Re.Time Machine Question

Hi
I have bought a Seagate 2TB Backup Plus drive to use with Time Machine which I bought from the Apple Online Store. Following the instructions on the Apple website, I plugged the machine in, went through the set up process and ticked the 'show in menu bar' option. However, I can't get the Time Machine icon to appear in the menu bar and I have an (unwanted) icon for the external drive itself in the top right hand corner of the home screen wallpaper which I can't get rid of.
The backup itself seems to be working fine as the machine because when I plugged it teh first time, it said tha the initial backup was taking place and the date and time of subsequent backups is displayed. However, I can only get this info by going through the settings menu and clicking onto the Time Machine logo there.
How can I get the Time Machine icon to appear on the menu bar and how do I get rid of the hard disk icon?
Thanks

LSC wrote:
OK I am pretty sure this in the FAQ but the answer still isn't overly clear to me so I'm going to ask anyway...apologies in advance.
I recently found out that my iMac hard drive is failing, I have an appointment with the Genius Bar in two days to see what is wrong and get it fixed.
In the meantime, I am currently backing up my hard drive using Time Machine but I am hearing conflicting reports as to whether or not I can do a full restore from Time Machine should my iMac have it's hard drive or other components replaced.
So...question: Can I directly restore my iMac (with a possible new hard drive or other components) from Time Machine?
yes, you can. you can do it using full system restore utility on the leopard install DVD. there are no ifs or buts about it. where is that "conflicting info" coming from?
If not, how can I do it.
I am most worried about my photos in iPhoto as my wife will murder me if I lose our wedding and honeymoon photos.

Similar Messages

Where to Post Time Machine Question?

My question title says it all. How do I find the area in which to post a Time Machine question? Or do I just do it here? Thanks.

There is no place to post a question on Time Machine

Time Machine question.

Hello. Im not sure exactly where to post this, i couldnt find a Time Machine section. Ill make this as short as possible.
I have a 2011 mac mini with snow leopard 10.6.8 and my wife just bought quick books accounting software which requires 10.8 mountain lion, so i just bought it, although i havent installed it yet and here is why. I started another thread the other day about weather or not i HAD to update to Yosemite, all the reviews are making me nervous so im opting for Mountain Lion. So, in my thread a member asked me how i back up my mac mini, well i dont and never have. But i recently got a 1TB external hard drive which im going to return for a 2TB. This member was talking to me about mountain lion and suggested that i install it on my external hard drive so that i could keep my nicely working Snow Leopard as well as having Mountain Lion for my wifes quick book program. As we spoke, the member said he wasnt sure id be able to back up my mac mini with Time Machine onto the 1TB as well as install Mountain Lion onto it and i also plan on putting a few thousand pictures on it. Can someone tell me if this is possible? I know ZERO about time machine and backing up for that matter. Ive never done it. So another question, if i was to back up using Time Machine and a 2TB external hard drive, would that also back up all my photos in iphoto, my photoshop program and Toast editing? Would all of that be backed up? Am i making any sense? LOL.
Thanks.

zowenso wrote:
So, are you saying that I should have a totally different external hard drive to use for time machine back ups?
Would it be safe to store all my pictures and the installation Mountain lion back up on one external hard drive or am I going to have to get a separate one for each?
Also, what if I just did the standard update to mountain lion and didn't save it to an external hard drive? Could I then use one external hard drive for my pictures and the time machine back ups?
Yes. Use a different drive for your Time Machine back ups.
You could use a 2TB external USB drive, partition it into 2-1TB partitions, install OS X Mountain Lion on one and point your Time Machine back ups to the 2nd 1TB partition. I think you should be able to use this 1TB partition for both your Snow Leopard and Mountain Lion Time Machine back ups. Just point each to that 1TB partition. All of your data (photos, music, documents, Quickbooks data, etc.) would be backed up by Time Machine as it backs up the entire drive (OS/Apps/Data). So, if you use that 1TB partition for both back ups, both drives (SL on your Mac Mini and ML on the external 1TB partition) will be backed up.

Time machine questions... how to use with an external drive etc.

Hi,
I am about to start using Time Machine. I have a few questions:
1. Can Time machine be used to restore data and applications / application settings?
2. I have a CalDigit VR eSATA drive which is 1TB RAID 1 which I was going to use as the Time Machine target drive.
Does Time machine store all of its data files in one main folder with many sub folders?
If my TM backup data takes up 600GB on the drive can I safely store other data on the 400GB or is it best to partition the drive HFS+ Journaled 600/400 and leave TM to its own dedicated partition?
3. Does TM keep adding data until it runs out of disk space and only then delete older BUs?
4. Is TM a good backup software for total recovery or is something like SuperDuper better? I would almost never use TM to recover a file that was deleted... but I am looking for a way to protect against data lost in the case of HD failure.

If you haven't found this yet, take a look here: http://www.apple.com/findouthow/mac/#tutorial=leopardtimemachine
That should give you a rough idea of the "look and feel."
1. Can Time machine be used to restore data and applications / application settings?
Yes, unless you tell it not to, it saves everything (except some system caches, temp files, etc.). If your HD fails, you can recover your entire system to a new/repaired HD via your Leopard install disc (it has the restore utility) and your TM backups. OS, apps (Apple and 3rd-party), preferences, settings, data, the whole system.
Does Time machine store all of its data files in one main folder with many sub folders?
As you may be able to see in the video, the small Finder window is very much like the main one; you can see your data in the same way. TM presents a "picture" that appears to be a full, separate backup of the way your Mac looked at any time. Of course, that's an illusion. It only actually copies files/folders that have been added or changed since the last backup.
You can't tell which items are "real" and which are the "multi-links" representing a file that didn't change on that particular backup.
For more info on the internals: http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/07/10/12/roadto_mac_os_x_leopard_timemachine.html
3. Does TM keep adding data until it runs out of disk space and only then delete older BUs?
Sort of. After an initial Full backup, it does incrementals (hourly, if you let it). Then it converts the first of the day to a daily backup, which it keeps for a month, and deletes the other hourlies after they're 24 hours old.
After a month, it converts one per week into a weekly backup and deletes the dailies.
It keeps the weeklies until it runs out of room, then begins deleting the oldest. But because of the "multi-links," it doesn't delete it's copy of anything that's still on your internal HD. So it manages it's space and deletions automatically and intelligently.
4. Is TM a good backup software for total recovery or is something like SuperDuper better?
They both have their advantages and disadvantages. Many of us use a clone plus TM. The clone advantage is, of course, being bootable. TM isn't. TM's advantages are the very fast incremental backups (it doesn't have to examine every file and folder to see what's changed): the ability to restore old items; and the ability to restore your entire system to a previous state, even if that's a prior version of Leopard!

Time Machine questions: Handling backups for multiple Macs to one FW drive

I am reviewing the Time Machine thread and seeing a lot of helpful information, but I would like to ask something I haven't quite found yet.
We have 2 Leopard Macs, a MacBook Pro and an intel iMac... with plans to upgrade another MBP from Tiger to Leopard at some point.
In planning for Time Machine, we set up a 1 TB drive, attached it via FW 800 to the iMac, partitioned it GUID for Intel, and made 3 partitions, one for each planned Mac we want to back up to it.
I started Time Machine on the iMac first and the first backup of about 100 gb took maybe 4 hours.
Then we tried to start the Time Machine backup for the MBP over the network (wireless). It was understandably much slower and quit with some error last evening, so I took advantage of the pause to move the notebook to a wired ethernet connection. It got even slower so this morning I directly connected it FW 800, erased what had been backed up, and started over. So far, so good. 6GB out of 100 in 10 minutes or so. The idea being, if we can get the first backup completed faster over wired connection, maybe doing the incrementals over wireless network will be okay. Sounds like some folks are doing that successfully. I am hoping that works out.
Questions: Was it necessary to partition my 1TB drive into a partition for each Mac's Time Machine backup? I did make each partition bigger than the hard drive it is designated for.
To get the MBP to mount the external FW drive on its desktop, I had to disconnect the drive from the iMac. Is there any way I can connect the FW drive to both the MBP and the iMac (the drive has two FW 800 out connections, so it is physically possible)? I'm thinking (from reading posts of others with notebooks) that one strategy is to connect your notebook to your Time Machine drive at night and let it back up, but it'd be great if I could leave the iMac connected while doing so. Is there a way the volumes on the drive can mount on both desktops?
When I try wireless again, I'm seeing mixed posts regarding whether the MBP will need a password to log in to the remote volume each time, or only the first time when the Time Machine backup is established... if I could get clarification on that, it would be helpful.
Thanks!
thanks

What do you see on your notebook when you click on your TimeMachine icon in the Dock?
My notebook is mounting the backup drive on an hourly basis, running a backup, and looking like it is doing something... but when I then look at TimeMachine, I can't see the backups. (On my iMac with the drive directly attached, I see a progression of windows showing all the hourly backups the last 24 hours, etc.) I just called Apple to ask why this is so, and they told me they couldn't help me because wireless Time Machine backups aren't supported.
I know backups to a hard drive attached to an Airport Express Base Station are not supported. But when they say "You can designate just about any HFS+ formatted FireWire or USB drive connected to a Mac as a Time Machine backup drive. +Time Machine can also back up to another Mac running Leopard with Personal File Sharing, Leopard Server, or Xsan storage devices+"... well, how can you DO that?

External Hard Drive and Time Machine questions

Hello, I am new here to the forums and I have looked all over for the answers to two questions that I have regarding external hard drives and the time machine feature.
For some background, I recently had a scare (water spill but luckily I had a keyboard cover on and the entire spill landed on the cover) with my Mid-2012 13" Macbook Pro (2.5Ghz) and due to almost losing all my data I've decided to invest in an external hard drive. However, rather than just purchasing a 500GB HDD to use as an external hard drive, I decided to kill two birds with one stone and upgrade my Macbook Pro as well by investing in the 480GB OCW Mercury Extreme Pro SSD. I'll be using the SSD as my internal drive so the original hard drive that came with my Macbook will serve as my backup external drive. Lastly, I plan to use the external drive solely for the purpose of backing up my MacBook in case something ever happens to my Macbook.
I am using this guide to help me with this whole process: http://circuitremix.com/?q=content/macbook-pro-solid-state-drive-upgrade-guide-a nd-performance-testing.
My two questions are:
1) When following the guide, it never mentions anything about the Partition Map Scheme. After being alerted to this and doing some additional research, is it better to go with the GUID Partition Table rather than the Master Boot Record?
2) After I have cloned everything onto my new SSD and replaced the HDD in my MacBook with it, should I erase everything on my HDD before setting it up with time machine? I was thinking about keeping the original data on the original hard drive (which would now be my external drive) just in case something goes wrong with time machine but I have read that people recommend solely dedicating the entire external hard drive for time machine backups.
Thanks in advance!

Format the new SSD in Disk Utility to Mac OS Extended (Journaled) and that will solve question No. 1.
After formatting, clone the new SSD using Disk Utility>Restore or Carbon Copy Cloner (down load from the Internet). Test the new SSD and if it performs as expected, do the physical swap.
Question No. 2. Erase the Time Machine HDD using Disk Utility and then install Time Machine. See this excellent website regarding Time Machine.
http://pondini.org/OSX/Home.html
If you want an external boot HHD, get another one and use Carbon Copy Cloner. This will give you redundancy in backups as well which is a good strategy. CCC also can update the contents in an incremental manner similar to Time Machine.
Ciao.

Hard drive, SSD, Time machine question

I was using a Macbook Pro mid 2012 13" for this problem.
About a month ago, I upgraded my hard drive to a Crucial Solid State Drive (SSD) 240 gb m500. I used Carbon Copy Cloner and everything went very smoothly and my computer worked great for about two months. Randomly one day, I turned on my computer and got a WHITE SCREEN. I have tried several things to try and correct this SSD but none of them will work. I have come to the conclusion that it is a broken/unusable SSD and am returning it.
My problem comes that my time machine backup is on my old macbook pro hard drive. I want to put back in that hard drive into my MBP with all my files intacted, but of course it is not in the right format to run.
I have access to another MBP, a 500 gb external drive, as well as a internal hard drive enclosure to plug my old hard drive into USB externally.
My question is would it be to risky, if I backed up my friends MBP to the 500gb external hard drive using time machine. Then I put my time machine backup on his computer. Then make a copy from his computer of my time machine backup to my old MBP hard drive. Then put my newly copied hard drive back into my MBP. And then take my friends MBP and time machine his backup back from the external drive back onto his computer.
Let me know if you have any other ideas. Thanks
~Katherine

With the SSD still in the MacBook, hold down the Option key at Startup. This will draw an icon for each potentially-bootable drive.
Now go away from your Mac and leave it powered on doing nothing for 20 to 30 minutes.
Sometimes an SSD gets so clogged with data it needs idle to do a major Garbage collect, but thinks it is still being accessed, so it delays the Garbage Collect. Leaving it alone for 20 minutes or more MAY allow it the time to fix itself.
If this helps, read this article on TRIM:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TRM
consider installing TRIM Enabler from Groths.

External Hard Drive/Time Machine Questions

The hard drive on my four-year-old-plus MacBook Pro is apparently failing, and I can't afford a new MacBook Pro yet. So I bought an external hard drive, hoping to clone my hard drive and run my computer off the external hard drive if the main drive crashes.
At the moment I can't afford an Apple external hard drive, so I bought a non-Apple model. So I was surprised when it asked if I wanted to use Time Machine to back up my data while I was setting it up. I chose yes, though I'm not even sure if I've set it up correctly.
OK, let me start from square one...
My external hard drive has 1 TB of storage space, and I initially formatted it in one big block - no partitions. If I want to boot off a cloned hard drive, will I have to partition it, so I'm booting off a particular partition?
If I do have to partition it, I understand I can use Apple's Disc Utilities to do the job. Can anyone tell me if there are any special steps or conventions I need to follow? I'd probably create a partition of about 200 GB for my cloned hard drive. (I'm currently using about 120GB on my internal hard drive.)
In fact, I might make two separate 200-GB partitions, cloning my hard drive to one partition, then cloning it to the second partition a few weeks later, just for security.
My first Time Machine backup is scheduled to begin in just half an hour or so. Will it merely copy all my files to the external hard drive, or will it create an operable clone? Approximately how long do you think this initial backup will take, using firewire?
Also, once I get my hard drive cloned, I'm thinking of booting up with the clone and upgrading to Snow Leopard. If everything works fine, then I'll upgrade my main (internal) hard drive to Snow Leopard as well.
Sorry for all the questions. I think I understand the basics; there are just a surprising number of details to figure out.
When I can afford it, I hope to upgrade to a new MacBook Pro 13" or 15" and an iPad, which I'd like to take to work with me.
Thanks for any tips.

David Blomstrom wrote:
If I want to boot off a cloned hard drive, will I have to partition it, so I'm booting off a particular partition?
yes.
you would need to partition it and use one partition for cloning and the other for TM backups.
i don't recommend such a setup, however. it's like putting all eggs in one basket - if (not when) the external fails, you'd have lost both backups @ the same time !
If I do have to partition it, I understand I can use Apple's Disc Utilities to do the job. Can anyone tell me if there are any special steps or conventions I need to follow?
yes.
you can use the instructions in [this|http://web.me.com/pondini/AppleTips/DU.html] user tip.
I'd probably create a partition of about 200 GB for my cloned hard drive. (I'm currently using about 120GB on my internal hard drive.)
the partition for the clone needs to be just a big as your startup disk (e.g. 120 GB). the partition for TM backups, otoh, would ideally be 2-3 times the size of your startup disk.
more information [here_|http://web.me.com/pondini/TimeMachine/1.html].
Will it merely copy all my files to the external hard drive
it will back up everything on your startup disk unless you specifically exclude files from backups.
or will it create an operable clone?
no.
use software such as _*Carbon Copy Cloner*_ to clone your system.
Approximately how long do you think this initial backup will take, using firewire?
the initial backup could take overnight - depending on how much data is to be backed up.
Also, once I get my hard drive cloned, I'm thinking of booting up with the clone and upgrading to Snow Leopard. If everything works fine, then I'll upgrade my main (internal) hard drive to Snow Leopard as well.
yes, that will work just fine. in fact, some users recommend this technique even if the internal drive is not about to fail - better muck up a clone than the regular startup disk.
JGG

Time MACHINE question regarding hard drive restore...

Ok so i need to restore a hard drive with time machine. im going to be wiping my imac HD for a fresh install, hopefully things will run a little quicker. its seeming a little laggy these days. what im worried about with time machine though is that its going to restore all the little fragments of past installed/uninstalled programs and certain logs and settings ect.. the things that are currently bogging down the system. i know that time machine has a list of exclusions of what it doesnt restore.. but do i have to worry at all about time machine installing these things that i dont want? i would much rather just manually restore the system if this is going to be the case.
also, if i would manually restore the system from the time machine drive, i dont think i can just drag and drop backup folders from time machine and then pick and choose individual files and folders can i?
any help would be much appreciated!
just a heads up.. please dont reply if you're giving me your opinion because you enjoyed your experience with time machine restoration. im looking for fact and reality of what time machine does and does not restore. thank you

D00bysnacks wrote:
Ok so i need to restore a hard drive with time machine. im going to be wiping my imac HD for a fresh install, hopefully things will run a little quicker. Its seeming a little laggy these days.
That's rather a drastic step, which most likely won't help much, if any. Unlike with Windoze, you're usually better off to diagnose and fix the actual problem. See Baltwo's post here: http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=11853228&#11853228
what im worried about with time machine though is that its going to restore all the little fragments of past installed/uninstalled programs and certain logs and settings ect.. the things that are currently bogging down the system. i know that time machine has a list of exclusions of what it doesnt restore.. but do i have to worry at all about time machine installing these things that i dont want?
If you tell Time Machine to do a full system restore, yes, it will do that. With certain exceptions, such as system work files, trash, most caches and logs, it will put your system back just as it was. That's it's purpose, after all.
i would much rather just manually restore the system if this is going to be the case.
Really? See the pink box in #11 Time Machine - Frequently Asked Questions. Actually, it would be worse, if you don't use +Migration Assistant+ for your data.
also, if i would manually restore the system from the time machine drive, i dont think i can just drag and drop backup folders from time machine and then pick and choose individual files and folders can i?
You can't restore OSX that way. You can copy your data, but that may not work in all cases, and you'll likely have all sorts of permissions problems, as OSX will think the backups belong to a different user.
just a heads up.. please dont reply if you're giving me your opinion because you enjoyed your experience with time machine restoration. im looking for fact and reality of what time machine does and does not restore. thank you
You want free help, but only if it agrees with your version of reality? That's pretty cheeky.

A few good time machine questions...

Mac Users,
I had a Macbook Pro that was stolen at the end of June and I am now getting ready to replace it with an iMac. In as much as that is the case, I have some questions about using Time Machine to get my Macbook Pro backup loaded onto the new iMac.
Presumptions
1) The Macbook Pro came with Leopard and was upgraded to Snow Leopard with a "retail Snow Leopard DVD" (10.6.0), which I still have in my posession.
2) The Macbook Pro was backed up with Time Machine using Snow Leopard end of June (whatever current version of Snow Leopard 10.6.3?) that was.
3) The iMac will come with Snow Leopard with all updates as of the end of November (when I receive it)
4) The Time Machine restoration will be done with "setup migration" with all restore options selected.
Questions
1) Someone told me that because the Time Machine backup from the Macbook Pro was done from a machine that was upgraded to Snow Leopard with a "retail upgrade DVD", that I should start out by wiping out the new iMac's preinstalled variant of MacOS, then reinstall MacOS with the "retail upgrade DVD", do the Time Machine restore with "setup migration" and then update the OS to the latest variant of Snow Leopard via the softwareupdater. Why not just do the restore via "setup migration" from the version MacOS that is coming on the iMac stock from the factory pre-installed? Why all this work and concern with switching to the olde "retail upgrade DVD" first?
2) Once the Time Machine backup has been restored to the new iMac, I do not want the new iMac to immediately start a new Time Machine backup that might otherwise begin to wipe out the olde one I just restored from. How can I prevent this from occurring?
3) What will be missing when I do this restore?
a) 3rd party drivers I had before?
b) 3rd party installation keys and configuration parameters?
c) anything else I need to be concerned about?
Thanks,
Stuart

Stuart Blake Tener wrote:
1) Someone told me that because the Time Machine backup from the Macbook Pro was done from a machine that was upgraded to Snow Leopard with a "retail upgrade DVD", that I should start out by wiping out the new iMac's preinstalled variant of MacOS, then reinstall MacOS with the "retail upgrade DVD", do the Time Machine restore with "setup migration" and then update the OS to the latest variant of Snow Leopard via the softwareupdater.
Do not take advice from that person. That's completely wrong
Why not just do the restore via "setup migration" from the version MacOS that is coming on the iMac stock from the factory pre-installed?
That is the best way, by far. See #19 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 this forum), for details.
2) Once the Time Machine backup has been restored to the new iMac, I do not want the new iMac to immediately start a new Time Machine backup that might otherwise begin to wipe out the olde one I just restored from. How can I prevent this from occurring?
As noted in the yellow box at the end of #19, immediately turn Time Machine OFF.
Even if a backup gets started, the first thing it should do is send this message:
|
|
Just click +Do Not Backup Now.+ See #B5 of [Time Machine - Troubleshooting|http://web.me.com/pondini/Time_Machine/Troubleshooting.html] (or use the link in *User Tips* at the top of this forum), for details.
Some folks claim they never saw that message, so turn Time Machine OFF anyway.
As explained in #B5, it will do a new, full backup, which will take a lot of space, so it may have to delete a lot of old backups, and may still not have enough room. But in no case will it erase your last remaining backup.
3) What will be missing when I do this restore?
Anything you specifically excluded from backups. Otherwise everything should be just as it was on the old Mac.

Time Machine Question: How does it handle external drives?

Hi,
To date, I have only been backing up my HD (macbook pro) though Time Machine onto a dedicated back-up external drive.
Today, I backed-up and forgot that my 2nd external drive (for music) was plugged into my Macbook. So, Time Machine seems to be backing up both my HD and my Music. This is not a bad thing. But, I have one question - worded two different ways:
1. If I back-up again next week and my Music External drive is not plugged in, will the future back-up simply write over the music back-up?
2. Do I need to plug in my Muisc External drive next time I want to back-up my HD?
A third, related question:
3. I also have a 3rd external for pictures and movies. Will Time Machine back this up as well? Is this a reliable way to back things up?
Thanks in advance,

Read Pondini's TM page here
http://web.me.com/pondini/Time_Machine/Home.html
My advice is not to let TM become a catch all backup because it's placing all your software eggs in one hardware basket. Hardware fails just as much as software does and a catch all TM failure takes it's all down in one shot. Not only that TM also traps your data.
Maintain two seperate hardware backups of your data in easy accesible (from any computer) as possible.
I use a 50/50 partition on my main boot drive and Carbon Copy Cloner to auto-clone A to B nightly, but this only offers software protection, then I have a external drive clone spaced back a few days, and then a another clone spaced back about a few weeks or months. The external clones offer hardware and software protection.
This might not work in your case, each person's needs are different, the key is to have a multi-based approach to give you diversity in case something goes wrong.
More good advice here
https://discussions.apple.com/message/16276201#16276201

Quick Time Machine Question.

Hi guys, new to the Mac interface (been a windows user all my life), but needless to say I can see what all the fuss was about (OSX is amazing). My question is in regards to time machine. If I erase something off of my Mac, when TM does a backup does it also erase that file off of TM? I ask this because I want to free up some space on my mac's HDD, but I don't want those files to erase off of TM. Thanks!

you shouldn't use TM for archiving purposes. use a separate drive for that. TM will not erase those files immediately. You'll be able to use TM to restore those files but only for a while. Overtimes TM erases old backups when it runs out of space on the backup drive. Therefore it's not a suitable archiving solution.

A Few Little Time Machine Questions

I just got a 1TB External Drive from Western Digital (My Book Studio Edition.) I just used Time Machine on my Mac Book Pro and now all my files are backed up. But I have a few questions:
1. Does this mean that I don't have to manually drop and drag files into the External Drive?
2. Does this mean I can delete files off of my computer and retrieve them later from my External Drive? (If this seems like a dumb question, it's rooted in my misunderstanding of Time Machine - I'm not sure if it temporarily backs things up, backs things up only when you command it to, or backs things up permanently.)
Thank you!

crimson_ghost,
Your questions appear to be answered, but I'll chime in too with some (perhaps) additional information...
Time Machine is mainly a backup and recovery tool. It makes a comprehensive backup of your entire installation, including all installed applications and all user data. The intention is that you will be able to completely recover from any potential disaster, such as a total failure of your internal hard drive.
Each backup that Time Machine makes is a complete "snapshot" of your installation at the time of the backup, complete with each and every file on your computer. Time Machine is able to make this "complete" backup each time it runs- without consuming much, if any, additional disk space on the backup drive- by using an advanced file system feature called "multi-linked files." In this scheme, the data for a given file is only copied once to the backup drive, but multiple "hard links" that point to that data can be created. In effect, it is like having multiple phone numbers, all of which ring to the same phone. Each backup will contain one of these "hard links" that points to the data associated with a given file that has not changed since the last backup. If the file is new or has changed, the new data is copied to the backup, and a new string of hard links will be created. Since each additional hard link consumes almost zero space, many, many backups can be made without using much disk space.
An additional benefit of this Time Machine scheme is that we are able to "go back in time" to retrieve a file that may have been deleted from the "source," and there is a truly innovative interface for doing so. Some of the OS X and iLife applications even have "Time Machine awareness" built in, and the interface can be accessed from within those apps. Pretty cool.
However, this does not mean that Time Machine can be used as an "archive" tool. It can not be used in this manner, and you should not depend on using it this way! Especially if Time Machine is used in its "default" mode, where backups are made every hour, part of its routine is to regularly "thin" the backups. This process involves the removal of old backups that do not conform to the "one backup a day for the past week," "one backup a week until disk is full" rule. At some point, Time Machine will also begin to "expire" the very oldest backups, then remove them to make room for new ones. If you attempt to use Time Machine for "archival" storage of files that have been removed from the source (your installation), you will ultimately lose them.
Now, given the way Time Machine works, it will eventually consume all- or close to all- of the disk space given to it. So it makes sense to limit what we allow it to use. How much is appropriate, and how do we limit what it can use? That's easy enough to answer...
Time Machine needs at least twice the amount of space necessary for the initial backup. I say "at least," because it will work best when given closer to 3 times the amount of space needed. If your installation of OS X, including all your user data and applications, amounts to 100 GBs for example, you'll need to give Time Machine at least 200 GBs, and my recommendation would be more like 300 GBs. If you do not give it at least this much space, your backups will eventually fail. Time Machine first makes a new backup when it runs, and then goes about checking to see what can be deleted from the older backups. Because of this, it must always have plenty of "headroom."
Giving Time Machine more than the stated "3X" figure, though, is wasteful of precious disk space that could be used in more beneficial ways. For instance, by using that disk space for "archival" purposes
In order to limit what we give to Time Machine, it is necessary to partition the external drive. Multiple logical volumes can be created, and we can size these volumes to meet the needs of Time Machine. For various reasons (I could explain, if needed), I always recommend that the first partition be used for Time machine backups. If you do not know how to use Disk Utility to partition your external drive, just ask.
Scott

"About This Mac" Storage Screen and Time Machine Question

Hello,
I've been poking around in Lion a bit, and noticed something odd...
When you go to About This Mac >> More info >> Storage, my external hard drive that only has my Time Machine backup on it is displayed entirely as "other" in the file-type breakdown. Thusly, all utilized space is shown as yellow, as opposed to the purple that would designate it as "backup" information.
Is there something wrong with my Time Machine backup, or are other people experiencing this as well? It just seems strange that the results of the built-in backup application are not recognized as a backup by Lion.
Thoughts?
Thanks,
-Kevin

spartykjc wrote:
Hello,
When you go to About This Mac >> More info >> Storage, my external hard drive that only has my Time Machine backup on it is displayed entirely as "other" in the file-type breakdown.
Yes. The purple Backups refers to (some of ) the storage used for Local snapshots (on laptops, see #30 in Time Machine - Frequently Asked Questions), and, apparently, Versions.
There are many other misleading and inaccurate things there, too.

Time machine questions. Please help

So, I'm getting rid of my laptop and switching.    I've had my time machine external HD plugged into my airport extreme doing backups.   Well, I just plugged it into the laptop directly and hit backup
So is it really just as simple as plugging the HD into the next computer and hitting "restore"    Is there any extra steps?   Will it come back just like this one is set up?
I'm nervous that I accidently deleted an older backup in time machine through the finder to make space for the new back up.   I hope that doesnt mess anything up.    This backup is only like 90 mb.    IS that cause it took previous ones so its only adding the new data since the last backup an hour ago?
I want to not include my movies that are in iTunes,    They eat up about 60 gb of space and my new computer HD will be smaller.   Is tehre a way to do that? I currently have the movies themselves copied onto the external.    But cant seem to get them out of my iTunes library.    Couple of questions regarding that..
    1. Is this a good idea
     2. Is that the best way to do it
     3, will doing that mess with my backup at all?
     4. How do I get them out of my itunes library to shrink the overall backup?
If my backup IS larger than my new HD, can I pick and choose what I want to put into it or not? Or will it give me message saying the backup is too large?
I know this was a lot of questions. But if anyone could please help I'd greatly appreciate it.
Thank you for reading.
----Confused and nervous

In order to do a TM restore, that means erasing the hard drive and restoring from a TM backup which will put everything back the way it was before, including the operating system. However, since you're getting another computer, don't go that route. I would only use that when restoring to the same computer.
You said you deleted backups via the Finder. Wrong move. You may have damaged your TM backup. Always better to delete from within TM.
If you're switching to a new computer and you don't need backups from different times, I would erase that external and create a new backup, or clone your hard drive using Super Duper or Carbon Copy cloner.
With the new computer, when you first log in, you will be asked if you want to migrate your data. This is the Setup Assistant. You should have your backup drive plugged in and imediately migrate your user account from the backup drive. You can also migrate applications (any apps installed by you), or just reinstall them after if you want a clean installation. You should have the option to unselect any data from your user folder that you don't want to migrate.

Re.Time Machine Question

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for