Time machine and backing up
Okay I know this question has come up before, but I have a Lacie 160GB External drive, bought yesterday and I am unable to backup because of a error along the lines of "...Problem creating backup directory". I am a new apple user, can someone tell me what I need to do to get this to work, in simple terms?
Thanks
Reformat the drive.
Search for Time Machine GUID.
Apple has "Troubleshooting Problems in Time Machine" (now if only there was a common easy to go to Mac 101 Help on Apple site, from Help menus. There IS "Help" and search field in Disk Utility.
Having used Macs, and recently Windows, sadly, guess who has the best online Help?
All you generally have to do is type into a search field.
Next to Support.
Google.
Search Discussions.
I typed "Time Machine" in the search field next to SUPPORT above.
http://www.apple.com/support/leopard/timemachine/
Takes you to a number of articles on formatting and preparing drives.
Similar Messages
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Difference Time Machine and Back-up
What is the difference between Time Machine and Back-up to .mac or?
Time Machine.. backup software on your Mac computer. (Only 10.5 and after seeing you list 10.4)
Time Capsule.. hardware device which is an Apple Airport Extreme plus a hard disk wrapped into a bit bigger box than the AEBS. Dumb as a board.. it is a router with hard disk hanging off. Entirely unsuitable as external storaage as it has no backup method for itself. It is a target for Time Machine, so Mac Laptops can back up wirelessly.
TownMouse33 wrote:
I want to store pictures on an external hard drive. They told me in the Apple store I could do this on time machine.
I am not sure if the Apple Store folk told you the wrong thing misunderstanding you.. but you cannot use Time Machine as a store. It is backup and files inside it are not usable.
Moving your iPhoto library to the TC is also a really bad idea. If you simply want to store raw photos.. which is a good idea btw.. as iPhoto kind of consumes them, yes, you can put them on the TC.. but use another location, external drive to back them up. In fact do it the other way around.. use the external drive to store them and stick to TC to work as backup since that is what it is designed for. -
Sorry for my ignorance. Do I need to use both Time Machine and Back-up? What's your best advice for using these effectively? Thanks for your PATIENCE and time.
I've never had a .Mac account so I can't comment specifically about Backup but it's always better to have two backups. Using both Time Machine and Backup would probably be useful. This article covers some of the basics about the differences between Time Machine and Backup.
Mac OS X 10.5: When to use Time Machine or .Mac Backup to back up data
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=307050 -
Time Machine and Back To My Mac (BTMM)
I was showing a recent Mac convert how Time Machine works.
Since my backup drive is connected to my Mac at home and I was
at my workplace, I used "Back to my Mac" (BTMM) to connect to my
home Mac. BTMM worked fine until I entered Time Machine.
Time Machine started and displayed a window showing the contents
of my desktop, but control of the remote Mac was lost.
I can still disconnect and reconnect using BTMM, but the Time Machine
screen is still there and I can't exit from it.
The cursor appears to move (that may be local), but there is no response
to keyboard commands (Esc) or mouse clicks.
Is this happening to anyone else?
Does Time Machine interrupt BTMM?
Is there a work-around or should Time Machine be off-limits when using BTMM?
Thanks all!
- PhilDisregard... Looks like it was a fluke.
Eventually, I made contact with someone else at the house.
Seems the problem was at the remote Mac.
The mouse button had no effect there either. Nor did the Esc key. (Is that normal?)
I asked for a Cmd-Opt-Esc at the other end and I watched from here and saw my desktop reappear.
When I went back into Time Machine again (via BTMM) it worked fine.
(Complete with rotating galaxy this time.)
Hmm... Is there a way to send a Cmd-Opt-Esc to a remote Mac? -
Time Machine and backing up external hard drives
Time machine will not back external hard drives I have connected to my Mac Pro. It works fine with the 3 hard drives mounted in the computer. Is this the way Time Machine is intended to work or am I doing something wrong? Thanks in advance for your assistance.
According to Disk Utility, GUID and AFP are both ok for a non-bootable drive with either CPU. The difference is when you want to make a volume bootable.
Since TM volumes are not bootable, it shouldn't matter UNLESS you have some other bootable system installed on the drive.
Right now, the drive on my Intel iMac is partitioned AFP and the one on the PPC powerbook is GUID. They both appear to be behaving themselves. The iMac has had one instance (since the last partition job) of a massive backup which occurred right after I changed the exclude list and the PPC has had no massive backups (other than the initial one). On that one, I built the exclude list BEFORE the initial backup.
- gws -
Time machine and backing up to a Windows disk
Hi all
Setup as follows : iMac 2.4GHz Core 2 duo 1GB memory and a Windows XP SP2 desktop with a USB HDD attached.
I am new to the world of Macs and am very interested in using Time Machine. My Mac can see the USB HDD when I choose "Connect To Server" and Time Machine allows me to choose this disk as the backup target but when it runs it continually fails. The error is "The backup volume cannot be found".
I have two questions :
1. Can a Mac (Time Machine) use a Windows volume to backup to?
2. If it can, why can my mac see the volume in one application but not in another?
I would appreciate any responses, as my reading of this topic has resulted in what appears to me to be many conflicting answers.
IanYou are correct that it is a Windows formatted disk. The issue with formatting the disk in HFS+ is that although the disk management component of Windows can see the disk it can't actually do anything with it - not even assign a drive letter. And most definitely Windows Explorer cannot see it so the disk can't be shared.
It seems to me that I am in a no-win situation. I am trying to run the iMac in the cleanest way possible - no wires so I really don't want a harddisk constantly plugged in, but by the same token I would really like to take advantage of Tim Machine. Also I don't believe that Time Capsule is that great as an ADSL modem is still required... I guess I won't win this one.
My last ditch attempt is to try formatting the disk using the Mac in FAT32 and then plug it back into the windows box and see what happens (I Say this because windows refuses to format it as anything other than NTFS). I will update when I have tried this. -
Use external drive for both Time Machine and storage for Back to My Mac
Hi all,
I have been "a Mac" now for over a year and just keep finding cool new things that make me happy I switched. The latest thing is Back to My Mac offered with my Mobile Me account. With a rather convoluted mix of PC/Mac/iOS devices to manage - best $99 I ever spent btw...
I also have a 1TB Time Capsule that I have been using with Time Machine to back up all four of my Mac computers at home. Needless to say, the 1TB is really struggling to handle the amount of data being backed up and certainly leaves no room for anything else.
What I wanted to do was to attach a larger external hard drive via a powered hub to the USB port on the Time Capsule and use it for Time Machine backups while using the internal 1TB drive with Back to My Mac so that I can have remote access to all my data from anywhere without having to leave my computer running at home all the time in order for my laptop to "see" it when I'm away. And, yes, the amount of that data far exceeds what any level of Mobile Me subscription can offer! I should also mention that the hard drive is the only USB device connected through the hub to the Time Capsule at the moment. There are no other devices that might be "getting in the way".
I'm thinking maybe all this is asking too much without the addition of a dedicated file server (Mac Mini, perhaps - not a purchase my budget wants to make).
I understand that the Time Capsule doesn't support partitions, so I bought a Western Digital 2TB Elements drive, connected it to my Macbook Pro and used Disk Utility to reformat the drive from the incompatible NTFS it shipped in to a single, Mac OS Extended (Journaled) partition. I then made two folders on the drive, one for Time Machine backups and one for Back to My Mac remote storage/access. Great.
However, when I connected the 2TB drive to my Time Capsule I could not see it at all. Time Capsule was reporting problems in the way of a disk error. From within my Airport Utility, I could see the trouble was the external drive. The utility suggested connecting the drive to a Mac and using it's Disk Utility to troubleshoot.
I followed through, checking the disk, etc. and ended up reformatted the drive on my Macbook Pro yet again with the same specifications as before but without the folders and reconnected it to the Time Capsule. Same deal. But now, I can't even remotely connect to the Time Capsule at all. I can see the Time Capsule in the shared area of my Macbook's Finder but can not connect. The connection tries and fails even before it gets to asking me for username and password credentials.
Long story short, first of all, I suppose I would like to know if I'm asking for the impossible?
Second, if what I want to do *is* possible, what steps do I need to take to make it so?
Thanks in advance for any advice or suggestions you might have.Well, I have now reformatted/partitioned my poor WD Elements 2TB drive about a dozen times as well as restarted my 1TB Time Capsule so many times it's no wonder it's as confused as I am! <G>
Last night, at your suggestion, William, and in respect for your continued support, I tried creating two 1TB Mac OS Extended (Journaled) partitions on the WD external USB drive, both with GUID partition tables. Both volumes mounted to my laptop's desktop flawlessly and without issue.
Once the external drive was connected to the Time Capsule, however, it was a crap shoot as to whether or not the drive was recognized at all, reporting a problem with the disk, or, even at one point, mounting one of the two volumes but not both. <sigh>
I read somewhere on the Internet that you need to restart the Time Capsule for volumes on an external USB drive to be recognized.
So I tried that. I connected the freshly partitioned/formatted disk to the Time Capsule and restarted it. This succeed in removing the issue of reporting a nameless drive with a capacity of 0MB. It then reported the drive with its correct name but would not recognize whatever volumes in whatever partitions that particular crack at it contained with the exception of the once, as I mentioned above, when only one of two volumes mounted correctly and was listed with the right name and capacity on the Time Capusule's Setup's Disk tab.
At this point I have given up on my goal to use the external drive with Time Machine to back up my Macs or to hope I will ever be able to see its contents remotely via Back to My Mac. All I would like to do now is simply find a reason why I can't get it successfully connected and playing nice with my Time Capsule in the first place!
Any further suggestions or advice as to what steps I might take next would be greatly appreciated.
Thank you all. -
I use Time Machine to back up my entire computer with my external hard drive. I am getting a brand new iMac this month and was wondering what is the process of using this back up to restore my new computer exactly how my old computer was? I want to make sure I will still have various important files on my new computer, like my songs in iTunes, my photos in iPhoto, etc, etc. Thanks so much in advance!
Welcome to the Apple Support Communities
When you turn on the new iMac for the first time, Setup Assistant will ask you to restore a backup, so connect the external disk and follow steps to restore all your files to your new iMac. Your new Mac will have the same settings and programs as your old computer.
In other cases, I would recommend to restore the whole backup without using Migration Assistant or Setup Assistant, but a Late 2012 iMac uses a special OS X build, so the OS X version that you're using on your old Mac won't work on the new one. For more information, see > http://pondini.org/OSX/Home.html -
I have been storing my Aperture and IMovie Libraries on an external hard drive that recently died. Fortunately I've been using Time Machine to back up to a 2nd external drive. How do I restore my libraries to a new external hard drive?
This is a tricky one.
Open up Time Machine and go back to a date using the timeline on the right side of the window when you know the drive was working and was backing up as part of Time Machine backups.
Click on the name of your Mac under the Devices heading on the left side of the window in Time Machine, and if things are working correctly you will see Macintosh HD (or whatever you have named it) and the name of the external hard drive that was backing up in the past.
Right-Click on the name of the external hard drive and then click on "Restore (name of drive) to....." You may be asked for your adminstrator password at this point.
It might be easier to restore the drive contents to your desktop if you have room on your Mac, and then copy things over to the new external drive where you want to store the Aperture and iMovie Libraries.
Once the libraries have been moved over the new external hard drive, you will likely need to "point" Aperture and iMovie to the location of the libraries on the new external hard drive. -
I have an older macbook pro and the hard drive is starting to go (making loud noises). i tried to back up to an external hard drive (my passport essential se) using time machine and the computer keeps shutting down. the same thing happens when just trying to save my pictures from iphoto to a flash drive. suggestions to complete backup please?
Sounds like you'll need to access that drive while it is not booted. You need to replace it anyway, so do that, then one way or another (ext enclusure, et), access it and copy files.
If you keep trying to boot it, you might kill it for good and not get your files, so just swap it out first. -
I bought 2 2TB WD Passport Drives with the intention of housing my iTunes/iPhoto libraries off my older MacBook. I have successfully transferred the Libraries to one and am using the other one for Time Machine. In Snow Leopard I could back up my computer to Time Machine no problem but when I did not exclude the iTunes/iPhoto drive the back up fails. Both drives have been reformatted, permissions repaired and checked in Disk Utility and one was replaced. I have been to the Genius Bar now 5 times. I have tried using USB drive and FireWire. Both drives are recognized and are working properly otherwise regardless how they are connected. Finally yesterday the Apple store installed Lion to see if that fixed the issue and it did not. Time Machine successfully backed up a USB Flash drive, and today I will try an older external drive. Any ideas on what else to try??? Do I have to resort to third party software like Carbon Copy Cloned to get this done? Any ideas why this wont work? I am using a FireWire converter but as I said, both drives are working normally otherwise (libraries working, time machine working for the computer's hard drive. Any ideas would be appreciated!!?
Thanks so much but none of that helped. It was driving me crazy because it would back up another external drive. I just changed the name of the drive from iPhoto/iTunes Library to Media Libraries and IT WORKED!! I guess for some reason it didn't like the drive being called iPhoto or iTunes ???? I don't understand but I have tried so many solutions and exchanging things out but the name change did it????!!!
Thank you for your help and replying to this. Guess I made my own issue! -
How can I use time machine to back up and play media?
I just bought an external hard drive that I wanted to back up some media files onto (music and photos). I also want to stove videos/movies on the hard drive and play them from there. A few questions:
1. Is that the same as backing up with time machine or is it referred to as something else?
2. Can I use time machine to add new files, or should I do that manually?
3. Once the files are on my hard drive, can I remove them from my computer or should I keep them there?
I know that these questions may seem obvious, but I'm concerned about losing files because I don't understand what time machine actually does. Please feel free to ask me questions if you need to understand my question better. Thanks!Time Machine makes a backup of your hard drive, which you can restore from, but not use as a repository of data.
Time Machine automatically makes incremental backups as you change things on the Mac HD.
Time Machine is not an archive, meaning if you make a backup, and then delete the originals from your Mac, Time Machine will eventually delete the copies it has made.
However, if you copy the files directly to the external, then you can remove them from the computer. But, those will be your only copies. If that disk dies, they'll be gone. So, that's really not a backup. It's the only source.
You can back up to Time Machine and also store other files on the same disk. -
My iPhoto app was digressed back to 9.5, not sure how I did it. I went to time machine and restored. Now it wont accept my password. tells me it is locked. Can anyone help me?
Run Repair Permissions in Disk Utility and see if that helps.
If not, you can select the iPhoto Library in your Pictures folder, go File > Get Info (or Command-i), go to the bottom of the info window and set your permissions to Read & Write. On the Action menu at the bottom (the one with the gear) choose Apply to enclosed items... -
I am currently in Zambia on missions work and my computer is constantly exposed to heat. I have just been trying to avoid using it during the hottest part of the day. Today though, I started it up and it was stuck on the grey page with the rotating circle for over an hour, then once the circle left, it remained frozen on the gray page. I used command + r at startup to go to the utilities page to analyze the disk. It found that there were problems with the disk, but then it could not fix those problems and told me to backup as much information as I could and reinstall or redo it all. I haven't ever used time machine to back up any of my information, but i have an external drive that I can use right now to backup my files. I can't get into my computer though to backup the files. How can I use this external drive to backup my files while the computer is currently messed up? Please help.
Emergency Backups (Data Recovery)
A) Format an external disk:
(This will erase all data on the external disk.)
Boot in recovery mode (power then Command-R).
Alternative: Network recovery boot (power then Command-Option-R keys)
To format (and erase) the destination recovery disk:
Plug in the drive you are about to erase.
Select the volume that is NOT your system disk.
Click on Partition.
Pull down under Partition Layout to 1 Partition.
Click on Options…
Select GUID Partition Table.
Name: Emergency Backup (or whatever you prefer)
Format: Select Mac OS Extended (journaled)
Click Apply.
Click Partition.
B) Try to boot in Safe Mode (power then Shift key).
(This will be a slow boot. Be patient.)
If it won’t boot in Safe Mode, jump to C.
If it boots in Safe Mode, try to boot in normal mode.
If that fixed your problem then start a Time Machine backup.
http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1427
https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-4055
If not, boot in Safe Mode again.
Go > Computer.
Double click on the system disk.
Drag the Users folder to the recovery disk.
C) To clone the disk:
Boot in recovery mode.
Select Disk Utility.
Try to repair the system disk twice.
Whether or not the repair succeeds:
Drag and drop the system disk to Source:
Drag an drop Emergency Backup to Destination:
(Take care not to reverse this order.)
Click Restore (the lower Restore button).
Once your system is healthy, maintain two reasonably current backups. (Time machine restores can fail.)
Create either two Time Machine backups (good) or one or more Time Machine backup(s) and one or more bootable-clone backup(s) (better).
Use Carbon Copy Cloner or SuperDuper! to create bootable-clone recovery disks.
See https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-3045
and https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-6031 -
Its all in the question.
I have backups from months ago.
And ICLOUD deleted my contact from others devices.Bring the Contacts window forward, then enter Time Machine and scroll back to a snapshot that includes the contacts you want to restore. Select the contacts and click the Restore button in the lower right corner of the screen.
If you don't have a Time Machine backup, but your contacts are all on iCloud and haven't been overwritten, then you can recover them by following the instructions on this page. Double-click the downloaded file to import it into Contacts. This procedure will not work if you've synced an empty Contacts database to iCloud.
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