Upgrading hard drive and OS - time machine suitable?

I've been keeping regular copies of my system using time machine, but am not sure of it's overall capabilities. I am about to replace my internal hard drive (2008 macbook) and upgrade to Snow Leopard. Once this is done can I simply restore my old settings, applications, and files using time machine? Would this also include things such as my .profile file?
Also if anyone has any advice on a good replacement hard drive then that would be super. I have the late 2008 aluminium macbook, and need something bigger than the current 230GB. I'm off to do some research now, but it can't hurt to ask here too.
Thanks for the help,
Nick

Yes, the Momentus is a good drive.....You shouldn't have any issues with that one...
I myself purchased a Seagate Momentus 5400RPM hard drive and used it for a few months until I got a nice deal on a 128GB Kingston V200 SSD.....
Now I'm enjoying a quick Macbook Uni with 8GB of RAM and SSD upgrade. Planning on giving it to my niece since I have a couple of late 2011 Macbook Pros.
Good luck

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Installing a new hard drive and using Time Machine to Restore system

I just upgraded a Macbook (2006) hard drive and had problems importing the Time Machine backup. The problem was that the initial install discs were for Tiger, which did not support Time Machine. After numerous attempts at a work-around I solved this problem the following way:
I connected the 2006 Macbook (with new hard drive) to a newer Macbook (with Firewire port) - one with install discs for Leopard (which supports Time Machine).
I launched the newer Macbook with the install disc (#1)
I connected the two Macbook via firewire cable.
I launched the 2006 (new hard drive) Macbook in the Target Disc mode.
I connected the USB external hard drive containing the Tme Machine data to a USB port in the newer Macbook.
Next I went to the Utilities Menu on the Macbook (operating from the Install Disc) and selected Time Machine. I followed the prompts to match the source and destination. The process worked fine.
The above assumes that a new hard drive is properly formatted using Disc Utility per Apple's guidance prior to the Time Machine restoration described above.
Cheers.
Bill

Bill,
No, the glass is half full!! In this case, we (collectively) have three things to brighten our day:
1) That I was mistaken, and that your usage is completely legitimate. I definitely prefer this to what was inherent in my erroneous assumption, and I do not mind being wrong (not in the slightest).
2) That we can be clever enough to overcome obstacles, then go out of our way to share our newfound knowledge with others. More specifically, that you have done so.
3) That we are willing to police ourselves, if and when one of us might go astray. Even if I was wrong in this case, isn't it nice to know I am willing scold someone for being less than honorable?
Perhaps my greatest mistake was the assumption that, if you had the proper disks at one time, you would still have them, or would have said so in your initial post. My apologies. Technically speaking, the media for a given OS should always be somewhere in your possession when running that OS. In practice, however, I strongly believe that some "wiggle room" exists, guided by common sense. In this case, I believe that the fact that you purchased said media gives you a pass, regardless of whether or not you know off the top of your head where it is.
There. Are you still saddened?
Scott

I replaced my hard drive and used time machine to boot from but it installedthe unrepaired disk permissions of the faulty previous drive would this cause problems on my new drive?

I replaced my hard drive on macbook pro and used time machine to boot from but it also installed the unrepaired disk permmissions of the other drive, would this cause problems to my new drive?

Can you remember what the permissions problem was that you had before? You may need to reinstall OS X from scratch and not reinstall anything from your Time Machine backups. To be on the safe side you should reinstall all third-party applications from scratch, as well. Then only restore from your backup your document/data files.

How do i reformat imac hard drive and restore time machine backup?

How do I reformat my iMac internal hard drive and restore from a Time Machine backup?
I have an iMac 20" Mid 2007 with a problematic hard drive.
IntelCore 2 Duo, Processor speed 2 Ghz
800 Mhz Bus speed
4 GB RAM
250 GB Western Digital Hard Drive
10.6.3
Was getting a question mark upon booting up, so I booted from a 10.6.3 Snow Leopard CD and ran disk utility. Repair disk was interrupted with an error message. 'Disk utility can't repair disk. Backup files, reformat disk and restore backed up files.'
1. Should I select Erase, Mac OS Extended Journaled, Erase?
2. If I do this, won't I lose my networkability, and therefore lose access to Time Machine backups?
3. If it were you, would you go ahead and replace the hard drive? Not sure I should trust this hard drive!
4. If I need to replace the hard drive, can you send instructions?
Thanks!

Clean Install of Snow Leopard
     1. Boot the computer using the Snow Leopard Installer Disc or the Disc 1 that came
         with your computer. Insert the disc into the optical drive and restart the computer.
         After the chime press and hold down the "C" key. Release the key when you see
         a small spinning gear appear below the dark gray Apple logo.
     2. After the installer loads select your language and click on the Continue
         button. When the menu bar appears select Disk Utility from the Utilities menu.
         After DU loads select the hard drive entry from the left side list (mfgr.'s ID and drive
         size.) Click on the Partition tab in the DU main window. Set the number of
         partitions to one (1) from the Partitions drop down menu, click on Options button
         and select GUID, click on OK, then set the format type to MacOS Extended
         (Journaled, if supported), then click on the Apply button.
     3. When the formatting has completed quit DU and return to the installer. Proceed
         with the OS X installation and follow the directions included with the installer.
     4. When the installation has completed your computer will Restart into the Setup
         Assistant. Be sure you configure your initial admin account with the exact same
         username and password that you used on your old drive. After you finish Setup
         Assistant will complete the installation after which you will be running a fresh
         install of OS X. You can now begin the update process by opening Software
         Update and installing all recommended updates to bring your installation current.
Download and install Mac OS X 10.6.8 Update Combo v1.1.
If you have your Time Machine backup drive connected, then you can use Setup Assistant to migrate your Home folder, application support files, and third-party applications and system preference files. I recommend doing this via the Setup Assistant when the option appears.

Need to reformat hard drive and restore Time Machine backup. What's the safest way to proceed?

I have a Mac desktop, purchased in 2007. We upgraded last year to Snow Leopard. It has been slow for a few days, and yesterday wouldn't go past the gray screen. Tried booting in recovery with no success, same for safe mode. Even tried fsck -fy. Eventually went to the Snow Leopard install disk and tried to repair disk, but got an "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" message. I've got Time Machine back ups on an external hard drive, but I want to make sure I do this right and don't make things worse. What steps do I need to take?

In most of the cases, that Disk Utility message means that the hard drive is damaged.
However, you can try to erase the disk and restore the Time Machine backup to see if it works. Follow these steps:
1. Insert the Snow Leopard DVD and press the C key while your Mac is starting.
2. Go to Utilities menu > Disk Utility, select Macintosh HD on the sidebar, go to Erase tab and erase the disk. If there's an error during this step, take the Mac to an Apple Store to get a new hard drive.
3. Close Disk Utility, go to Utilities menu, choose the option to restore a Time Machine backup and follow the steps.
If the computer is slow after doing this, take the Mac to an Apple Store as soon as you can

I replaced my MacBook Pro hard drive and now Time Machine is very slow.

I replaced my 160G Hard Drive with a 750G. I have a 3 TB external hard drive for Time Machine. I back up using firewire 800.
I am running the latest OS. When I start the first backup using Time Machine it goes fine for about the first 30G. Then slows way down. Now I am only seeing updates of 10M ever few minutes. What is wrong?

Nothing is wrong. I had the same issue after swapping HD but using the same TM backup. Give it a few hours to do the first backup. Subsequent backups will be alot faster.... trust me.

I upgraded to Maverick and now Time Machine will not connect to the external hard drive to back up files. The external hard drive is a Western Digital "My Book Live" 2 TB. How do I solve problem?

I upgraded to Maverick and now Time Machine will not connect to the external hard drive to back up files. The external hard drive is a Western Digital "My Book Live" 2 TB. How do I solve problem?

I also had problem accessing my WD MyBookLive after upgrading to Maverick.
To resolve the problem, I used Connect To Server (Cmd K) to specify the IP address.
Then I enter a user id and password I created in the MyBookLive.
You can also verify that you have admin access to the MyBookLive using Safari or Chrome.
Just enter the MyBookLive IP address as the URL.

I have an Apple Macbook and will be backing up the entire system to an external hard drive utilizing the Time Machine application. when I am doing this, will the data on the external drive that I am using be erased?

I have an Apple Macbook and will be backing up the entire system in order to upgrade to a newer OS. I will be using an external hard drive to do this and there is already data on it. To complete the backup, i will be using the Time Machine application. Does this application wipe out all of the existing data on the external hard drive, or will it create a new "folder" for the backup?
thank you

No, but as steve359 states you should use a dedicated hard drive for backups. It you need a temporary backup then you can use the drive provided it has sufficient space for all your data on the hard drive.
When Time Machine finds that the drive has data on it already it may decide to erase the drive before continuing, which is another reason to use a dedicated drive.

OS is Mountain Lion, upgraded no problems, used an external Hard drive for my time machine, now my iPhoto will not show any of my photo's or ay new ones I import! Help please!!

OS is Mountain Lion, upgraded no problems, used an external Hard drive for my time machine, now my iPhoto will not show any of my photo's or ay new ones I import! Help please!!

Do you get this window when you hold down the Command+Option keys and launch iPhoto?
If not then you're not holding down both keys long enough.
OT

Trying to use a new, larger external hard drive for my Time Machine backup. However, every time I start the backup, it gets started then fails. And, I can't delete the few files that did save on the external. Sort of a catch 22. Any ideas?

Trying to use a new, larger external hard drive for my Time Machine backup. However, every time I start the backup, it gets started then fails. And, I can't delete the few files that did save on the external. Sort of a catch 22. Any ideas?

Is it a USB hard drive? USB hard drives have the problem of not giving full speed if they are hooked up on the same bus as keyboards and mice. Double check your profiler to make sure that is not a problem. If it is Firewire, make sure there aren't other firewire devices in use at the same time. I recommend not only keeping a Time Machine backup, but also a clone, and if you do use Time Machine, to make sure the Time Machine drive or partition is at least twice the size of the original drive.

I have a 250GB western digital external hard drive for my time machine backups. if i just want to backup and recover my photos and movies how do i do that with time machine?

I have a 250GB western digital external hard drive for my time machine backups. I did not download the software that came with the external HD. If I only want to backup my photos and movies from my Macbook how do I do that in Tme Machine with my external HD?

Format the HDD in Disk Utility>Erase to Mac OS Extended (Journaled) and the open System Preferences>Time Machine and set up the external disk as the Time Machine HDD. Then look at the Options, and exclude what you do not want backed up.
Ciao.

I would like to connect an external hard drive to my time machine and use it as a network drive to store itunes and iPhoto how do i do this

I have just purchased a new my book hard drive and would like to connect it to my time capsule and store my itunes and iphoto contentent there to free up space on my internal hard drive . Can this be done and what is the process?

I'd like to store my Aperture /IMovie Libraries on an external hard drive.
That is fine and recommended.. use the fastest disk you can afford.. ie Thunderbolt>USB3>FW800>USB2.
In addition, I'd like to partition the external hard drive so that Time Machine can use it to both back up my IMac and the external library drives.
Let me be clear.. you want to partition the one disk.. use it for TM and move your files to the external disk.. and then backup to the same disk.. You can do it.. but that is not a backup.. that is an experiment in how long you can get away with running files and backups on the same disk before you lose everything.. like Russian Roulette.. pull the trigger enough times and laws of probability will do you in.
You must have backups on a different disk .. otherwise it is pointless.
Can I set up a RAID 5 format for redundancy?
No.. you can buy special USB and Thunderbolt external drives that support RAID..
BUT that is still not a backup.. let me show why.. you make a silly move and corrupt your file in aperture.. it is not that rare.
Raid will corrupt all copies of the files.. it is replicated across all disks.
Delete a photo it is deleted across all disks.. you have no recovery.
Alway, always consider RAID system one disk.. backup onto another disk.. and if the photos or movies are at all important to you.. ie your family .. make another copy and store in a relatives house.. There is no such thing as too much redundancy.

How do you remove back up data from the memory storage? my storage data states that i have over 80gb of data used for back ups and i dont know why as i use a external hard drive as a time machine .now my 250gb flash storage is nearly full

how do you remove back up data from the memory storage? my storage data states that i have over 80gb of data used for back ups and i dont know why as i use a external hard drive as a time machine .now my 250gb flash storage is nearly full.. HELP!

When Time Machine backs up a portable Mac, some of the free space will be used to make local snapshots, which are backup copies of recently deleted files. The space occupied by local snapshots is reported as available by the Finder, and should be considered as such. In the Storage display of System Information, local snapshots are shown as Backups. The snapshots are automatically deleted when they expire or when free space falls below a certain level. You ordinarily don't need to, and should not, delete local snapshots yourself. If you followed bad advice to disable local snapshots by running a shell command, you may have ended up with a lot of data in the Other category. Ask for instructions in that case.
See this support article for some simple ways to free up storage space.

Can I set up multiple usb hard drives- one for time machine and a second for media? Can one also print wirelessly with an old HP C6280 printer?

Can I set up multiple usb hard drives- one for time machine and a second for media?
Can one also print wirelessly with an old HP C6280 printer?

Can I set up multiple usb hard drives- one for time machine and a second for media?
Yes.
Can one also print wirelessly with an old HP C6280 printer?
Possibly by using an Airport Express, but depends on what type of port connection the printer requires.

I have an IMAC and I'm running OSX 10.9.2. I'd like to store my Aperture /IMovie Libraries to an external hard drive. In addition, I'd like to partition the external hard drive so that Time Machine can use it to both back up my IMac and the externa

I have an IMAC and I'm running OSX 10.9.2. I'd like to store my Aperture /IMovie Libraries on an external hard drive. In addition, I'd like to partition the external hard drive so that Time Machine can use it to both back up my IMac and the external library drives. Is this possible? Can I set up a RAID 5 format for redundancy?

I'd like to store my Aperture /IMovie Libraries on an external hard drive.
That is fine and recommended.. use the fastest disk you can afford.. ie Thunderbolt>USB3>FW800>USB2.
In addition, I'd like to partition the external hard drive so that Time Machine can use it to both back up my IMac and the external library drives.
Let me be clear.. you want to partition the one disk.. use it for TM and move your files to the external disk.. and then backup to the same disk.. You can do it.. but that is not a backup.. that is an experiment in how long you can get away with running files and backups on the same disk before you lose everything.. like Russian Roulette.. pull the trigger enough times and laws of probability will do you in.
You must have backups on a different disk .. otherwise it is pointless.
Can I set up a RAID 5 format for redundancy?
No.. you can buy special USB and Thunderbolt external drives that support RAID..
BUT that is still not a backup.. let me show why.. you make a silly move and corrupt your file in aperture.. it is not that rare.
Raid will corrupt all copies of the files.. it is replicated across all disks.
Delete a photo it is deleted across all disks.. you have no recovery.
Alway, always consider RAID system one disk.. backup onto another disk.. and if the photos or movies are at all important to you.. ie your family .. make another copy and store in a relatives house.. There is no such thing as too much redundancy.

Upgrading hard drive and OS - time machine suitable?

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