Time machine back up issue - external hard drive

Bought a new 1T USB 3.0 external hard drive. Backed up fine first time but now my mac is not 'seeing it'. Doesn't show in finder or anywhere, power light doesn't come on on hard drive though I can feel it working ('vibrating and heats up slightly). Sometimes when I plug it in it says drive wasn't ejected properly even though it didn't show in the finder to begin with and power light didn't come on. All ready done software update in first instance. What to do?

Check that the data cable is securely inserted at both ends.
Try a different cable.
If you're connecting the drive through a hub, connect it directly to a built-in port on the Mac.
If you're connecting it directly, try a different port.
Test the drive with another Mac. Test another drive with this Mac.
Boot from your recovery partition (Mac OS X 10.7 or later) or from your installation disc, and launch Disk Utility. Is the drive recognized?
If the drive doesn't work under any of the above conditions, and if another drive does work with the same Mac, then the drive has failed. You may be able to salvage the mechanism by removing it from the enclosure and installing it in another one, or in a drive dock.

Similar Messages

Can 'Time Machine' back-up other external hard drives

Can 'Time Machine' back-up other external hard drives connected to your mac as well as the mac memory itself?

As Neil says, yes, it can. But external HDs are excluded by default; you have to tell Time Machine when you do want to back one up.
See the exclusions box in Time Machine Prefs > Options.
If the drive is shown in black, just select it and click the minus sign at the bottom.
If it's shown in gray, though, it's not formatted for a Mac, and Time Machine can't back it up (and you can't remove it).

Can Time Machine back up an external hard drive plugged into a Time Capsule

I have iTunes and iPhoto libraries that have outgrown the hard drive on my laptop so I've moved them on to an external hard drive. Since I'd like to move around the house with the laptop, I've plugged the external hard drive in to the Time Capsule so that the files on the external hard drive will be accessible on the network. Now that my really important files live on an external hard drive, I want to back it up.
Time Machine is backing up my laptop's internal hard drive to the Time Capsule drive, but I can't seem to figure out how to make Time Machine also back up the external hard drive that's plugged in to the Time Capsule.
Is this possible?

I understand that [Chronosync|http://www.econtechnologies.com/pages/cs/chrono_overview.html] ($40 U.S.) can do that, but I've never used it.
If you do that, you'll want to back it up to a disk image on the TC's internal HD, or a separate HD. See #Q3 in [Using Time Machine with a Time Capsule|http://web.me.com/pondini/TimeMachine/TimeCapsule.html] (or use the link in *User Tips* at the top of this forum) for details.

Can Time Machine back on one external hard drive (work files) to another external hard drive (back up)?

Can Time Machine on a Mac Book Pro 10.5.8 back up an external hard drive (working files) to another external hard drive (WD dual backup)?

I have Mountain Lion here ready to upgrade, but I'm scared of what will happen - there's always something when you upgrade, but I guess that's for a different post!
Yes, it's a different post, but let's make a comment any way.
Your power pc apps will not work when you upgrade to Mountain Lion. You will have to replace all the apps you use.

Time Machine Back-up from External Hard Drive

Time Machine only back-up what is on my MBP Drive,
Can I back-up files from an external usb drive that is connected to MBP to TM???
if no what is a good back-up software to use????
Thanks.

This is in regards to the function of an iMac (new 3.06 GHz intel dual core processor), Time Machine, Lacie 500 GB hard drive and an APC 750 standard battery back up system. This is the closest thread regarding my particular issue and hope other users find this useful and there is some response.
The time machine backup using the Lacie external hard drive is working fine when everything is on. I did not install the software that came with the APC 750 battery backup since a) when connected to the iMac, the iMac recognizes it and appears to be working and b) the forums recommended the software isn't needed and not overly compatible. I have the iMac plugged into the Master Outlet that controls a few slave periperals to save power, etc. The instructions indicate external hard drives are good to be plugged into slave outlets.
The issue I am having is that I have the Lacie hard drive plugged into the slave outlet and everytime I put the computer to sleep, I have to remember to eject the Lacie hard drive, since the battery backup (APC) shuts down the slave peripherals down rather abrubtly.
I'm wondering if this is something I will have to routinely remember to do or is there a way around this. It is a hassle since I am basically force to do manual backups using time machine since the computer is on (not sleeping) from about 5pm to 11pm and on weekends. I don't want to leave the Lacie external hard drive running perpetually in the surge outlets either because it seems to become active for no apparent reason...I believe I have all the settings set correctly, but this once an hour time machine backup may have something to do with it?
It should be noted that the Lacie hard drive seems to be active (ie beeping, spinning) during non-scheduled Time Machine backup. It did this when I kept it on all the time before my APC UPS, and as mentioned above, it still does. It seems to kick on more than once an hour. I always look in the time machine preferences and it will say for example, next time machine backup at 11:15 am, and the current time will be say 10:10 am. You would expect not to hear a peep from the Lacie external hard drive until 11:15 am, but I do.
In summary: 1) do I need to always eject the external hard drive disc when plugged into slave outley, and perform manual time machine backups and 2) while the computer is on, is it normal for the drive to activate during non-scheduled time machine backups?
Thanks,
Robbie

Can Time Machine back up a external hard drive connected to Airport Extreme

I recently purchased a new macbook pro, and airport extreme.
I attached a 750 GB external hard drive to the macbook pro, and reformatted it so time machine made the initial back up and hourly back ups from there.
Is it possible to now to unattach the external hard drive and attach it to the airport extreme, where the mac book time machine will back up to the external hard drive through airport extreme?
i have seen conflicting posts is if this is possible.

That would probably be safest.
Note that Apple's position on this got even more negative with Snow Leopard: http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?path=Mac/10.6/en/15139.html
It does work well for some folks, not so well for some, and not at all for others.
I got a refurb dual-band model in September. It worked well for about 3 months, but lately I get the error 109 and corrupted backups every few days, that Disk Utility can't fix. Once, Disk Warrior could, but since then, if they're corrupted, nothing helps. That's on a year-old Seagate drive that seems fine otherwise, especially when connected directly.
And I have an excellent wireless connection; it's only about 10 feet from my Mac, speeds are great, S/N ratio is good, etc.
It makes no sense to me that a TC would work better, but they seem to.

Will Time Machine Back up an External Hard Drive Attached to my Mac Pro?

Apple TV is GREAT, but it quickly filled up my hard drive. My thought is to take my folder that contains all of my personal files and put it on an 1TB external hard drive. I'd then "point" iTunes to where this new folder is. First, is that the right approach? Will that mess anything else up? Second, can I have Time Machine then back this external hard drive up? So, I'd like to have Time Machine back up my Mac HD and the external HD. If Time Machine won't do this, is there a good back up program for Macs that is very turnkey?
Thanks in advance!!!

GregT wrote:
Apple TV is GREAT, but it quickly filled up my hard drive. My thought is to take my folder that contains all of my personal files and put it on an 1TB external hard drive. I'd then "point" iTunes to where this new folder is. First, is that the right approach? Will that mess anything else up? Second, can I have Time Machine then back this external hard drive up?
If the drive is formatted +Mac OS Extended,+ yes. While it's connected, go to TM Preferences > Options. If it's listed in the exclusion box, just select it and click the minus sign at the bottom.
If it's listed in gray, however, it's either formatted wrong or corrupted, and you can't remove the exclusion.

Converting Time Machine back into an External Hard Drive?

before i got my macbook, i used my 320GB external hard drive on a windows XP-run computer. i transferred all my files to my new mac, before using it as my time machine drive.
it's now incompatible with windows though.
is there any way to either
-allow my drive to be used with a windows XP computer?
or
-unassociate the drive with time machine, and revert it back to a plain old external hard drive?

In order to use that old drive with Windows XP, I'd repartition it with the MBR option and format it as a Fat32 drive. Once you connect it to the WinXP machine you can also reformat the drive to NTFS for better performance and compatibility with XP.

Time Machine Back Up for External Hard Drive Partition

Hey guys,
I have had my imac connected to an external hard drive which runs time machine for some time now (about a year and a half).
I now wish to partition the external hard drive with a Fat 32 section so that I can load data (vidoe's, music etc.) from my windows laptop onto it.
The external hard drive is currently not partitioned in anyway so I will have to create a new partition. Is there anyway of doing this without losing the time machine data already saved?
If not is there anyway of saving the time machine data onto the imac so that when the partition process is complete it can simply be 're-loaded' onto the external hard drive?
Thanks for your help!
Philippe

Hi, I've been trying to do that: using Disk Utility to create a partition on my EHD that already has Time Machine running on it. My EHD is 2TB and I have deleted last year's TM backups so now I have over 900GB available space on the EHD (previously was 750GB) but when I ran the Partition, after hours of processing ("modifying partition map...") - and I mean like 12 hours no kidding, it resulted in "There is no more space" error! What a waste of time!
Is there any way to find out how much space is needed for partitioning beforehand? I wished DU could tell me that before the "modifying partition map" process begun.
FYI I am running on 10.5.8 and the partition I want to add is to be in Mac OS Extended (Journaled) format, the same with the current format.
Any help is appreciated. Thank you very much in advance.

Will Time Machine back up and external hard drive connected to my TC?

Here is my desired set-up: older Powerbook G4 whose iTunes Music is saved on an external HD (WD MyBook offering USB, FW, and ethernet connections); backup wirelessly to a Time Capsule using Time Machine; connect the external drive to the Time Capsule either using USB or ethernet (whichever is faster); have Time Machine backup everything, ie, the laptop and the external drive connected directly to the Time Capsule.
Right now, the external drive is connected directly to the Powerbook using Firewire and everything is working as desired. I would like to have the external drive networked, however, so that I can enjoy music on the laptop without having it connected to the external drive. Seems like I could connect the external drive to the TC to provide a networked iTunes library, but I also want Time Capsule to back it all up together with my Powerbook.
Is this possible?
If so, which connection method is best between the external drive and the Time Capsule, USB or ethernet?

f.bomb wrote:
Seems like I could connect the external drive to the TC to provide a networked iTunes library, but I also want Time Capsule to back it all up together with my Powerbook.
Is this possible?
No. Time Machine will not backup a network share such as you describe. Sorry.

Will Time Machine back up my external hard drive as well as internal one?

I am considering upgrading my Macbook to Leopard. All of my photos, movies and iTunes music are stored on a 250G external drive and as these are the files I work with most frequently I need to back them up regularly. Can I use Time Machine to do this, in other words does the back up include drives other than the main internal one? If not it would be of little use to me.

yes HFS+=mac os extended. I would check the format of the drive. most factory formatted drives are formatted for windows not Mac and hence are formatted FAT. FAT drives are also read+write from OS X. select you drive in finder and enter command+i. read off the format in the resulting info window.

I got a macbook pro 2008 and can not back up using time machine. it eject my external hard drive everytime. does someone has a fix???

i got a macbook pro 2008 and can not back up using time machine. it eject my external hard drive everytime. does anybody has a fix???

Does your external hard drive have it's own power supply? It should.
Is your external hard drive formatted with the NTFS file system? It won't work.
It needs to be formatted either with Mac OS Extended or FAT32.
(There are drivers available to add NTFS support to OS X but their quality is unknown, especially the "free" ones.)

Re Time Machine I have an external hard drive with files I backed up manually over the past 2 years 1TB of memory. I am finally taking the leap to use Time machine to back everything. will I have to reformat that drive, thus wiping my previous bac

Re Time Machine
I have an external hard drive with files I backed up manually over the past 2 years 1TB of memory.
I am finally taking the leap to use Time machine to back everything.
will I have to reformat that drive, thus wiping my previous back ups?
can I split it the drive in two partitions?
Also
as I have two separate Macbook Pro's- one older than the other.
OSX 10.68
the other is
OSX 10.75
can I back them up separately?
or even synch and merge files and folders etc? between the two?

You CAN use a drive with files already on it to store Time Machine backups. But long term, that is not recommended. You do not need to reformat or re-partition the drive to do this. Once Time Machine Backups are established, you could remove the old files.
But do not delete Time Machines files with the Finder -- that can cause it to lose its place and lose everything.
With the cost of backup drives under US$100, it might be a better idea in the long run to get another drive. Best results from Time Machine is a drive about 3 times larger than the drive(s) you are backing up.

I am running my first backup on Time Machine using a Seagate external hard drive with a thunderbolt adapter and cable. I have a MacBook Pro 2011. It is backing up 11GB, and is telling me it will take approx two days. Is this normal?

I am running my first backup on Time Machine using a Seagate external hard drive with a thunderbolt adapter and cable. I have a MacBook Pro 2011. It is backing up 11GB, and is telling me it will take approx two days. Is this normal?

Download the supplemental fix to 10.7.5
http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1599

I had to reformat my OSX 10.5.8 and i can't restore my emails from my time machine backup from an external hard drive - only the latest (post backup) time machine back ups are available to restore. Please can any help

I had to reformat my OSX 10.5.8 and I can't restore my emails from my time machine backup from an external hard drive - only the latest (post backup) time machine back ups are available to restore. Please can any help? I can find the mail folder in my libraries, but the Restore Button is grayed out

OSX treats the reformatted drive as a different one; it's the same as replacing it, and the old one is no longer connected.
See #E3 in Time Machine - Troubleshooting to see and restore from the "old" drive.
And, you may not want to restore via the Finder; see the blue box in #15 of Time Machine - Frequently Asked Questions.

Time machine back up issue - external hard drive

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