Time Machine backup? pictures and external hard drive

I know this question has been asked before but I just wanted to make sure of something. Does a basic Time Machine backup backup all photos? And also a real basic question-- Is a Apple Time Capsule the same as a external hard drive?

You can save the pictures in Time Machine backup.. that is not a problem and what the TC is designed for.
You cannot off load the pictures from the internal disk of the computer and use the Time Capsule as the drive for a running library.. that is when it will get corrupted.. if you need more space for a library use External drive that plugs in by USB or FW or Thunderbolt. And it must be formatted standard Mac OS extend journaled.. then Time Machine can backup the drive to the Time Capsule.
I should also use the language more carefully.. the TC is fine for files even of pictures.. but it is unsuitable for an iphoto library or aperture library. I am always assuming on a Mac when people talk about pictures then they mean a library.. but if you save raw pictures from the camera onto a TC directly that is fine. The only issue that then arises is no automated backups.. TC is not a NAS in the normal sense of the word.. Every NAS has a built automated backup.. TC does not. You also cannot backup files on the TC using TM.. it was designed as a Target for Time Machine backups Not as a source. There are other backup products that will work.. but then you will need to figure out where to back up file to.. and the worst possible place is the USB on the TC.

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Is there any way to create a time machine backup to an external hard drive with content already on it? I have a hard drive that i have used for pictures but when i try to run a backup it says i need to start from a blank drive. Can i get around it?

Is there any way to create a time machine backup to an external hard drive with content already on it? I have a hard drive that i have used for pictures but when i try to run a backup it says i need to start from a blank drive. Can i get around it?

It would be much better if you had separate drives for the pictures and Time Machine backups.....but, if you want to use the same drive for both purposes, temporarily move the folder with the pictures to another location for safe storage.
Run the Time Machine backup on the hard drive and verify that everything is working correctly. Time Machine will format the disk for you in Mac OS Extended (Journaled) as part of the backup process.
Then move the folder with the pictures back to the hard drive with the Time Machine backups.
When you have tested to make sure that everything is working again, then and only then should you delete the folder with pictures from the temporary storage area.
Again....it would be much better to keep Time Machine backups on a drive just for that purpose, and other data on another drive for that purpose. This is clearly one of those times when the fact that you can do something does not mean to imply that you should do it.

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.

I threw out 24 time machine backups from an external hard drive into my desktop trash and now I can't empty my trash.

I threw out 24 time machine backups from an external hard drive into my IMac desktop trash and now I can't empty my trash.

Since you didn't mention what type of error message you were seeing, I'm going to guess on what is happening.
I'm guessing that since you threw away Time Machine backups, that Time Machine is probably active on your Mac. There is a chance then that the files you tossed are marked as in use. You can't delete files that are in use.
Try turning Time Machine off, then restart your Mac. Then try deleting them again.
Once done, turn Time Machine back on.
Tom

HT201250 How can I migrate a Time Machine backup from an external hard drive to a new TimeCapsuls?

I just got a 2TB Time Capsule. I want to migrate my time machine backups on an external hard drive to the new Time Capsule. I have about 430Gb of files to back up; I don't want to wait 7-8 days for the backup, unless I have to. I am using OS 10.7.5 (forget which cat that is). I have mounted the TC drive as 10.0.1.1; I tried to drag and drop from old to "data" on TC, but I get the error "The volume is the wrong format for a backup." Any ideas how I can move my old files to the new, and bypass creating a brand new backup file?
Thanks.

Rather than do that, which means starting over from scratch, losing all your edits, organisation and so on, why not simply use iPhoto Library Manager to revert the Library to the older version? Easier, less destructive.
The instructions on that are here
If you really want to start over: you can access the Originals folder simply by going to your Pictures Folder and finding the iPhoto Library there. Right (or Control-) Click on the icon and select 'Show Package Contents'. A finder window will open with the Library exposed.

Is there a way to get my photos off an old time machine backup from an external hard drive?

Is there a way to get my photos off an old time machine backup from an external hard drive?

You will have to connect the Time Machine HDD and click on the Icon. You will see one folder called Backups.backupdb. Click on that and you will have to continue until you find the home folder. The iPhoto library (where the pictures are, not the application) will probably be in your pictures folder. You will have to drag that to your desk top. Then you will have access to individual images.
Ciao.

I need to create a new iPhoto library and import 'ORIGINALS' from a time machine backup on an external hard drive.

I made the mistake of installing OS 10.9 on my older MacBook Air and the machine has become horribly slow and unpredictable. I visited the Apple store and questioned a 'Genius' about getting rid of 10.9 and reinstalling the previous OS 10.6 for which I have the disks. He advised that I should reformat the Air, reinstall 10.6 and then restore from the Time Machine backup that I have.
He explained that of course, after I reinsatll 10.6, I couldn't import the iPhoto Library from the backup drive complete because it had been recreated using the OS 10.9 and wouldn't work with 10.6. I would have to create a new 10.6 iPhoto Library and move the actual ORIGINALS, from the backup into it. He actually had the path to the iPhoto library shown on my Air to the point of >Pictures >iPhoto Library > ORIGINALS.
I didn't question how he got the path to the point of > ORIGINALS and figured that it wouldn't take too much to do what he suggested. Now I can't find how to get to point of seeing the ORIGINALS in the path. When I go through the path >Pictures >iPhoto Library, the next column shows me the iPhoto Library icon and the info re size, creation date etc.
Can anyone advise how to get to the 'ORIGINALS' in order to import them and does anyone have any further suggestions that might help in completing this procedure ?
Thanks, in advance, for any assistance available.
p.s. is there any way of looking at a Time Machine backup and finding what O.S. was present when the backup was produced ?

Rather than do that, which means starting over from scratch, losing all your edits, organisation and so on, why not simply use iPhoto Library Manager to revert the Library to the older version? Easier, less destructive.
The instructions on that are here
If you really want to start over: you can access the Originals folder simply by going to your Pictures Folder and finding the iPhoto Library there. Right (or Control-) Click on the icon and select 'Show Package Contents'. A finder window will open with the Library exposed.

Can I migrate my data from a regular hard drive to a solid state drive using only a Time Machine backup from an external hard drive?

I just bought a Samsung 830 256GB solid state drive which I will use to replace my 15-inch, 2.53 GHz, Mid 2009 MacBook Pro's stock hard drive. I also keep an external hard drive in which I keep my regular Time Machine backups via FireWire. Would I be able to migrate all my data from it after putting in the solid state drive? I prefer not to use any third-party applications and I do not plan on replacing the SuperDrive with the hard drive that I'm going to remove from my laptop.

chinodelarosa wrote:
Would I be able to migrate all my data from it after putting in the solid state drive?
Yes.

Importing Time Machine backup from an external hard drive

Hi...to all
Last week i bought a Macbook. I pluged in my external hard drive Maxtor OneTOuch 4 Plus and it did a time machine backup on the Maxtor OneTOuch 4 Plus. The folder that was generated by the time machine on my external hard drive has the name backups.backupdb.
Then, i decided to return the Macbook and bought a Macbook Pro.
When I pluged the same external hard drive, Maxtor OneTOuch 4 Plus, although I am able to access and open individual files and folders, I am not able to copy neither any nor all the folders/files from my external hard drive to my new Macbook Pro. Moreover, I am able to access/open the files located in my external hard drive but when try to copy specific files from this drive to my Macbook Pro I get the following error message: Sorry the operation could not be completed because an unexpected error ocurred (Error code -50). Now, here is where it gets interesting: after 2 failed attempts to copy any single file from my external hard drive to my Macbook Pro desktop and receiving the above error message I am then able to copy the specific file (singular). This would mean that to copy the files and folders in the external hard drive i would need to do it on a one by one basis? If so, it would take forever...
Can someone please kindly help out.
Thanks on advance

Are you referring to the files in Time Machine's backup directory on your hard drive? If so, and if what you are trying to do is to recover those from the backup to your working volume on the Macbook Pro (which is not what your title says you want to do but seems to be implied by the body of the question) then you need to have the computer name of the Macbook Pro the same as the computer name of the original Macbook (I think that step is required), then on the Macbook Pro choose "Browse Other Time Machine Disks" from the Time Machine menu in Dock. This will allow you to recover files or folder in the usual way.
Alternatively, if you wanted to transfer all your user data in one go, you could fire up Migration Assistant and choose the Time Machine backup as the source to transfer the user data from (again I think the computer names have to be the same but I'm not totally sure).

Time Machine backup to AEBS external hard drive

Buy in haste, repent at leisure they say. I needed a new wireless router and thought the AEBS looked just the thing - and a quick look on the spec page showed you could connect an external hard drive via USB - great, I could back up all our computers wirelessly I thought, using Time Machine. Didn't see the small print that says you cannot do this, tho' can't see why Apple couldn't make it work.
I have had a whole string of hard drives go down in the past year, LaCie, Maxtor, WD, and two internal hard drives from a MacBook and a MacBook Pro. The only ones that seem bullet proof are the Gtech drives I have for editing in Final Cut so I bought one of those for our communal Time Machine drive.
To begin with everything worked fine despite Apple not supporting this set up. Then with a regular Software update I must have upped the firmware to 7.4.2 and the system stopped working. I discovered the problem and went back to 7.4.1 but no joy. Then, inexplicably, it began to work again later that day so I just breathed a sigh of relief. Now it's happened again - I realised that I had updated to 7.4.2 again - presumably from a Snow Leopard update, and I am now unable to get it going again even after going back to 7.4.1.
I can select the external HD so that it appears on the desk top as a wireless drive, it appears in the list of available disks in TM, but if you ask it to back up it takes an age to return a message saying it 'could not access the sparsebundle (error 109).
It seems to me I have invested heavily in a system that is never going to work but I wondered if there was some way of backing up manually over the wireless link using another type of back up system? Or are there other things I should try? I know some people seem to have this set up working fine...

The problem here is the way Apple chooses to implement Time Machine Backup in 10.6.x to a Network volume. When TM first came out myself and a bunch of similarly naive Unix hackers figured we could get the best of both worlds by backing up with Time Machine to a backed up or otherwise redundant network volume using Time Machine. But in the beginning TM didn't backup to network volumes. It does now by creating a sparse bundle on the network volume and backing up to the Sparse bundle as if it were a physical, local, disk drive. I seems logical to infer that Time Machine was written to backup to locally connected disk drives which differ from network disk drives in one very important respect: You can tell a local, physical disk drive that you need to know the status of any given write operation and you can trust that result with a reasonably high degree of confidence. That same can't be said for a write to network drive so Apple fakes it by creating a Pseudo Drive or Disk Image Drive on the network volume and writing way. The Sparse Bundle Error comes up when the Pseudo Drive wasn't put away correctly. There are filesystem repair programs to fix this condition which are described in other threads. Dig around for "fsck sparse bundle" on Google the next time this happens and you may be able to rescue things.

Time Machine backups corrupt or external hard drive failure?

My goal today was to upgrade my MacBook Pro's HD, and to restore my system from my latest Time Machine backup which resides on an external hard drive. I installed the new hard drive, formatted it as Mac OS Extended (Journaled), and selected Restore System From Backup from Utilities. The system restore was five minutes form finishing when I received an error that the system restore could not be completed, and that I should restart my machine and try again. I did as instructed, but once the system restore process began, the screen went gray, and I was told that the Snow Leopard install could not be completed.
Before beginning the process a third time, I ran Disk Utility from the Snow Leopard install disc and attempted to verify and repair the external (Time Machine) hard drive. The Time Machine hard drive could not be verified, nor could it be repaired. I popped in the old hard drive into my MacBook Pro, booted Snow Leopard, and ran Disk Utility, and tried again repairing the Time Machine hard drive. Here is the log of the error I received:
2010-12-29 21:14:30 -0800: Verify and Repair volume “Time Machine”
2010-12-29 21:14:30 -0800: Starting repair tool:
2010-12-29 21:14:31 -0800: Checking Journaled HFS Plus volume.
2010-12-29 21:14:31 -0800: Checking extents overflow file.
2010-12-29 21:14:31 -0800: Checking catalog file.
2010-12-29 21:20:22 -0800: Invalid node structure
2010-12-29 21:20:22 -0800: The volume Time Machine could not be verified completely.
2010-12-29 21:20:22 -0800: Volume repair complete.
2010-12-29 21:20:22 -0800: Updating boot support partitions for the volume as required.
2010-12-29 21:20:22 -0800: Error: Disk Utility can’t repair this disk. Back up as many of your files as possible, reformat the disk, and restore your backed-up files.
2010-12-29 21:20:22 -0800:
2010-12-29 21:20:22 -0800: Disk Utility stopped repairing “Time Machine”: Disk Utility can’t repair this disk. Back up as many of your files as possible, reformat the disk, and restore your backed-up files.
Do these errors indicate that my Time Machine backups located in the Backups.backupdb are corrupt, or is the external hard drive corrupt and failing?
The Time Machine backups are on a Maxtor OneTouch, and from what I've read, they're prone to an early demise. I've also recently noticed that my Time Machine backups started slowing. For example, I would plug in my external hard drive and if 1.3GB needed to be backed up, it would stall at 300 MB before jumping to 700 MB, stall again, then jump to 900 MB. That could be a sign of a failing hard drive, correct? If the external hard drive is failing, I can purchase a new eternal hard drive then copy the Backups.backupdb to the new hard drive, correct?
However, if Backups.backupdb is corrupt, then from what I understand, I would have to start fresh. I would prefer to not start fresh unless there's no other option, as I would be losing almost three years worth of Time Machine backups.
Any guidance is appreciated. Thanks!

ali_baba7 wrote:
2010-12-29 21:20:22 -0800: Invalid node structure
2010-12-29 21:20:22 -0800: Error: Disk Utility can’t repair this disk. Back up as many of your files as possible, reformat the disk, and restore your backed-up files.
It's possible a heavy-duty 3rd-party utility such as +Disk Warrior+ can fix that. It's about $100, and there's no guarantee, but it's probably a good investment for the future.
Do these errors indicate that my Time Machine backups located in the Backups.backupdb are corrupt, or is the external hard drive corrupt and failing?
The structure of the file system is damaged.
That may have been caused by the disk beginning to fail, but there's no way to tell for sure until you erase and reformat the disk and try to use it.
I've also recently noticed that my Time Machine backups started slowing. For example, I would plug in my external hard drive and if 1.3GB needed to be backed up, it would stall at 300 MB before jumping to 700 MB, stall again, then jump to 900 MB. That could be a sign of a failing hard drive, correct?
It could, but it could also be whatever's wrong with the file structure.
If the external hard drive is failing, I can purchase a new eternal hard drive then copy the Backups.backupdb to the new hard drive, correct?
No. You can't copy corrupted backups. They're all linked together, like a database, so if anything's damaged, the whole set is suspect, and can't be copied.
There are a couple of options:
If the disk is physically ok, and the directory damage was recent, you might be able to restore from an earlier backup. But since you noticed problems some time ago, the damage may not be recent.
Or, you might be able to get up and running by just installing OSX from your SL Install disk (and the 10.6.5 "combo" update). You'll be missing whatever wasn't restored in that last 5 minutes or so. Things are restored in the same order they're listed by the Finder, so it will be the last things in the last user account. You should be able to figure out where it stopped, check or delete the very last file (likely incomplete) and selectively restore as many of the remaining things as you can, via the "Star Wars" display.
Just to make things more difficult, if the disk is failing, the more you use it, the more likely it is to get worse or fail completely.
So your safest bet may be to install OSX, then download and install the 10.6.5 "combo" update. Info and download available at: http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1324 Be sure to do a +Repair Permissions+ via Disk Utility (in your Applications/Utilities folder) afterwards. Then recover what you can.

Removing Time Machine backups for (missing) external hard drive

My Time Machine was backing up everything, including external hard drives.
One of the external drives (ORIGDRIVE) started hardware failures. I added a new external drive (NEWDRIVE) and used Finder to copy files over (some via RAID and some from the Time Machine copy a month before the problems cropped up).
Then I ejected and unplugged ORIGDRIVE and shipped it back to the manufacturer.
The problem is that the Time Machine still has all those copies from ORIGDRIVE eating up disk space, but I want to keep a year's worth of monthlies for all the other drives (just in case another drive fails soon).
Since ORIGDRIVE is not mounted, Time Machine doesn't show me those files so I can use the "Delete All Backups of" option within the GUI.
If I try renaming NEWDRIVE to ORIGDRIVE, what I get instead is ORIGDRIVE 1 .
We're talking dozens of TB here, so reformatting the Time Machine volume and starting over maxes out the system and leaves me flying without a complete backup for most of a week, something I'd rather avoid.
Suggestions?

My Time Machine was backing up everything, including external hard drives.
One of the external drives (ORIGDRIVE) started hardware failures. I added a new external drive (NEWDRIVE) and used Finder to copy files over (some via RAID and some from the Time Machine copy a month before the problems cropped up).
Then I ejected and unplugged ORIGDRIVE and shipped it back to the manufacturer.
The problem is that the Time Machine still has all those copies from ORIGDRIVE eating up disk space, but I want to keep a year's worth of monthlies for all the other drives (just in case another drive fails soon).
Since ORIGDRIVE is not mounted, Time Machine doesn't show me those files so I can use the "Delete All Backups of" option within the GUI.
If I try renaming NEWDRIVE to ORIGDRIVE, what I get instead is ORIGDRIVE 1 .
We're talking dozens of TB here, so reformatting the Time Machine volume and starting over maxes out the system and leaves me flying without a complete backup for most of a week, something I'd rather avoid.
Suggestions?

Time machine backup of connected external hard drive

Morning all,
I've read through various posts regarding my question but most appear to be slightly vague for my understanding.
I have a 3TB TM with a 500GB external mac formatted hard drive connected via USB. This hard drive contains music and a couple of years photos that will eventually go into iPhoto once sorted but I'd like TM to back up this hard drive for the moment.
Upon entering TM Preferences and the Select Disk button, I have a list of backup drives that includes the external hard drive. The default backup disk is the TM.
What I cannot understand is how to get TM to backup this external hard drive using the preferences given to me?
Or, if, by default, this drive is being backed up, where are these settings listed?
Many thanks
Tim

I have a 3TB TM with a 500GB external mac formatted hard drive connected via USB.
Is the 500GB connected to the TC or the Mac?? I am lost but as I read that sentence the USB drive is plugged into a TC.. and the TM is a typo.. Time Machine is software on your computer.. Time Capsule is a hardware router with a hard disk,, in your case 3TB.
TM cannot backup network drives.. plug the 500GB into the Mac and it will automatically list in exclude on TM.. you have to remove it from the exclude list to be included.. it is kind of thinking a solid state physicist would use.. holes instead of electrons.

Is there a seamless way to transfer Time Machine backups to another external hard drive?

I already have Time Machine backing up to a 500 gig WD external hard drive, but it has run out of room, so I bought a 3TB external hard drive which will do the job for quite awhile. I have not hooked up the new external hard drive to my iMac because I don't want to lose my current TM backups.
Is there a way to easily transfer my current TM backups to my new HD. Or does TM magically bring the files over? I need to understand what and how it all works.

I already have Time Machine backing up to a 500 gig WD external hard drive, but it has run out of room, so I bought a 3TB external hard drive which will do the job for quite awhile. I have not hooked up the new external hard drive to my iMac because I don't want to lose my current TM backups.
Is there a way to easily transfer my current TM backups to my new HD. Or does TM magically bring the files over? I need to understand what and how it all works.

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.

How to I get Time Machine backups OFF my external hard drive?!?!?

I'm not asking how I restore a backup.
I plugged in my 250GB external to try out TM. Before TM did it's first backup I have 160GB free. After TM did its backup I have 1GB free. I no longer want to use TM and have told it to "Stop Backing Up" in Sys Prefs. The problem is that I still only have 1GB of space left. When I view the external in the finder I only see my 90GB of drag and drop backups, but it says the disk only has 1GB of free space. Are the Time Machine backups invisible? How do I reclaim my space back?
Thanks!

pvonk wrote:
Looking at info, I found the folder was owned by root. Even with my admin privileges, I couldn't delete. I then found that root wasn't activated on that machine, so I had to do more dancing around.
In cases like this, you should be able to delete it from the command line by using sudo: sudo rm -rf directory (be careful with this command)
After deleting the TM backup folder, the drive still indicated that the former lost space was still lost. I eventually reformatted.
How did you delete it? Could it be that the folder was still in the Trash of the external disk?

Time Machine backup? pictures and external hard drive

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