Time Machine hoses external NTFS partition?

A friend of mine, a fresh convert from WIndows, attached her external 1TB NTFS-formatted (Windows Vista) disc, wanting to transfer files from it to the internal HD.
For some reason Time Machine appropriated the drive and placed a Time Machine partition on it, taking up close to the whole space (1TB). I assume Time Machine in a friendly manner asked if she wanted to make backups to this external drive without having some kind of protocol on informing the user that this will overwrite existing information.
It was only when Time Machine was about to make a backup writing to this partition she mentioned it for me via chat and I immediately told her to stop Time Machine from doing that. She then shared her screen with me so I could investigate, which I did with Disk Utility after turning Time Machine off completely. It shows the Time Machine partition on the disk, but no NTFS partition is acknowledged.
What I assume have happened is that for whatever reason OS X wasn't able to see the NTFS partition and instead treated the disk as an unformatted device. Then Time Machine put a partition on it.
When doing so, I hope Time Machine didn't write zeros all over the disc and it's a good chance the files in the NTFS-partition is still there. And if it didn't write over the NTFS-partition part, that may also be there.
However, as far I know the NTFS-partition should be visible in Disk Utility. Which is isn't. That's a bit scary.
My next course of action is to use a file recovery application from a Windows machine on this drive in hope that files can be rescued. As we don't have access to an empty 1TB drive it would be even better, if the Time Machine partition could be just removed and the NTFS-partition repaired or reinstated.
Any ideas on how to proceed?

Mikael Bystrom wrote:
I assume Time Machine in a friendly manner asked if she wanted to make backups to this external drive without having some kind of protocol on informing the user that this will overwrite existing information.
Yes, similar to this one:
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What I assume have happened is that for whatever reason OS X wasn't able to see the NTFS partition and instead treated the disk as an unformatted device. Then Time Machine put a partition on it.
It reformatted it. The NTFS partition is gone. Time Machine can only back up to an HFS+ journalled volume.
When doing so, I hope Time Machine didn't write zeros all over the disc and it's a good chance the files in the NTFS-partition is still there. And if it didn't write over the NTFS-partition part, that may also be there.
Correct. A +data recovery+ app should be able to recover most of it.

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Sirs or madams,
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Mr. BGreg,
Thank you very much. "...under the covers...". I think you meant "under the hood", as in a car. I suppose "under the covers" would be man/woman interfacing, which I am familiar with!
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So my understanding, as you wrote, has been that my Powerbook will boot from an external hard drive, provided it connects via Firewire, and the disk drive itself is 'normally' formatted with however my computer's own disk drive is formatted, (HFS OS extended (journaled) or some such??). So I was left wondering why Western Digital would indicate that even though their such-and-so external hard drive case/drive was Firewire capable, that they would then say it would not be bootable with my Apple PPC computer......
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Time Machine with external HD

Guys, I have a problem in my Time Machine.The external HD is not found, but the mac recognizes the HD, only the Time Machine is not.What is very strange is that until a few days ago before the backup was working properly at this Time Machine HD.
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Click on the  icon on the menu bar and retrieve this display:
(This is from mine)
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Ciao.

Can I use the same external hd for time machine and storage without partitioning it?

Hello,
I have been using an external hard drive for my Time Machine that was only used for this purpose.
I downloaded some files in it that I want to use, and I haven't backed up using Time Machine since.
Can I download the files on my MacBook from the HD without running into any problems, or is there anything else I should do?
I prefer not to partition the hd, since I will be deleting these files, or transferring them to a different HD, and using this HD only for Time Machine back ups, as I did previously.
** I am not sure if this changes anything, but I just updated from Snow Leopard to Lion.
Thank you so much

carolsm wrote:
Thanks Kappy, I will do that.
I just really needed these files and had no other hard drive to store them.
Do you think that it will be okay just this one time if I download the files on my MacBook without compromising my backups?
I will transfer them to a new hard drive, and erase them from my Time Machine external hard drive.
For the time being it will be fine. There is always a chance of a disc crashing and therefore not advisable practice. Some here run seperate drives with Time Machine, Cloned backup and file backup. I have a portable drive I keep Time Machine backups and file backups on. I am running that at my own risk, but no problems over the last couple of years. Just make sure I get it to my normal TM Backup disk as soon as I get home. Backing up those other files will not compromise your Time Machine backups as you asked.
Cheers
Pete

Can I use Time Machine to backup to partition on external drive and a Time Capsule?

Trying to plan in advance...
I was wondering if I can (with a laptop) use Time Machine for both:
1. Creating Time Machine backups on a partiion of an external drive. My plan was going to create 2 partitions: one to be used for Time Machine backups of another external hard drive (that holds all of my media) and then the other partition was going to be a bootable clone of my internal drive (totally separate from Time Machine)
and
2. Also use Time Machine for my Time Capsule, to create Time Machine backups of my internal drive.
Is this possible? I had heard that you can't use TM to make backups to a partition on an external drive, AND use it for another drive (like Time Capsule) at the same time. But I would think that this should be possible-
Thanks everyone-

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If you are using Snow Leopard (as in your profile - this is the Mountain Lion forum), you have to manually select the backup volume each time. Tedious, but possible.
Read Apple Support Communities contributor Pondini's FAQ on that subject: "Rotating" Time Machine backup disks

Time Machine & newly re-formatted/partitioned external hard drive.

A couple of weeks ago I wanted to reformat a WD external hard drive, entitled "My External", from MS-DOS format into Journaled Mac OS X format.
I backed up my "My External" files to another separate external hard drive using Time Machine. When the back-up was complete, I proceeded to create 1 partition and reformat half of "My External" into the Journal Mac OS X format.
When the process was finished, the new sections were entitled, "Mac Only" and "Et Al". I entered Time Machine, expecting to see "My External" on the Finder window sidebar so I could restore files. However, all I saw was "Mac Only" and "Et Al" all grayed out.
Where did the back-up files for "My External" go? And is there any way I can get them back? PLEASE help. I thought using Time Machine would cover and back-up everything.
Thanks in advance for your time.

Rini718 wrote:
Before, I do remember going back in time the cascade and seeing My External in the Finder sidebar and being able to click around in it. That's why I had assumed that it also backed up My External via Time Machine.
I tried your tip for the no-longer-connected drives; it seems that you're right about the MS-DOS AKA FAT32 format not allowing for back-up via Time Machine. I feel so ignorant/lied to by the display. -sigh-
I really don't think you saw the data. You probably saw the icon and name in the sidebar, and didn't notice that they were grayed-out on the backup windows (it's not particularly obvious, unless you're looking for it). And/or, you saw it on the first +Today (Now)+ window, and didn't realize it wasn't a backup. You would not be the first, unfortunately.
What do you suggest I do? I have the newly reformatted/partitioned Mac Only/Et Al External. I have not written anything to it since the day this all occurred, but I have let a salvaging program read it for a preliminary scan (the attempt did eventually fail though). Reading it shouldn't do anything to the data that may still be in it, si? Only writing to it?
That's my understanding.
The app mentioned here most often is +Data Rescue 3,+ and it seems to get good reviews, but I haven't used it myself, so can't recommend it over any of the others.
Some of these have a free "trial mode," that will tell you if there's anything to be recovered, and perhaps recover a single file. For more, you have to pay the $$.
You'll also need another drive to receive anything it can recover.
Look for apps or services under +Data Recovery+ via Google, VersionTracker.com, or MacUpdate.com.
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Once this is sorted out, I'd strongly suggest keeping secondary backups. See #27 in Time Machine - Frequently Asked Questions (or use the link in *User Tips* at the top of this forum).

Time Machine hoses external NTFS partition?

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