Time Machine and partitioned External HD

I have an External Hitachi Easy Drive HD, 1 Terabyte, connected via USB to my Mac Mini, which I have partitioned. The smaller partition of 200GB is for a clone of my Mac Mini OS 10.5.8 and all contents, making it a bootable drive. The remainder space of 731 GB is for Time Machine storage. From my Mac Mini, I opened Time Machine and under preferences, change disk, and designated the Time Machine partition for the "use for backup". I have designated folders under "options", exclude; that are not to be in the Time Machine backup.
I initiate Time Machine. It now backs up completely the whole Mac Mini 200 GB partition that is already on the External Hitachi HD and then adds to it the designated Time Machine partition as well as the Time Machine back up. They appear as two distinct folder with contents.
Why? How can I control this behavior?

Euchre is correct, although I'm surprised it backed-up another partition on the same drive without sending you a warning message first.
TM will eventually delete those backups, but not for a while. If you want, you can delete all the backups of that drive via the procedure in item #12 of the of the Frequently Asked Questions *User Tip* at the top of this forum.

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HT201250 i am using for first time the time machine and an external hard drive because I want to erase my macbook and start from zero files. do i keep my files in the portable hard disk when I connect it again with the macbook or the time machine will era

i am using for first time the time machine and an external hard drive because I want to erase my macbook and start from zero files. Am i keeping my files in the portable hard disk when I will connect it again with the macbook or the time machine will erase all?
I would like to know if after I erase all my data, empy hard drive inside the macbook, the time machine will erase all my files that I have saved in my "WD "My passport" external hard drive

Welcome to Apple Support Communities
Time Machine has to erase the external disk in order to make backups. Before setting Time Machine up, copy the files of your external disk to the hard disk of the Mac in order not to lose them, and then, set up Time Machine. The first backup will start automatically.
If you want more information about Time Machine, read the Pondini's site > http://pondini.org

Time Machine and Seagate External hard drive

I connected my Seagate External Hard Drive (300GB) to my MacBook pro for the first time. I got a prompt asking if I would like to use this as a backup disk with Time Machine. Absent-mindedly, I hit "NO".
Now the Hard drive is not showing up in the list of disks in Time Machine and I can't figure out a way to search for new disks or change the settings. I would like to use the hard drive to back up my Mac.
(Also, my Mac has a Windows partition) and I have used Norton to backup the Windows side on the same hard drive.)
Any suggestions?

MG1373 wrote:
(Also, my Mac has a Windows partition) and I have used Norton to backup the Windows side on the same hard drive.)
Hi, and welcome to the forums.
Do you mean there's already Windoze data on the external you want to use for Time Machine? If so, this probably isn't going to work. The external is almost certainly set up with the MBR (Master Boot Record) partition scheme, which will not work for TM backups. To check this, use Disk Utility (in your Applications/Utilities folder). Click the top line of the drive (with the make and size), then look at the bottom of the display for *Partition Map Scheme.*
If it is MBR, the only way you can put a partition for Time Machine on this drive is to erase it completely and reformat it with the GUID partition map scheme (unless it's a PPC Mac, which needs the +Apple Partition Map+ scheme), then make 2 (or more) partitions, one formatted +Mac OS Extended (Journaled)+ for TM.
If you do that, you may not be able to set up a partition that you can use for the Windoze data. I don't do Windoze, so can't be sure about that.

New to Mac, Help with Time Machine! Partition External HDD or not?

Hey Guys I'm a new mac user
I need help with time machine
I wanted to know how time machine works and what all does it back up?
I have 2 hard drives one is of 1TB and one is of 320gb
In the 1TB hard drive i store all my music videos and work stuff it is windows formatted
The 320gb hard drive is mac formatted and I was thinking of making a partition on it one with 250gb for time machine and the remaining 70 gb for mac softwares and files. The ssd of my mac has a capacity of 256gb. I have read for time machine you need at least 2x the space of your ssd on your external hard drive but i don't understand if my ssd is only 256 and can store files worth 256gb why do i need double the space? Secondly if I choose to use the complete 320 gb for time machine will that be okay or even if i choose to partition it to 250gb for time machine will that be fine too? Or will I need to format my 1TB hard disk out of which currently only 300 gb is empty and partition that to 500 gb for time machine?
I'm really confused every tells me to use time machine but do I need it? And what does it exactly do?
Your input will be really appreciate thanks

The reason that you want a partition (or drive) of 2-3 times the size of your boot drive for Time Machine is so that you can keep backups further back than just the current boot drive state - for that you'd need to make a clone of the drive rather than using Time Machine (see -> http://pondini.org/TM/Clones.html).
For more information for backups in general, see -> Most commonly used backup methods.
Note that you can't use Time Machine to backup a Windows partition.
Good luck,
Clinton
MacBook Pro (15” Late 2011), OS X 10.??, 16GB Crucial RAM, 960GB M500 Crucial SSD, 27” Apple Thunderbolt Display

Help w/ Time Machine and 2 External Drives + Main Drive

I need some help on the best possible setup with the tools on hand...
Currently I have the following:
iMac with 500GB Hardrive
My Book with 2 TB Hardrive
My Book with 1.5 TB Hardrive
What I want to do (in my head anyways) is have my main drive for my normal applications (ilife, iworks and everything else under the sun) and use the 1.5 TB for my iTunes as i have alot of movies and music and then use my 2 TB to back up the main drive and 1.5TB drive that way if my 1.5TB drive dies my iTunes are still in tack and likewise for my main drive with my applications.
before I go ahead and do this... is it best just to use time machine on my 2TB drive? or should I parition it say 1.5TB for Time machine and 500 GB for Carbon copy so I can boot off of that drive if need be?
I have done some research on the subject but just want to make sure I'm not missing a step or if there is a better set up I should do with my current gear (500MB main drive, external 1.5 TB and 2TB drives)
thanks!

Narayan9 wrote:
total data that needs to be backed up isnt that much... probably around 600-700 MB currently
I'm sure you mean 600-700GB
(but it is growing). I'm in the mitts of ripping my purchased DVD's to itunes so I can watch them VIA Apple TV.
The whole reason for me buying the 2 external drives was to ensure my itunes files wouldnt be lost in a hardrive failure as I have a very large DVD collect (around 300) and as you know its very time consuming to copy them to itunes in the first place and if my main drives dies Im not sure if I would have the patients to re-copy everything to my iMac.
you can use the 2TB drive to back up everything you have now via TM. but if it grows much more then I would suggest using a different backup solution as outlined in my first post. TM needs space for incremental backups and some overhead just to operate. most other backup tools don't.

Time Machine and partition on external drive

Planning to buy a big external drive, but, is it possible to partition the external drive and make TM work on one ?

Absolutely, in fact it is recommended to give TM its own partition. Use the first partition of the drive (that's the one that ends up at the top of the list in Disk Utility).
Make sure the partition is double, if not three times, the size of what you will be backing up.
Note that you have the option (Sys Prefs-TM-Options) to exclude drives and folders from backups. This may save a lot of space and is useful for the applications folder (as you likely have that stuff on CD/DVD), for music (if you have it on CDs), the downloads folder etc; see [this page|http://www.ryanblock.com/2008/05/good-folders-to-exclude-from-time-machine -backups] for more ideas on what to exclude so as not to backup unnecessary stuff. Also, if you work with scratch disks (in Photoshop or video applications, for instance), exclude them as well as that's just unnecessary.
/p

Time Machine and partitions

I am running OS X 10.6.8 and am setting up a new 1 TB external hard drive to do Time Machine backups. I would also like to use a small portion of this drive to store some other material that is separate from what I am backing up, i.e. non-Time Machine material. I am considering partitioning the drive to set this space aside, but I'm wondering if I need to bother. My understanding is that Time Machine will not overwrite existing files like this if it encoundters them as it fills up the disk, it will just think it has less room. But is that correct? If you put other things on your Time Machine drive will it leave them alone?

OK, I guess I'm not following. I thought, from the reply from Niel above, that if I just put some stuff on the drive without partitioning it and then started using Time Machine, that TM would just write its stuff around my other files and leave them alone. You seem to be saying that when you set TM up it creates a partition for itself, i.e. wipes the drive (I have not started to use it yet, so I don't know if that is the case). I guess he was suggesting the same thing. If that is the scenario, I can understand that I should make a partition for the other things first, rather than manually putting them into the TM partiton after it has been set up.
As for backup, this is going to be a backup drive in the first place, so the material on it will be redundant with its primary locations.

Time machine and 2 external HD

Hello, all.
I have time machine to make backups to the one of the firewire hard drives. The 2nd hard drive is connected to the 1st hard drive via firewire (daisy chain, is that the vocab for that?). The hard drive is a 3rd copy of select photos.
The main hard drive has iPhoto and the photos. The second set of photos is the back up to the "Timemachine" HD.
How do I know if Timemachine is putting a copy of the iMac HD to the external "Timemachine" HD or if Timemachine is putting a copy of the iMac HD and the other external HD (3rd photo set) to the "Timemachine" HD.
I only want Timemachine to copy the iMac HD to the "Timemachine" HD. Sorry, if this sounds confusing.

jonesey1019 wrote:
My concerns are the videos that are in iMovie are only on the external HD, should they be backed up from the external or place them on the internal drive somewhere?
Hi, and welcome to the forums.
The essential requirement of a good backup scheme is to have (at least) two copies of everything important in (at least) two places. So yes, you need to back them up somehow.
Also, if Time Machine is only backing up the internal 1TB the external HD has 2TBs left over.
Not necessarily. Time Machine not only keeps copies of what's currently on your Mac, but also copies of things you've changed or deleted, so it needs more space than the data it's backing-up. It varies greatly, depending on how you use your Mac, but a "rule of thumb" is it needs 2-3 times the amount of space as the data it's backing-up, to be able to keep a reasonable "depth" of backups for you.
Can I store additional files on the HD that is running Time Machine if I need the space in the future?
You can, but any other data should be in a separate partition. See #3 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).
You can have Time Machine back up one or more of the externals, along with your internal HD (if they're formatted for a Mac), but you'll not have room for all of them.
You may want a "split" strategy: Time Machine for your internal HD, and a different app for the others. Especially if the data on the externals doesn't change frequently, you may not need the "archive" copies of things that have been deleted or changed, so you'd only need the same amount of space for them. And you may not need them backed-up as frequently as Time Machine.
You might use either CarbonCopyCloner or SuperDuper; they're most often used to make "bootable clones" of startup drives, but would work for this purpose as well. [CarbonCopyCloner|http://www.bombich.com> is donationware; [SuperDuper|http://www.shirt-pocket.com/SuperDuper/SuperDuperDescription.html] has a free version, but you need the paid one (about $30) to do updates instead of full replacements, or scheduling.
Message was edited by: Pondini

Time Machine and partitioned drive

Hiya.
I have a macbook pro running snow. I use TM to an external hard drive.
When I first got the macbook I (foolishly) thought it would be a good idea to partition the internal hard drive. I've now realised my error and would like just one partition, however this does not seem to be possible without wiping the drive (or buying something like ipartition...)
Can I wipe the hard drive starting up from a version of osx on the hard drive, create one partition and then use TM to put back my osx setup to the new single partition? Or can it only put back the two partitions?
Thanks!

jonniecrossley wrote:
Hiya.
I have a macbook pro running snow. I use TM to an external hard drive.
When I first got the macbook I (foolishly) thought it would be a good idea to partition the internal hard drive. I've now realised my error and would like just one partition, however this does not seem to be possible without wiping the drive (or buying something like ipartition...)
Can I wipe the hard drive starting up from a version of osx on the hard drive, create one partition and then use TM to put back my osx setup to the new single partition? Or can it only put back the two partitions?
If OSX is the first partition (on top of the diagram that Disk Utility shows, when you select the top line of the drive and click the Partition tab), then you'll only have to delete the other partition. If it's second, this is going to be a bit more complicated: if so, post back and we'll tackle that.)
Then you can just drag the lower-right corner of the top partition down to fill the remaining space.
As Jolly Giant mentioned, I'd strongly recommend making a second backup of everything before you start this. You shouldn't need it, but remember: Murphy was an optimist!
Once that's done, you'll have to be careful of a few things. First, you'll need the procedure in #E3 of the Time Machine - Troubleshooting *User Tip* to view the backups from the now-missing partition.
Second, you'll need to restore the top-level folders to an alternate location. Select them, click the "gear" icon in the TM Finder window's toolbar and select the +*Restore <item> to ...+* option, then specify the now-single partition on your internal HD.
Third, you may have to "redirect" some things from the deleted partition, if you had, say, your iPhoto library there. And you may have had some aliases directing things there.
Last, do all this with TM off. TM's first backup after this will be a big one; everything you moved from the deleted partition is new to the remaining partition and will be backed-up again. That will, of course, take a lot of space and considerable time. TM will, eventually, delete it's backups of the deleted partition, but if you're going to have a space problem on your TM drive, you might want to leave TM off for a while, be sure everything came over properly, then use TM to delete all backups of the deleted partition. Use the same procedure as above, but this time select the +*Delete all backups of <item>+* option.

Time Machine and Partitions GUID or Apple

Am having that today now only problem with T.M. But can get it to work by right clicking and all the rest. But was wondering, I just checked my 3 drives 1 internal and 2 external. The internal drive is the GUID partition table and so is my 320gb with my tiger backup, but the drive I'm using for time machine is the apple partition map. Would that make a difference? And how do I partition it to the GUID partition table. Also have read some posts about the computers name, how can I find it ?
Thanks Neil

Alright I think you are experiencing a problem that I had with time machine; just for curiosity what hard drive are you using? I am using Mybook, but I think this should help anyways. Before you do anything i would make sure the computer reads the drive, like when you plug it in, does something come up? If not then go to disk utility and format it to FAT after this everything should work fine. Now open up the disk utility and click on the partitions tab, once there create two partitions but make sure you click on the options thing and make them both GUID, also be sure it read Mac OS Extended (Journal). Once those partitions are created go back and revert the process (Make it one partition) name it whatever you wish but keep the GUID setting and the os extended journaled. Now everything should work flawlessly. You shouldn't have any time machine problems. I do recommend having two partitions that way time machine is not taking up your entire external drive, because it will use it all up if you have 1 partition. When I first got used time machine I let it use a 750 Gig drive; I had this as my main storage unit and would place movies and other non mac related documents in there, after a while I noticed that some of my stuff was vanishing like some messed up prank my computer was pulling on me, but no, time machine just deleted stuff you put on your drive to make room for backups, so once again don’t make my mistake make two partitions.

If i back up my mac using Time Machine and an external hard-drive, can that same hard-drive be used on another computer and on a PC?

Hi!
I hav just got a macbook pro and am used to using a HP pc and am a newbie! I have backed up my macbook with my elements external hardrive and was wondering if i can transfer the music i have purchased and is now on my external hard-drive back onto my other laptop purely because i use both laptops for different things and want to use my music on both. how do i do this? and do i need a particular software to do so?
Any tips would be greatly appreciated
thanks
alex xxx

Welcome to Apple Support Communities
You can do it, but it's not recommended to use a Time Machine volume to store other files. In this case, you can create a second volume on the external drive, so you will be able to use it to store data and transfer it to other PCs.
As you are going to use the external drive with other PCs, you can make the volume and format it in "MS-DOS (FAT)" with Disk Utility > http://pondini.org/OSX/DU3.html Finally, you will be able to copy files to the external drive.
If you copy files to a Time Machine disk, you may damage the Time Machine file structure, so you shouldn't do it. It may not happen, but it's better not to try that. Also, you won't be able to read the Time Machine drive in a PC

Time Machine and Networked external hard drive

My family has thee macs and one PC, all under the same roof. All the Macs are 2008 and later models (MacBooks and MacBook Pros, with Leopard or Snow Leopard).
I lost a load of data last weekend and my i-disk did not contain a backup of all the data, pics etc lost which came as a nasty shock. Bolting the stable door after the horse has bolted, I've bought a Western Digital 1TB external hard disk and connected it to the USB 2 port on my linksys Gigabit N+ router. This network device does appear in my list of shared devices and I can manually copy and paste data to it, but Time Machine doesn't seem able to see the device to enable me to automate the backup process.
I've looked for relevant posts on this forum but can't see quite the thing, can you help me please?
What if anything can I do to get Time Machine to do automated backups and can this be done via the network router to enable others in the family to do likewise?

To expand a bit on one of the options Kappy mentions, if one of your Macs is stationary, you can back up over your local network to a shared drive connected directly to it. See #22 in the Frequently Asked Questions *User Tip,* also at the top of this forum.
It's "iffy" and not supported by Apple, but some are able to back up to a USB drive connected to a recent-model Airport Extreme. See the Using Time Machine with a USB drive connected to an Airport Extreme *User Tip,* also at the top of this forum. As mentioned there, don't depend on those 100%; also maintain some sort of secondary backups, in addition.
But that's something I learned (the hard way, of course) long ago: Airport or not, never trust your backups to a single app or piece of hardware. No app is perfect, and no hardware is trouble-free indefinitely.
Or, you may be able to find an alternative app that will back up to your setup. See Kappy's post on +Basic Backup,+ complete with links to the web sites of each product.

Is it possible to use an AirPort Time Capsule as both a Time Machine and an external hard drive from which to stream from?

I recently purchased a new 2TB Time Capsule. I purchased it in hopes that I can set it up in 2 ways.
1. Empty my almost completely full MacBook harddrive onto it (mostly movies, music, and photos) that I can stream directly from via iTunes and my Apple TV (this will allow me to free up much needed space on my MacBook)
2. Use it as a wireless Time Capsule to back up what is left on my harddrive
I currently use another external harddrive as a time machine but it is a cumbersome process. I know that Time Capsule's weren't built to be partined for needs such as this, but I've been told by Apple that it is possible. Does anyone know how? Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks!

1. Empty my almost completely full MacBook harddrive onto it (mostly movies, music, and photos) that I can stream directly from via iTunes and my Apple TV
Yes, you can use the Time Capsule to provide both a wired and wireless network AND media storage to stream from an iTunes host device to an Apple TV. As an example, you can place your iTunes Library on either the TC's internal HDD or an external USB HDD attached to the TC. You can then access this library from iTunes located on a Mac or PC, and then, stream it to the Apple TV.
2. Use it as a wireless Time Capsule to back up what is left on my harddrive
Yes, you can use the TC as a backup destination for either Time Machine or any other network-ready backup program. Again you can either use its internal HDD or an attached USB HDD for this purpose.

HT5097 I recently upgraded my macbook to Mountain lion. Before doing so I used time machine and an external hard drive to back up my entire laptop. When we upgraded my computer came back like new. All pics, music, videos documents etc gone. How do I ge

I recently upgraded my macbook to mountain lion. Before doing so I used time machine to back up my entire laptop with an external hard drive.
When I got my computer back it was clean....all pics, music, documents, bookmarks etc. are gone. How do I get these files off the external hard drive and back onto my laptop with the new upgrade?

I recently upgraded my macbook to mountain lion. Before doing so I used time machine to back up my entire laptop with an external hard drive.
When I got my computer back it was clean....all pics, music, documents, bookmarks etc. are gone. How do I get these files off the external hard drive and back onto my laptop with the new upgrade?

Why does Macbook Pro rename my Time Machine and other external hard drives?

Why does my Macbook Pro rename my Time Machine to "Time Machine I" and then back again periodically. Last night it was one name, this morning it is another. It also does it on other external hard drives - usually by adding a I after the name. It is frustrating for me because I store a large runtime folder on an external hard drive and end up losing a lot of time with my computer not being able to find files because of the renaming.
And even though it still looks like Time Machine under "Get info: - when I open a folder window or Disk Utility it has a new name, and there is no way to change it. I've seen other questions that mention Macs renaming themselves, so it seems like a similar issue. I did try deleting the preferences plist file, but that did not work.
Is this a glitch with this particular model or operating system?
Specs: Macbook Pro A1297 - 2009 model.
Snow Leopard 10.6.8
2.8GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
8GB ram
Many thanks for any advice.

nachdenki wrote:
strange, my external HDs were added to the exception list automatically. maybe because they wouldn't fit on the time machine volume.
It seems to depend on when the drives were connected. When you first turn Time Machine on, it only excludes the TM drive itself, and any drives not formatted HFS+.
If you connect a drive later on, that drive will be excluded automatically.

Time Machine and partitioned External HD

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