Time Machine Settings

Is there a way to change the frequency of back up's with time machine?
It seems like it's running every couple of hours. I'd like to just have it run once a day.
Thanks.

By default it runs once an hour, not every couple of hours. Resetting your mind's clock might help.

Similar Messages

Why is a network share not showing up in time machine settings when on the wifi?

Hi all,
I am currently trying to set up time machine for my Macbook air. I have connected an external harddrive to the network router and made it available as a network share. I have both read and write access to the drive, when mounted as a an SMB volume and while connect to the network via Wifi. However, when opening time machine settings and trying to select the backup volume, the network drive doesn't show up.
What's wrong?
Kind regards,
Martin

Time Machine cannot backup to a SMB network volume.
Time Machine may also have problems backing up to AFP volumes on some network attached storage devices (NAS).

How can I change time machine settings?

How can I change time machine settings? I only want Time Machine to backup my Home Folders and the items on the desktop. Currently, it's backing up more files which overwhelm my backup drive. How do I get it to back up Home/Desktop ONLY?
knarfrh60

Also, see selecting items to exclude from the backup here...
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1427
You may also find this Link of interest...
Time Machine Tutorial

Can't access Time Machine settings when AirPort (WiFi) is on.

Problem:
My iMac (2.66 MHz Inter Core Duo) with 10.5.8 needs an upgrade to Maverick...it is connected to my home network with AirPort
I have a NAS on my home network (Verbatim MediaShare 2TB) wired connected, which I have had working as a drive for TM-backups. It stopped working with TM about 1,5 year ago, did never figure out why, backups just failed.
Now I want to get it going again for a fresh backup prior to the OS upgrade.
The issue I am facing now is that I cant access the settings for the backup drive in TM settings as the AirPort is on.
I need AirPort on to be able to mount the drive of the NAS, but then I cant access TM-settings. If I switch of AirPort temporarly to access TM-settings the drive which I need to select is dismounted.
I am kind of stuck. Why is this happening?
BRG
/Johan

BDAqua wrote:
Got me really confused, sorry...
Can't access Time Machine settings when AirPort (WiFi) is on.
the NAS Volume for backup "COMPUTERSBACKUP$" can be mounetd as it should when AirPort is on.
Hi, label explains the problem pretty much...
That is: The dialog in TM where the disk for TM to put backuped data is not accessable when the iMac has connection to my home network. The button is there, but when i press it notheing happends. If i deactivate the network interface, the dialog opens.
I hope this claryfy my problem.
BRG
/Johan

Can time machine settings be associated with a network location?

Many people with laptops connect to home and office networks these days, and use different backup disks associated with the two locations. I, for example, use a wireless network to do time machine backups during the week in an office, but have no access to the drive at the weekends. My laptop spends frustrated weekends repeatedly calling the backup disk. How can I ease its pain? Surely if it backing up to a network location, it can simply ask itself if it is connected to the right network before attempting to call the disk? Are there any plans for such functionality?
Please any answerers assume that I am far too lazy and forgetful to turn time machine off every weekend and on again during the week. Imagine that I have a similar system at home for which I have to manually change time machine settings when switching between locations (I don't, but I guess that's where the main annoyance would be).
Many thanks,
Kashi

gorton_k wrote:
Many people with laptops connect to home and office networks these days, and use different backup disks associated with the two locations. I, for example, use a wireless network to do time machine backups during the week in an office, but have no access to the drive at the weekends. My laptop spends frustrated weekends repeatedly calling the backup disk. How can I ease its pain? Surely if it backing up to a network location, it can simply ask itself if it is connected to the right network before attempting to call the disk? Are there any plans for such functionality?
Please any answerers assume that I am far too lazy and forgetful to turn time machine off every weekend and on again during the week. Imagine that I have a similar system at home for which I have to manually change time machine settings when switching between locations (I don't, but I guess that's where the main annoyance would be).
take a look at ChronoSync

Question re: upgrading to OS 10.6.2 and Time Machine settings

Hello all - and Happy New Year.
A friend of mine who received a Mac Air for Christmas also received an Apple Time Machine to go with it. (I have to say that he is loving the Mac!)
When we (I) tried to install the Time Machine for him we ran into a lot of problems. Specifically, he is the director of a school and is using his Mac on a LAN that is fairly well restricted and "fire-walled" for a variety of security reasons. This made it impossible for me to get the wireless portion of the Time Machine working properly. We finally called the administrator of the LAN and explained the problem. Without getting into details - he was able to configure the Air Port to have access to 4 static IP addresses: 1 for the Time Machine and 3 others that Time Machine can allow other devices to use (specifically, the Mac Air, my friend's iPhone, and a guest).
Now, after hearing about the benefits of upgrading to Snow Leopard, my friend would like to go with the upgrade.
My question is this: Is there a risk that all the hard work that we went through to configure Time Machine will be wiped away? In other words, will the upgrade process save this configuration or will we have to call the LAN administrator once again to set it up?
Any assistance would be welcome.
Thanks,
Mike

Thanks, I appreciate your assistance.
The OS version that he is using reads 10.5.8. Yes, I agree that it should already have Snow Leopard installed - perhaps he received an upgrade disk as well with the computer. I'll have to check that out.
I apologize, I was using the wrong terminology in my original post. The device is a "Time Capsule" that includes a 1TB hard drive and a Wi-Fi base station. The configuration that we went through for the Wi-Fi is what concerns me. As I mentioned in the question, the configuration that we went through to get it to work properly was time consuming (and a bit confusing). I would not want to go through that again if we were to upgrade my friend's computer to 10.6.2.
If I understand your response correctly the configuration is a software issue and the upgrade should preserve all the settings on the Mac. The settings in the Time Capsule itself should not be affected.
Thanks again for allowing me to work through this. I appreciate it.
Take care,
Mike

Unable to change Time Machine settings

Time Machine has been behaving strangely for me. For starters, when I attempt to access it through system preferences, it fails to load. The top bar simply becomes "Loading Time Machine..." and remains that way. It does not hang, but simply does not seem to proress.
However, I can load up Time Machine if I run it from the .app in applications. When I do so however, the settings are locked. When I attempt to click on the lock in the bottom right hand corner to unlock the settings however, nothing happens. No Authentication pop up, no request for password or anything.
I have never used time machine before this, and discovered this only when attempting to set up time machine for the first time.
If you have any suggestions on how to solve this problem, your help would be very much appreciated.

You do not ever need to install 3rd party software to use a hard drive in OS X. I strongly suggest you remove anything you installed from Western Digital. There have been issues in the past with OS X upgrades where the WD software caused OS X to completely erase a hard drive, and it's likely that anything from WD you installed is old and not compatible with Yosemite.

Time Machine settings for multiple drives?

I have two hard drives installed in my mac, one is for system related stuff and one is a working drive for FCPX. Is there a way to set my time capsule to create a backup of my boot drive and an external drive to use time machine to back up the 2nd internal drive? Thanks!

Won't that change the preferences for both drives? I want the system drive to back up wirelessly to the time capsule, and then the 2nd drive to back up through Time Machine to a FW800 external drive... but only copy the 2nd drive, not the everything else that is backing up wirelessly.

New Time Machine Settings?

I am replacing my old time capsule with the new 2TB version. Should I have the same settings?

Global CIO wrote:
I am replacing my old time capsule with the new 2TB version. Should I have the same settings?
I'd try that. Start by using AirPort Utility to save the configuration of the old Time Capsule using the menu option File > Export Configuration File, then use File > Import Configuration File to configure the new Time Capsule.

Time Machine doesn't back everything up

Having a quirky issue with Time Machine - it's only backing up the 'Users' folder from the OS hard drive, not the 'Applications', 'Library' or 'System' folders. Therefore, if I ever needed it to reinstall it wouldn't have enough of the data.
Any ideas how to tell Time Machine to back up all folders on the OS drive? Nothing I can see in Time Machine settings/preferences with such an option...
For info, the OS is on a 250GB inernal SSD and Time Machine is backing up to a 2TB external drive.
Thanks!

Just as an update, I tried deleting the com.apple.TimeMachine.plist preferences file and effectively 'resetting' Time Machine but it made no difference. I ran the diagnostic and reported it as a Bug to Apple. For your info, details of report are below.
Thanks
Andy
20-Aug-2013 10:42 AM Andy Worby:
Summary:
Time Machine is failing to back up all top-level folders present on the main OS hard disc, even though they do not appear in the 'Exclusions' list within Time Machine preferences. As a result, 'System', 'Library' and 'Applications' top-level folders are not backed up. The only folder being backed up is 'Users'.
Upon investigation, the com.apple.TimeMachine.plist preferences file contains exclusions for above mentioned top-level folders (see screenshot 1), although they have 'not' been purposefully added to the 'Exclusions' list via the Time Machine preferences window.
Deleting the com.apple.TimeMachine.plist preferences file and then setting up Time Machine once again via the preferences window does not change the result - the three affected folders still fail to back up.
Steps to Reproduce:
1. Delete com.apple.TimeMachine.plist preferences file to perform a full reset of Time Machine.
2. Enter Time Machine preferences window.
3. Select backup hard disc ( in this case, I am using an external 2TB hard disc via Firewire 800 connection).
4. Click options
5. Ensure that only the backup hard disc is selected in 'Exclusions' list.
6. Click Save
7. Commence a Time Machine backup.
8. Allow backup process to complete.
9. Go directly into the backup hard disc.
10. View top-level folders that have been backed up from the OS hard disc.
Expected Results:
All top-level folders from the OS hard disc should have been backed up.
Actual Results:
Only the 'Users' top-level folder from the OS hard disc has been backed up.
Regression:
Problem is continuous, and has occurred for some time, although I do not know from which exact date.
Notes:
I have included the following attachments:
1. Study iMac.tmdiagnostic.zip
2.Screen shot 1 - this is a screenshot of the Time Machine preferences file
3. Screen shot 2 - this is a screenshot of the top level folders within my OS hard disc

I want to use time machine to backup two 4 TB drives, one USB and the other thunder bolt to 2 4TB USB drives

I have a 2012 iMac running Mavericks, booting off of a external 4TB thunderbolt drive and using a separate 4TB USB drive for my pictures. I want to back up each of the drives to two USB 4TB drives with Time Machine. I cannot seem to figure out how to have multiple sources with multiple destinations.

Hello Randy,
Try excluding the drive in Time Machine settings. Take a look at the article below to go through and remove the exclusion of the external drive so that can be backed up as well.
OS X Mavericks: Exclude items from a Time Machine backup
http://support.apple.com/kb/PH14182
Regards,
-Norm G.

When I connect my Time Machine it appears mounted several times and does not back up.

Two weeks ago when I connected my external hard drive containing my Time Machine, the drive was listed several times in my finder sidebar with one mounting in the regular teal color and the other seemingly faded but still clickable. The Time Machine says that it is backing up but hasn't since then. I hadn't changed any Time Machine settings nor touched the external hard drive in any way that I could explain why this is suddenly happening. When I eject the machine I have to force eject every instance of it listed.
I've had this Time Machine for over two years now and have never had a problem with it. While I could hypothetically rewrite the whole Time Machine if that would fix the answer, I would rather not lose those two years of information. I've yet to find any other cases of this and am not sure exactly what is even happening, so any thoughts or ideas would be greatly appreciated.

Ooops!
First Timer mistake.
Sorry.

External time machine drive no longer being automatically recognized

Recently my RMBP has stopped recognizing my external time machine drive. When ever I connect my 1 TB WD drive to my mac, it shows up on my desktop as usually but will not get recognized by time machine. I used to be able to connect the drive, have it show up on my desk with the orange USB logo, and then it would be auto recognized and the time machine logo would appear on it and it would start backing up. Now, I connect it and it just stays at the orange USB logo. I have to go to the time machine menu bar icon and open time machine's preferences and manually select the drive to get it to back up. This happens both on battery power and while I'm charging. I have already verified the disk in disk utility and have repaired as well. I don't recall when this started happening. I was running the 10.9.4 beta before its public release, but it hadn't been working before I upgraded to that either.

This simple procedure will clear your Time Machine settings, including exclusions. The backups won't be affected. If you have a long exclusion list that can't be recreated easily, you may prefer a more complicated procedure that preserves the exclusion list. In that case, ask for instructions. Otherwise, do as follows.
Triple-click anywhere in the line below on this page to select it:
/Library/Preferences/com.apple.TimeMachine.plist
Right-click or control-click the highlighted line and select
Services ▹ Reveal in Finder (or just Reveal)
from the contextual menu.* A Finder window should open with a file selected. Copy the file to the Desktop. Then move it (the original, not the copy) to the Trash. You'll be prompted for your administrator password. Restart the computer and recreate your settings in the Time Machine preference pane. It will show that you have no backups. Don't worry; your backups haven't been touched. Run a backup to test. The backup may take much longer than usual. If TM now performs as expected, delete the file you copied to the Desktop.
*If you don't see the contextual menu item, copy the selected text to the Clipboard by pressing the key combinationcommand-C. In the Finder, select
Go ▹ Go to Folder...
from the menu bar and paste into the box that opens by pressing command-V. You won't see what you pasted because a line break is included. Press return.

Time machine will not backup to empty external hard drive after replacing Mac's internal hard drive and restoring

First - I live in a tiny fishing village in Belize, so getting support here is virtually non-existent. There is no one else in my village who even uses a Mac. Recently, my hard drive in my 2012 Macbook Pro 13" went bad (said it suffered a "shock"?) and I was traveling to Cozumel, Mexico, so had it replaced there. We used an external hard drive backup to restore the data to it's last time machine backup (October of 2014). Everything was working fine, until I returned home, added some pictures, and wanted to do a fresh backup. Now, time machine will start the backup, but gets about 113,000 of 181,000 done, and it locks up. I can do nothing - everything freezes, and I have to eventually power down the computer. I even tried deleting the old backup from the external hard drive, erasing it completely, and reformatting the external hard drive using disk utility. Still locking up. It is a 5 GB external hard drive, so space shouldn't be an issue, and it was backed up to the same external hard drive previously with no issues. I'm still running Mavericks, and don't want to try to upgrade to Yosemite until I can be sure I have a backup of my old data and pictures. I am a writer, and use that to make my meager living LOL
I'm stumped. I've looked through the files endlessly but can't find anything similar to my issue. Any suggestions? I know just enough to be dangerous, and don't want to lose everything we worked so hard to retrieve when my hard drive crashed last month.
Thanks!

SMH5206 - I tried letting it sit and crank overnight twice. First time I thought it was my error causing it to lock up. Now I know better. I haven't changed any of my time machine settings - and actually never used time machine regularly. Only reason I had a fresh backup from last Oct was because I did one before I upgraded to mavericks. Everything worked fine then - and we used that to restore when the hard drive crashed and was replaced. I have actually deleted hundreds of pictures off my hard drive and one entire user, so it should actually be a much smaller backup - so if it did it before on the same external hard disk, I don't understand why it won't now. I'm really confused.
Kahjot - the external hard drive is the same one I backed up to previously - and I have completely erased it and reformatted, and the information I'm backing up now is less, so there should be no reason why it doesn't have enough room now, when there is actually less information on my current hard drive (see my reply to SMH5206). When I plug it in, it says it is a 500.07 GB WD "My Passport"
I've even tried to have time machine only backup certain files, and not the whole thing. Still locking up.
I'm sure it's my error somewhere, - I just don't know how or where

Time machine for new HOME FOLDER location?

i am on lion on a mac pro and for some reason i am getting a bit clutched here redoing my backup routine after having MOVED MY HOME FOLDER to a NEW DISK (it is now in bay 3). i have just wiped the external "Time Machine" disk and then in TIME MACHINE SETTINGS:
"SELECT DISK" is to select the destination (i.e. the Backup HD that the data goes to) - and then -
do i just make sure that the NEW DISK with the newly located HOME FOLDER is simply not listed in OPTIONS > "Exclude these items from backups"??
also, if i /also/ want to BACKUP the disk that i am booting into (it is in Bay 1) do i just make sure that this disk is not listed either??
thanks for any help as my brain is not working very well with this.
- jon

Default is to back up everything on your Mac. Everything on every drive that is locally attached. Things NOT to be backed up are on the BlackList.
You understand perfectly.

Time Machine Settings

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