there's an alternative. Connect the drive to one of them, and back that Mac up to it directly.
Back up the others to the same drive, via sharing, over your network. See #22 in [Time Machine - Frequently Asked Questions|http://web.me.com/pondini/Time_Machine/FAQ.html] (or use the link in *User Tips* at the top of the +Time Machine+ forum), for instructions.
If there's room for all those backups (see #1 in the FAQ,) you could put the 4th MS-DOS partition on it, or you could put it on a separate HD connected to your Airport Extreme.
But note that Time Machine cannot back up a MS-DOS drive, or any drive on a network, so you'll need some other way to back up that data.
However you do it, either GUID or APM will work. While GUID is preferred for an Intel Mac, the only time it's required is if you want to install or update OSX on it. You can "clone" OSX to an APM drive, and it will boot your Intel Mac, but you can't install updates on it.
As Bob says, you might get the backups to work via the Airport Extreme, but most likely they'll start turning up corrupted before long. It's happened to me 3 or 4 times in a bit over a year, and that seems fairly typical of the many, many such posts here and in the Time Machine forums.

FileVault 2 and Time Machine recovery

Hi,
After reading a lot of forum posts about FileVault 2, almost everything seems to be clear to me, but I still have one important question:
My Macbook Pro (on Mountain Lion) backups automatically to my Time Capsule through Time Machine. When I enable FileVault 2, and my Macbook is stolen, can I just buy a new Macbook and restore it from the (unencrypted) Time Machine backup? Or will this give problems because the 'original' Macbook the backup was made off, had FileVault enabled?
Thanks in advance

To answer your question directly, yes, you would be able to purchase a new MacBook and restore from the unencrypted backup. The backup data is not encrypted by default, that is why you can only back up to Time Machine while logged in.
You can also choose to encrypt your Time Machine backup, in which case you would still be able to do the same thing, it would just require you to enter your Time Machine's password to start the recovery process.

Is there a way to back up an iPad using something like Time Machine?

I have had a MBP for a few years now and I love it. One of the features I really like is Time Machine. I just purchased the new iPad and have filled my 64 GB to the brim. I would like to back it up to my laptop or portable HD and recover all the data just as I would using time machine. So in case it is lost, stolen or broken I could restore it onto a new device as was before. Is there an app for this? Thanks in advance for the help.

Photos taken on the iPad will always be synced with iTunes along with contacts, bookmarks and notes created on the iPad. However, if you have synced this iPad with a different computer which has transfered its photos to iPad, a different iTunes will not transfer or backup these to the new computer. Same goes with music which has not been purchased in iTunes but synced from another computer, such as ripped CD's.
Apple assumes your using one iTunes to sync with multiple devices. Not the other way around. This is the advantage of iCloud, as long as your using the one apple ID you can sync from the cloud to multiple devices without being tethered to one machine.
But if you have synced this iPad with a different iTunes or computer and have put iTunes Purchased music onto it, then you will get a warning like the one below, giving you the option of syncing this music into the current iTunes if the computer is authorised with the same apple ID... In other words; if your using the same apple ID on two different computers to make iTunes purchases.
Once again, Apple assumes your using one Apple ID and not mixing and matching with another persons account. If you would like to share music which is not purchased through iTunes you are free to do so, but you cannot use a regular "iPad sync with iTunes" as the conduit to do so, you should use a hard drive or even an iPod in Disk Use Mode to merge iTunes content from one computer onto you primary apple computer for syncing.
For more information about how to transfer all music content from one computer to another click here
For more information about transfering purchased music using iOS devices click here.
I hope that isn't too much to process. Feel free to ask any more questions :]

My Time Machine backup keeps failing. I get a message the "Volume has the wrong case sensitivity for a backup". Please advise.

My Time Machine backup keeps failing. I get a message the "Volume has the wrong case sensitivity for a backup". Please advise.
Thanks, Howard

You can change the case sensitivity of the sparsebundle.. but I really doubt the error is real.
See A8 here.
http://pondini.org/TM/Troubleshooting.html
The sparsebundle should have case sensitivity turned on.
I cannot even fathom how it could have changed.
Let me recommend before you start fooling around with the sparsebundle.
Do a full network start.
Power everything off.. start up modem.. wait 2min.. power up the TC.. wait 2min.. power up any other network gear like switches.. wait..
Now power up the computer and try it.
If the error is the same.. I would do a factory reset of the TC.. give it all short names, no spaces and pure alphanumeric. Then reset TM .. see A4 in the same reference as above.. and do a verify of the backups.. A5 above and try the backup again..
No luck..
Then erase the TC and start over.. it is sometimes necessary as TM does get itself in a knot.

Is Time Machine necessary in my case?

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