Time Machine as a simple server?

Short question, is it possible to access time Time Capsual harddrive over the internet if you got an static IP? Would be great to access files, sort of as an simple server. Thanks.

yes... You only need to login into TC on a mac but with the external ip and your username and passoword...
But... I've lost all data inside my TC anyways...

Similar Messages

Can Time Capsule be used as a time machine on a Windows Server. Is this possible, and how do i configure this?

I like to use the new TC in my office as a time machine on a Windows Server. Is this possible, and how do i configure this?
In fact my plan is to make the first back up by connecting to the server via an ethernet cable, but thereafter i like to bring the TC to my home and perform the incremental backups over the internet. This is for safety reasons, in case for example the office is broken into, or flooded, or fire (god forbid).
I sincerely hope it is possible, and not complicated.
Alternatively i would not mind replacing our current Windows server 2003 with an Apple server, but all computers in the network (except mine) are Windows 7 or 8. Would it work?
Thanks in advance.
Paris

I will consider the WD My Cloud device.
It is a NAS.. it is designed to provide a cheap centralised file storage.
What is NAS?? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network-attached_storage
A file server like windows uses heaps of power to do very little.. in your setup.. In most setups like SBS it will do exchange server and provide a heap of useful connectivity to your clients.
Since you are not using the windows server in anything but simple file serving you can replace with a NAS..
Problem with the TC is, it is a router with a hard disk inside.. designed specifically for Time Machine.. it fails to provide what a NAS does.. easy access to any clients, local or remote.. TC is designed by apple for apple and the rest of world is not really invited to the party.
It provides no backup.. no data protection.. and is so specifically apple orientated I do not think it works at all well with windows.
For a simple example.. windows will have file issues with large files.. because it is only NTserver FAT32 to windows.. bad luck if you have large files.. !!
Plainly if you use active directory in windows that facility is gone.
I just like Apple products, find them more stable than Windows and easier to use. Plus i can access the server from home if it is an Apple Server.
If you only need remote access for yourself that is fine.. too bad for the windows clients I guess.
Or you open it up to the world and bad luck for security.
Apple do not design for mixed environment.. in fact with the TC there is no provision for windows access officially at all.. so anything you do is a fudge.
You can use the TC for your Mac backups within the network.. that is fine. Apple provide no software at all to help with your windows clients.

Time Machine on Snow Leopard Server

I would like to setup a backup service using Time Machine of a Mac Pro Snow Leopard Server (10.6.5) to an external hard drive connected with USB. Are there any gotcha's with this type of setup that I need to be aware of? My faint memory recalls an issue with Time Machine backing up a server.
The server is mainly used for file sharing in a small (<10) person office.

Are you backing-up the clients, or the server, or both?
Like most folks here, I'm not very familiar with the Server product, but I understand TM can do either or both.
You may find better advice in the Server forums, at: http://discussions.apple.com/category.jspa?categoryID=96

Why can I no longer backup to Time Machine on OS X Server?

We have a Windows Server and a Mac Server. The OS X Server is basically only for backups from workstations via Time Machine and as a Software Update Server.
I can no longer backup from my MacBook to the Server. If I try to add the location again in Time Machine Prefs, it asks for username and password. I try my AD account, but it fails. Guest doesn't work either. Any suguestions? When I set up the Time Machine service on the server, it was very easy. What did I miss?

You have to enter the name and password of an administrator on the server.

Time Machine Service Page in Server App says "Error Reading Settings"

I have a Mac Mini running 10.8.3.
For some reason the Time Machine Page in the Server App refuses to work properly. If I reboot the server it looks fine for about 10 minutes. It displays the backup location and the list of individual backups. Then I get this message:
25/03/2013 14:37:51.673 Server[286]: Error: The server '127.0.0.1' reported an error while processing command of type: 'readSettings' in plug-in: 'servermgr_timemachine'. Error: Error Domain=XSActionErrorDomain Code=1000 "An unknown error occurred" UserInfo=0x7fdc1b2445e0 {NSLocalizedDescription=An unknown error occurred}
Also the Time Machine page in Server Apps is blank apart from "Error Reading Settings" and the slider at the top says Time Machine is off.
However Time Machine does work for some clients.
Anyone got any idea?
I think it started having problems when I got a "The network confirguration has changed" alert.

Hi Linc Davis
here are the logs from reboot to failure to load:
26/03/2013 16:57:50.256 servermgrd[1379]: [1379] error in getAndLockContext: flock(servermgr_timemachine) FATAL time out
26/03/2013 16:59:55.633 servermgrd[1527]: [1527] error in getAndLockContext: flock(servermgr_timemachine) FATAL time out
26/03/2013 17:01:58.077 servermgrd[1546]: [1546] error in getAndLockContext: flock(servermgr_timemachine) FATAL time out
26/03/2013 17:04:03.937 servermgrd[1561]: [1561] error in getAndLockContext: flock(servermgr_timemachine) FATAL time out
26/03/2013 17:04:05.220 Server[1154]: Error: The server '127.0.0.1' reported an error while processing a command of type: 'readSettings' in plug-in: 'servermgr_timemachine'. Error: Error Domain=XSActionErrorDomain Code=1000 "An unknown error occurred" UserInfo=0x7ffac4620f20 {NSLocalizedDescription=An unknown error occurred}
26/03/2013 17:06:07.359 servermgrd[1666]: [1666] error in getAndLockContext: flock(servermgr_timemachine) FATAL time out
26/03/2013 17:06:07.829 Server[1154]: Error: The server '127.0.0.1' reported an error while processing a command of type: 'getBackups' in plug-in: 'servermgr_timemachine'. Error: Error Domain=XSActionErrorDomain Code=1000 "An unknown error occurred" UserInfo=0x7ffac480f000 {NSLocalizedDescription=An unknown error occurred}
26/03/2013 19:18:51.737 servermgrd[1678]: [1678] error in getAndLockContext: flock(servermgr_timemachine) FATAL time out
26/03/2013 19:18:51.777 servermgrd[1678]: [1678] error in getAndLockContext: flock(servermgr_timemachine) FATAL time out
26/03/2013 19:20:55.346 servermgrd[2846]: [2846] error in getAndLockContext: flock(servermgr_timemachine) FATAL time out
26/03/2013 19:20:55.381 servermgrd[2846]: [2846] error in getAndLockContext: flock(servermgr_timemachine) FATAL time out
26/03/2013 19:22:57.682 servermgrd[2861]: [2861] error in getAndLockContext: flock(servermgr_timemachine) FATAL time out
26/03/2013 19:22:57.683 servermgrd[2861]: [2861] error in getAndLockContext: flock(servermgr_timemachine) FATAL time out
26/03/2013 19:22:58.114 Server[1154]: Error: The server '127.0.0.1' reported an error while processing a command of type: 'readSettings' in plug-in: 'servermgr_timemachine'. Error: Error Domain=XSActionErrorDomain Code=1000 "An unknown error occurred" UserInfo=0x7ffac4836250 {NSLocalizedDescription=An unknown error occurred}
26/03/2013 19:25:00.016 servermgrd[2872]: [2872] error in getAndLockContext: flock(servermgr_timemachine) FATAL time out
26/03/2013 19:25:00.135 Server[1154]: Error: The server '127.0.0.1' reported an error while processing a command of type: 'readSettings' in plug-in: 'servermgr_timemachine'. Error: Error Domain=XSActionErrorDomain Code=1000 "An unknown error occurred" UserInfo=0x7ffac494c120 {NSLocalizedDescription=An unknown error occurred}
26/03/2013 19:26:02.690 Server[1154]: Error: The server '127.0.0.1' reported an error while processing a command of type: 'getBackups' in plug-in: 'servermgr_timemachine'. Error: Error Domain=XSActionErrorDomain Code=1000 "An unknown error occurred" UserInfo=0x7ffac4826a80 {NSLocalizedDescription=An unknown error occurred}
26/03/2013 19:33:51.868 servermgrd[2886]: [2886] error in getAndLockContext: flock(servermgr_timemachine) FATAL time out
26/03/2013 19:33:51.901 servermgrd[2886]: [2886] error in getAndLockContext: flock(servermgr_timemachine) FATAL time out
26/03/2013 19:35:54.539 servermgrd[2932]: [2932] error in getAndLockContext: flock(servermgr_timemachine) FATAL time out
26/03/2013 19:35:54.580 servermgrd[2932]: [2932] error in getAndLockContext: flock(servermgr_timemachine) FATAL time out
26/03/2013 19:37:56.926 servermgrd[2947]: [2947] error in getAndLockContext: flock(servermgr_timemachine) FATAL time out
26/03/2013 19:37:57.424 Server[1154]: Error: The server '127.0.0.1' reported an error while processing a command of type: 'readSettings' in plug-in: 'servermgr_timemachine'. Error: Error Domain=XSActionErrorDomain Code=1000 "An unknown error occurred" UserInfo=0x7ffac472ad50 {NSLocalizedDescription=An unknown error occurred}
26/03/2013 19:39:59.284 servermgrd[2958]: [2958] error in getAndLockContext: flock(servermgr_timemachine) FATAL time out
26/03/2013 19:40:01.135 Server[1154]: Error: The server '127.0.0.1' reported an error while processing a command of type: 'getState' in plug-in: 'servermgr_timemachine'. Error: Error Domain=XSActionErrorDomain Code=1000 "An unknown error occurred" UserInfo=0x7ffac4657ce0 {NSLocalizedDescription=An unknown error occurred}
26/03/2013 19:42:04.286 servermgrd[2973]: [2973] error in getAndLockContext: flock(servermgr_timemachine) FATAL time out
26/03/2013 19:42:04.322 servermgrd[2973]: [2973] error in getAndLockContext: flock(servermgr_timemachine) FATAL time out
26/03/2013 19:45:20.502 Server[1154]: Error: The server '127.0.0.1' reported an error while processing a command of type: 'getState' in plug-in: 'servermgr_timemachine'. Error: Error Domain=XSActionErrorDomain Code=1000 "An unknown error occurred" UserInfo=0x7ffac43f84a0 {NSLocalizedDescription=An unknown error occurred}
27/03/2013 11:56:52.191 servermgrd[110]: [110] error in getAndLockContext: flock(servermgr_timemachine) FATAL time out
27/03/2013 11:58:54.217 servermgrd[371]: [371] error in getAndLockContext: flock(servermgr_timemachine) FATAL time out

Is Time Machine bad on Leopard Server?

Hi,
I'm pretty much a newbie when it comes to setting up osx server, however is it true that using time machine to backup Leopard Server is bad? Our office is running leopard server off a G5 dual-core 2.0 with 2.5GB ram. The boot drive is mirrored in a raid 1, and we have a Sonnet D800RAID (RAID 5) connected via ATTO raid card. All employees will work off the server, meaning all projects will be stored there on the RAID 5.
We wanted to use time machine to do incremental backups of the RAID 5, however apparently from what I hear, using time machine on a server is a no,no. Why though? Does it really use a lot of the CPU running in the background?
I really want to implement, but not if there's a BIG problem going to arise from it in the future.
Thanks in advance~
noiceT

Hi
I guess it depends? The current version of the Server Admin Manual available here:
http://images.apple.com/server/macosx/docs/ServerAdministration_v10.5_2ndEd.pdf
does not have a lot to say about it one way or another. However the previous version of the Admin Manual clearly states on page 37:
*+"Leopard’s Time Machine feature is not recommended for server file and system backup of advanced configuration servers"+*
If you purchased the boxed copy of Leopard Server 6-9 months ago it may still state this in the provided manual? There have been some who have used it successfully when the server is configured as Advanced. I have no personal experience of this but if you search the Mail Forums you should find recommendations to not use it if configured as Advanced/Mail Server. Its not so much backing up but rather problems develop when restoring.
I've not had chance to test with Open Directory, perhaps others have?
Just a thought but I would consider carefully (depending on server role) if I had need to use it for the Server itself. On the other hand I think it works fine as a source for client backups.
Tony

Time Machine Backup to Mac Server

If I missed the solution to this in the forums, I apologize in advance. I have been searching these forums and Google all afternoon to find a solution to this problem. If this is addressed elsewhere, please be kind enough to post a link.
Network - Mac XServe and managed client all running the latest updates. Managed settings are the mobile account with manual home sync, login message and display and SUS.
On the server, I set up the /Volumes/Server HD/Backups directory in Server Admin and checked the box to make it a Time Machine destination as the instructions stated.
On the client, I ran the command so that the network volume would show up (defaults write com.apple.systempreferences TMShowUnsupportedNetworkVolumes 1) and I am able to select the disk.
When I selected the disk initially, it told me my ID did not have permission to read/write/append to the network volume. So in Server Admin, I added my network ID with Read/Write access in the ACL section. After doing this, I can select the disk and start the backup. It acts like it is going to work, then I get the following error:
+Time Machine could not complete the backup.+
+The network backup disk could not be accessed because there was a problem with the network username or password.+
+Open Time Machine preferences to select the network backup disk and re-enter the correct username and password.+
I have spent the afternoon trying to figure this out. Is there something simple I'm missing and making this more difficult than it has to be?
Thanks in advance for any ideas you can give. I will mention this is my first XServe to administer, so if I'm making this harder than it has to be, that's why.

I have the same issue, but with a WD mybook 1TB NAS drive. It works for a day or two, then fails. Re-entering the username and password corrects it for a day or two, and it fails again. Has been a problem since the NAS was installed. I never used Time Machine before that.
Gigabit wired ethernet, iMac Snow Leopard as follows:
Model Name: iMac
Model Identifier: iMac7,1
Processor Name: Intel Core 2 Duo
Processor Speed: 2 GHz
Number Of Processors: 1
Total Number Of Cores: 2
L2 Cache: 4 MB
Memory: 2 GB
Bus Speed: 800 MHz
Boot ROM Version: IM71.007A.B03
SMC Version (system): 1.20f4
System Version: Mac OS X 10.6.2 (10C540)
Kernel Version: Darwin 10.2.0
Boot Volume: Macintosh HD
Boot Mode: Normal
Computer Name: Studio Mac
User Name: Denis DuBois (dubois)
Secure Virtual Memory: Not Enabled
64-bit Kernel and Extensions: No
Western Digital:
Device Name NAS1
Version 01.01.16 with MioNet 4.1.0.0.171
built on Fri Nov 6 13:28:12 CST 2009

Backing up Time Machine to a Remote Server

Hi All,
Relatively simple question, the answer I think is probably going to be somewhat complicated.
I administrate a mostly-mac network, I've got about 40 machines backing up to a 1TB drive on our server via Time Machine. So far, it's working great. My only concern is that if the building burns down this backup disk won't do squat for us.
Until now, I was using Carbon Copy Cloner to do incremental backups of the Time Machine drive to our offsite backup server. This was a pain in the *** to set up! I had to bring our backup drive out to the data centre to copy the huge amount of data!
Recently, CCC had an update, in the update notes it mentioned that CCC should not be used for Time Machine backups. You can imagine my chagrin!
I'm now questioning whether I should ever have deployed Time Machine in the first place. I'm thinking I'll go back to Retrospect. Unless one of you fine people can point me to a solution that would get my TM backups going offsite in a way that will preserve their integrity! rsync maybe? I'm hoping to hear from someone who's done it.

I just spent 30 minutes looking for the answer elsewhere to no avail. I too am surprised that it is unclear how to create a copy to move offsite.
One thing that may work is at the hardware level but it is more expensive. If you configure mirrored RAID on a RAID-available storage device you could swap in/out onto a remote site.
I have no idea whether OS X raid would work, i.e., configuring in Disk Utility the Time Machine device on the RAID tab to be a "Mirrored Raid Set".
Curious if anyone gets positive results from either of the above or knows that it won't work because "?tell us?"?

Reliability of Time Machine on Snow Leopard Server

I ran across a message that even though Time Machine is included in OSX 10.6 Server, Apple does not support its use in this system.
Now I can't find it again. Is that true?
Not trying to clone an entire computer, just the Library (for WebServer and QuickTime Streaming), would it be reliable enough for this?
I am using the second internal drive for the backup disk, and already have the entire computer backed up to an external image.
Not asking about strategy, but does Time Machine work reliably for what I am doing?
Second question, is TimeMachineEditor a good way to change the backup time in OSX Server 10.6?
Want to now make it in the middle of the night.
Thanking anyone for answers.
Frank
(I have to say this new forum structure is poor compared to the last one! Much harder to find topics and subtopics, who cares about the fancy toolbar)

It's actually quite usual for backup programs to suck at databases. I believe that even the high end backup systems like Retrospect etc have to take the database off line before it'll successfully perform the backup.
Databases just don't like to be backed up! In fact, if you tail the log in OS X server, when you perform an archive on it, it checks to make sure that the parts of the database that it's backing up that moment are not in use. For a program like time machine, that would just not be reasonable considering the way that it's designed to work.
They include it with OS X server so that tech guys like us can tell it NOT to back up things like the .mach folder and the /System Folder. ...and the netboot images etc. Most importantly, we tell it NOT to back up the Database files.
What it SHOULD back up is those files that your users can delete accidentally. That way you get to look like the hero when you get it back for them!
All that said... Here's what I do with time machine:
I don't back up any files that are duplicated everywhere else. (netboot images, restore images, CD/DVD images) I don't back up Mail, MySQL, and OD. Lastly, I don't back up my Roaming Profile shared folder.
Since my Open Directory only has user information in it, and I don't often delete or add users, I only perform an archive every other month or so.
MySQL gets a back up once a month. - though I only use the MySQL databases for a Forum that I've set up for the students at my school. If they lose a months of social networking posts, I'm not too concerned about it.
Mail... Well, I don't actually use mail on OS X. Being an education institution, we get google apps for free. So I got that route. One less thing to manage.

Authenticating with a Time Machine backup shared from Server

Hi everyone. I'm in a real tight spot here, so I'll be greatfull for any help you can give...
Last night I was going to attempt to partition for a BootCamp install, when the Yosemite install on my Mid 2010 MBP decided to report inconsistently on the amount of free space left on the system drive (Finder said one thing, Disk Utility another). Because of this, I it didn't matter how much space I freed up by deleting stuff, Disk Utility didn't recognize the new free space, so I couldn't create a large enough partition blah blah. Anyways, I couldn't repair permissions while booted in to the OS...oh dear. Reboot in to the Recovery partition and attempted to repair permissions from there, but that failed and advised me to format and reinstall. So that's what I tried to do.
I've got a Mid 2012 Mac Mini setup as a Server, with an external USB HDD configured as a Time Machine backup disk, which is shared over my network. Having formatted my MBP, I had no local Recovery partition left, so I booted in to the Internet Recovery mode. Restore From a Time Machine Backup couldn't see my shared Time Machine drive. Pretty odd. So I re-installed Yosemite, booted in to the fresh local Recovery partition and tried again. This time it could see my Time Machine backup drive. Great! Only problem is, when I highlight the drive and click Continue, it asks me to authenticate with the server and pre-populates the Username field with "root". Trouble is, the root user on my server was not enabled. Weird. So I tried the credentials of my administrator account on the Server. Failed. tried several other sets of credentials. Failed. Logged on to the server, enabled root user, set a password, rebooted the MBP and tried the new root user credentials for the enabled root user account on the server. Failed.
So my question is, ***?! Any ideas?
FYI, I did also try simply connecting the external disk that host my Time Machine backups, directly to the MBP but, of course, it couldn't see it. Probably because the folder structure is different to what the OS expects for a local disk, since it's configured as a share (/Shared Item/Time Machine Backups or what ever). I'm reluctant to go down the route of mucking about with the backup drive at this point, hence why I've come here.

Yea, I've opened it up to everyone and ensured it's shared over SMB and AFP. Opened up to the world! Well, locally at least.
I've had another stab at it tonight. I'm not sure if it is an authentication issue after all, because if I just type in gibberish credentials, the dialogue box shakes to signify that those credentials have been disallowed. However, if I type a know set of credentials in for the server (in this case the servers admin credentials) then I get the following message...
"There was a problem connecting to the server "server-name.local.". Check the server name or IP address, and then try again. If you continue to have problems, contact your system administrator"
FYI, I have committed my actually server name and replaced it with "server-name.local" is for illustrative purposes.
I checked that I could ping server-name.local from Terminal while booted in to the Recovery partition, over both Wi-Fi and Ethernet, which I can, without dropped packets. This is really starting to worry me now.
Any idea what I can restructure the folder structure on the backup drive, such that it will be visible to the Mac over USB? I'm weary of trying this method, as I really don't want to stuff my backup up and I don't have a an additional, sufficiently large enough, external disk to make a backup of the backup. Running out of options :-/
PLEASE HELP!

Authenticating with a Time Machine backup shared by Server

Hi everyone. I'm in a real tight spot here, so I'll be greatfull for any help you can give...
Last night I was going to attempt to partition for a BootCamp install, when the Yosemite install on my Mid 2010 MBP decided to report inconsistently on the amount of free space left on the system drive (Finder said one thing, Disk Utility another). Because of this, I it didn't matter how much space I freed up by deleting stuff, Disk Utility didn't recognize the new free space, so I couldn't create a large enough partition blah blah. Anyways, I couldn't repair permissions while booted in to the OS...oh dear. Reboot in to the Recovery partition and attempted to repair permissions from there, but that failed and advised me to format and reinstall. So that's what I tried to do.
I've got a Mid 2012 Mac Mini setup as a Server, with an external USB HDD configured as a Time Machine backup disk, which is shared over my network. Having formatted my MBP, I had no local Recovery partition left, so I booted in to the Internet Recovery mode. Restore From a Time Machine Backup couldn't see my shared Time Machine drive. Pretty odd. So I re-installed Yosemite, booted in to the fresh local Recovery partition and tried again. This time it could see my Time Machine backup drive. Great! Only problem is, when I highlight the drive and click Continue, it asks me to authenticate with the server and pre-populates the Username field with "root". Trouble is, the root user on my server was not enabled. Weird. So I tried the credentials of my administrator account on the Server. Failed. tried several other sets of credentials. Failed. Logged on to the server, enabled root user, set a password, rebooted the MBP and tried the new root user credentials for the enabled root user account on the server. Failed.
So my question is, ***?! Any ideas?
FYI, I did also try simply connecting the external disk that host my Time Machine backups, directly to the MBP but, of course, it couldn't see it. Probably because the folder structure is different to what the OS expects for a local disk, since it's configured as a share (/Shared Item/Time Machine Backups or what ever). I'm reluctant to go down the route of mucking about with the backup drive at this point, hence why I've come here.

Yea, I've opened it up to everyone and ensured it's shared over SMB and AFP. Opened up to the world! Well, locally at least.
I've had another stab at it tonight. I'm not sure if it is an authentication issue after all, because if I just type in gibberish credentials, the dialogue box shakes to signify that those credentials have been disallowed. However, if I type a know set of credentials in for the server (in this case the servers admin credentials) then I get the following message...
"There was a problem connecting to the server "server-name.local.". Check the server name or IP address, and then try again. If you continue to have problems, contact your system administrator"
FYI, I have committed my actually server name and replaced it with "server-name.local" is for illustrative purposes.
I checked that I could ping server-name.local from Terminal while booted in to the Recovery partition, over both Wi-Fi and Ethernet, which I can, without dropped packets. This is really starting to worry me now.
Any idea what I can restructure the folder structure on the backup drive, such that it will be visible to the Mac over USB? I'm weary of trying this method, as I really don't want to stuff my backup up and I don't have a an additional, sufficiently large enough, external disk to make a backup of the backup. Running out of options :-/
PLEASE HELP!

Can't get Time Machine to back up server or attached drives

Tried to use the search on these new discussion forums and was told I'm not authorized to search the server forums so sorry if this has already been asked and answered.
I'm having a serious issue trying to back up my Mac Mini Server running 10.6.7. The setup is I've got the main server hard drive running the OS and storing user folders, the second drive is storing all server data (mail, ical, etc). I have an attached Drobo that is where all our company's job files are stored. I want to back up mainly the job files to an external USB drive via time machine. I wouldn't mind having the server and data backed up as well but it's not as essential as the customer files. I have not been able to get a successful Time Machine Backup of anything. Time Machine will start backing up and hang after what seems like a random amount of data has been backed up. This can range anywhere from a few hundred Gigabytes or a few Megabytes. The last attempt has stalled out at 17MB of 518GB.
The troubleshooting I've done so far is to try to back up only certain things, so:
Format the USB Drive then try to back up only the main server hard drive, excluding all else.
Format the USB Drive then try to back up only the server data hard drive, excluding all else.
Format the USB Drive then try to back up only our jobs folder on the Drobo, excluding all else.
The result has been the same every time. Seemingly random amount of data get's copied and then the backup hangs. I do not get an error message the Time Machine backup icon on the menu bar just keeps spinning and I have the Time Machine window up that says:
Time Machine Backup
Backing up 269,376 Items
17.3 MB of 518.7 GB
This current attempt was to backup just our jobs folder and was started yesterday morning so it has been over 24 hours. Disk Checks on the external USB drive come up with no errors every time I've scanned it.
Hoping someone has a solution. One of the main reason's the company owner decided to get a mac server was how well time machine worked on his mac at home and the idea of being able to go back to pervious versions of customer jobs if necessary.

I agree with Sven. I use TM to backup my server and have had EXCELLENT success. I work in a school with many teachers that love to delete files and empty the trash on their user accounts.
>>facepalm<<
They promptly come-a-runnin' crying about how they've lost that ever important document. Time machine to the rescue!
About the hanging problem... I've see it as well. I fixed it by finding the document that it was trying to back up. I copied it to a USB stick and deleted said file from the server.
I ran the time machine backup again, and it worked! I kindly asked the teacher to just remake the file in question. Luckily it wasn't anything important. I just chalked that one up to a corrupt or unreadable file.
Another thing to beware of. DO NOT expect time machine to be able to do a complete system restore on OS X server. It's great for getting those lost files while the system is up and running, but it will not work when trying to replace your Open Directory. It might get stuck on MySQL, and Mail as well. These databases are VERY finicky. If you need to back up your OD database, open up server admin and select "Open Directory."
Click the "Archive" button at the top.
To the far right hand side of the "Archive in" field, click choose.
Select the location that you want to save your archive to (the time machine drive will work) and click choose.
Click "Archive..." Type the name for your OD backup and type a password if desired. You don't need to have one.
Lastly... Smile on the inside knowing that your OD is nicely backed up and safe!

Time Machine and Windows Home Server 2011 - Why no worky? (Original WHS worked fine)

So I've had an original WHS (HP Mediasmart) for years, thought it was time to upgrade...built a new server using WHS 2011 and everything on the windows side works great.
I'm not a mac guy, so only mac in the house is my GF's which had no trouble backing up to my previous WHS mediasmart using time machine, it was perfectly happy with it.
With WHS 2011, it seems to absolutely hate it; but it REFUSES to give an error. Just goes to "preparing" for about 2-3 seconds then immediately back to "next backup at X time".
I've done the tweaks in terminal to allow it to use network drives for time machine (which I didn't have to do when it was backing up to the old mediasmart, so I'm assuming maybe the mediasmart installer for OSX did that itself?)...The mac sees the server, sees the share, I can copy data to it and from it, just time machine refuses to use it (it allows me to select the share as the backup drive, just doesn't actually backup to it).
I've also tried creating custom sparsebundle files in terminal per some online guides/how-to's to get it to work...no go...used the wired ethernet ports mac address and tried it with the wireless ones too...neither worked.
What am I missing here?
It's Mac OSX 10.5.8

Mcdonsco,
Have you reviewed the logs on the computer you are trying to backup? What does it say in the console?

Time machine and network file server

Hi,
Is it possible to set up the time machine to a network file server which my macbook is able to see and use? Right now, time machine is limited to be used with a delicated external HD or another Mac...
It would be convenient to share files between my 1st mac and other windows PCs.

armyedwrd wrote:
I believe I can do a work around by simply sharing my External HD so that that can happen. It's just very awkward to navigate to that shared drive each time we access it. If I had separate backup HDs for each MAC, I think I could use the TC as a media server (at least that's what I get from the marketing material here ).
You might want to try one of the workarounds in #Q3 of Using Time Machine with a Time Capsule.
Have you ever used Time Machine Editor? Is it worth downloading and using?
It's not recommended; Time Machine usually works best the way it was designed. See Time Machine - Frequently Asked Question #13.

Do you have Time Machine in Mac OSX Server 10.6?

Do you?
How does it work? Does it back up the data every hour, or is is possible to do it more often?

Time Machine is variously incompatible with the creation of backups of the Mac OS X Server box itself; while the basic TM configuration might (does?) work, but the advanced configuration won't work. Well, you'll probably get copies of what was once an "advanced" configuration, but whether you can restore and resume use of those can be problematic at best.
You need take explicit steps to gain consistent and restorable archives of various Mac OS X Server configurations.
Have a look around the forums for existing discussions of (for instance) shutting off dovecot to get a snapshot of the mail store.

Time Machine as a simple server?

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for