Using external hard drive connected to desktop as time machine disk for laptop

I recently purchased an external hard drive for the purpose of backing up my laptop and desktop macs. Both are running Mountain Lion (10.7.5). The desktop is physically connected to both the hard drive and to my modem. I have enabled pretty much every sharing option on both the laptop and desktop. When my router crapped out I began just using the internet sharing capabiilty.
I have been able to chose the desktop as the disk for backing up my laptop, but I want to use the hard drive (connected to the desktop) as the disk. I cant figure out how to do this yet. I can easily access the hard drive by using either the "connect as user" option. I thought that perhaps I could broadcast the connection somehow as an airport connection, but I don't know how to, or if this is even possible.
The desktop is a mac mini, and the laptop is a macbook pro. Both were purchased in mid 2011.

This may assist you:
http://pondini.org/TM/4.html
Ciao.

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I am trying to get space on an external hard drive which has some old time machine back up files that I do not need but can not eliminate, even by going into the time machine, clicking on the backup file to be eliminated and using the drop down eliminate

I am trying to get space on an external hard drive which has some old time machine back up files that I do not need but can not eliminate, even by going into the time machine, clicking on the backup file to be eliminated and using the drop down menu with the gear box symbol to eliminate

I cannot find this 300GB "Backup" in the Finder, only in the Storage info when I check "About This Mac".
You are probably using Time Machine to backup your MacBook Pro, right? Then the additional 300 GB could be local Time Machine snapshots. Time Machine will write the hourly backups to the free space on your hard disk, if the backup drive is temporarily not connected. You do not see these local backups in the Finder, and MacOS will delete them, when you make a regular backup to Time Machine, or when you need the space for other data.
See Pondini's page for more explanation: What are Local Snapshots? http://pondini.org/TM/FAQ.html
I have restarted my computer, but the information remains the same. How do I reclaim the use of the 300GB? Why is it showing up as "Backups" when it used to indicate "Photos"? Are my photos safe on the external drive?
You have tested the library on the external drive, and so your photos are save there.
The local TimeMachine snapshot probably now contains a backup of the moved library. Try, if connecting your Time Machine drive will reduce the size of your local Time Machine snapshots.

I have a external hard drive connected, Finder will not let me search for files in the external hard drive how do i search in a hard drive

i have a external hard drive connected, Finder will not let me search for files in the external hard drive how do i search in a hard drive

What are you using to search? You should be able to search any drive in from the Finder. If you're having trouble, try "EasyFind" from the App Store (free). You can search any volumes with it.
Clinton

HT201250 I have two external hard drives. One is my Time Machine backup drive. The other I use for external storage of files (documents, photos, movies, etc). Can I set Time Machine to backup BOTH my Mac hard drive and my other external hard drive?

I have two external hard drives. One is my Time Machine backup drive. The other I use for external storage of files (documents, photos, movies, etc). Can I set Time Machine to backup BOTH my Mac hard drive and my other external hard drive?

Yes you can make multiple backups on one hard drive, for example if you’ve 1TB hard drive installed in your PC and you’ve two Mac Machines with 500GB drive each then you just make two backup images with size of 500GB each.
http://www.halfspot.com/use-your-pc-hard-drive-for-time-machine-backup/

Why is my external hard drive showing up twice on Time Machine?

This is the first time I am using Time Machine because somebody recently gave me an external hard drive.
The external hard drive is appearing twice on Time Machine preferences. One of them is currently backing up and the other one says "Waiting to back up" but I don't want it to back up twice on the same disk.
Here's a screenshot:
Does anyone know why it is doing this?

Triple-click anywhere in the line below to select it:
tmutil destinationinfo
Copy the selected text to the Clipboard (command-C).
Launch the Terminal application in any of the following ways:
☞ Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.)
☞ In the Finder, select Go ▹ Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens.
☞ Open LaunchPad. Click Utilities, then Terminal in the icon grid.
Paste into the Terminal window (command-V).
Post any lines of output that appear below what you entered — the text, please, not a screenshot.

I have an external hard drive set up as a Time Machine backup on my IMac. I want to add a second external hard drive and put my Aperture Photo Library on it. Is there a way to have the photos on this second hard drive automatically back up to the Time Mac

I have an IMac with an external hard drive set up as a Time Machine for automatic backups. I want to add a second external hard drive and load my Aperture Photo Library on to it so that the library can be shared by both me and my wife. Is there a way to automatically backup the photo library that will be on the second hard drive to the Time Machine hard drive?

Open System Preference > Time Machine
Click Options....
Ckick on external disk in list and hit the - button below the list to remove from the Exclusion list
Allan

I want to use external hard drive connected to airport extreme that contains iTunes library to airplay library to apple tv

I have a macbook 4.1 with 4gb ram running lion. I have a 3 tb external drive that i use for time machine bakcups and a partition for my itunes library. When I want to watch a movie I connect the external hard drive to my macbook, open itunes and airplay it to my apple tv. However, this solution is not optimal because I lose the use of my macbook when it has to be connected via usb to my hard drive.
What I want to do is be able to watch a movie on my apple tv via my external hard drive wirelessly.
I realize that hooking up an airport extreme to a harddrive for time capsule purposes is not supported and thats fine.
However, will this work for the purpose of airplaying itunes library to apple tv.
Also would this work with most other wireless routers that support external hard drives? Not asking for specifics here, because i know no one can know every device. But is there any technical problem that would prevent it.
Thanks

Yea I'm just going to wait for a solution I like better. The easiest way would be for apple to have some kind of itunes server software. Theres no reason that my computer running itunes shouldn't be able to communicate with with hard drive wirelessly just as it would with a usb cable. Kind of like wireless itunes synching with my iphone.
I don't want to use Itunes match because music is not my concern. It is the 1,000 movies that I want to watch on apple tv without tying up my laptop.
Thanks anyway

I was trying to back up my mac by using my external hard drive. Without realizing it, time machine erased all my backups from my other computers. Is there any way to recover these files? I can't even get the external hard drive to work on my pc.

I was trying to use my external hard drive to back up my mac computer. It had files on it from my pc computer. Time machine erased all my existing files. (I thought it was only going to erase the duplicate files and rewrite them). Is there anyway to recover these files from my external hard drive. My mac has renamed the hard drive time maching and it will no longer show up on my pc. What can I do?

Yes, the Old Master file has a folder for each year where I find all photos from that specific year. I am attaching a screen shot of the file.
In the meantime i have managed to download all photos (it did not download any video files though in mpg, avi, 3gp, m4v,mp4 and mov format) to a new iphoto library. Unfortunately the photos are quite mixed and often doubled up. I ma considering to purchase iphoto library which checks all duplicates in iphoto. this will save me a lot of time. What do you think?

Iomega external hard drive either 'not found' by Time Machine or is now in 'read only' format

I don't know what's going on with my iomega external hard drive. Sometimes the HD is recognised by the computer; other times it isn't; if it isn't I can restore to an earlier back up via Time Machine app; but it's like the disk isn't writable.
Ten days ago, I had trouble backing up my iMac using Time Machine. After turning it off and restarting my external hard drive, it backed up successfully.
However, today I am trying to back up my files, and TM tells me it can't find the external hard drive. Nothing has changed -- I have been out of town this past week -- but somehow my HD now seems to be in 'read only' format. It does turn on, and I could restore my computer to an earlier back up.
"Mac OS X can't repair the disk. You can still open or copy files on the disk, but you can't save changes to files on the disk. Back up the disk and reformat it as soon as you can."
Annoyingly, despite my HD not showing in Finder or on my Desktop (as it usually does), when I simply turn it off I get that warning message "The disk was not ejected properly".
Have tried verifying and repairing using Disk Utility, to no avail.
Am prompted to reformat but I don't have a good understanding of what this means and how to do it. I'm guessing this would wipe the disk clean and I'd have to create the initial back up image all over again -- I'm reluctant to do this since this HD is my only back up and if it all goes tits up I'll be up that famous creek without a paddle.
Thoughts, suggestions, input all welcome and deeply appreciated -- thank you!

fzgy wrote:
"Mac OS X can't repair the disk. You can still open or copy files on the disk, but you can't save changes to files on the disk. Back up the disk and reformat it as soon as you can."
It's possible a heavy-duty 3rd-party disk repair app can fix it, but they're expensive (DiskWarrior is about $100), and there's no guarantee it can do it.
Am prompted to reformat but I don't have a good understanding of what this means and how to do it.
That will erase it. See Time Machine - Frequently Asked Question #5.
It sounds very much like the disk is beginning to fail, although it's possible there's a bad port, cable, connection or power supply (if it has its own).
I'd suggest getting a new one, and using it for your Time Machine backups; once you have a good backup there, reformat the old one (and select Security Options to write zeros to the whole drive -- if that fails, you know the drive is toast). Use it for secondary backups, per FAQ #27. If it has failed, get a second new one for secondary backups.

Unlocking external hard drive that was locked with time machine

I use a MBP Retina (Mid 2012) with OSX 10.9.4. I left the MBP at Apple for repair and they changed the mother card and reformatted my HD (SSD). Since I had a backup on a WD My Passport external drive I was not too worried to restore. I had clicked the option "password protected" on TM and therefore the external HD was password protected. I also copied pasted many files on the same external hard drive, in case TM would fail one day to operate I thought that I would still have my files ...
But I was very surprised that when I plugged in my external HD into my MBP it didn't recognize it at all. The external HD did not appear on the screen anymore. Nor in Finder. It appeared in Disk Utility but it could not be mounted. Basically it was impossible to access my data. After a while and talking with Apple Support on the phone we could reach a point where a window appeared asking me the password for the access to the HD. Unfortunately it didn't work. The . password was not recognized. Even though we had selected the right country with the icon upper right on the screen to make sure that we used the correct keyboard.
So finally I reinstalled completely the OSX (coming rom Lion all the way to the last OSX) on the MBP and finally I could restore it with my TM. I spent three days on this since it only worked with one OSX - don't remember honestly which one - and not the last one. Don't know why.
Anyway.
Today I have my MPB working but I miss all the files that are still on my external HD because I cannot access to it anymore. As I said the recovery happened all of a sudden with TM with a former OSX and not the 10.9.4. With this current OSX my HD does not appear on the desktop nor on finder. Nothing. It is locked by TM and I cannot even key in the password to unlock it. Useless to say that I have the password.
Any idea how to sort this out please ? Thanks

This might work. Courtesty of V.K.:
run the following terminal commands (copy and paste, please)
sudo chflags 0 /volumes/*
sudo chmod a+rx /volumes/*
you'll have to enter your admin password (which you won't see). that's normal. this should unlock your drives.

External Hard Drive doesn't work after Time Machine cancelation

First post on the forum.
So far i've had 2 hard drives broken because of a simple Time Machine.
I own a MBP and an HP so my hard drives usually have 2 partitions, one for mac, the other for pc. About a month or so i was doing a Time Machine on my Iomega 1TB (the partition used for the time machine is formatted in Mac Os Expanded (with journaling)), and, because the time machine was extremely slow i stopped it. Then came the problems. I tried to connect the Iomega to the mac, but the partition in which i had the time machine doesn't mount. the other partition is mountable and i even managed to delete some files in it, so it worked. But now the partitions don't mount. I can still see the two partitions in Disk Utility, with the correct names i gave them, but cannot mount.
Right now i don't have the disk with me because i went to a "professional" to try and at least recover my files. What a joke that was. First they told me they had my recovered files and them the files were not mine. The switched the disks and gave me someone elses files. And now they ask me for 1100$ to recover my files because it is a hardware malfunction. Obviously i dont have that amount of money available and i cannot afford the recovery atm, and i do not believe that a software can cause hardware to fail. (just guessing)
Resume: 1 external hard drive, with 2 partitions, one mac os expanded and the other is a Windows NT Filesystem. None of the partitions are corrently mounting on mac but the disk utility recognizes the partitions and the names i gave them.
So guys can u help a poor little girl that needs her photographies so that she can go and show her portfolio to get a job. :/
Kinda desperate at this point.
ps: sorry for bad english, second language

One can't read the other.
Just to be clear Mac's can read/write FAT32 but windows cannot use OS X Extended. So to use a drive on both systems it needs to be formatted FAT32
FAT32 does have limitations and possibly the best solution is to use NTFS, a more modern, robust filesystem. The drawback here is that OS X does not natively read NTFS so a third party kernel extension is needed.

Western Digital External Hard drive keeps undocking when running time machine.

I have been using a 2TB Western Digital My Book external hard drive for about a year now to run time machine and backup my files. The past month I have noticed that my backups have been failing. I try and for a backup and about halfway through it gets "delayed" because of an error. Then I have a alert pop up on my desktop with the following message:
The disk was not ejected properly. If possible, always eject a disk before unplugging it or turning it off.
The disk was not unplugged from the power supply or the usb port. I am stumped. Anyone know what is going on and how to fix it??

I would avoid WD, Seagate, LaCie, and Iomega external drives, and any drive with special features such as networking or built-in backup software.

La Cie Porsche Design External Hard Drive no longer working with Time Machine since update to Yosemite.

My La Cie Porsche Design External Hard Drive USB 3.0 is no longer working with Time Machine. Is Yosemite the cause? How do I fix?

Can you see the drive in Disk Utility? If so, try selecting it and using the Mount button in the top menu. You can also run repair disk and repair permissions.

Can I switch external hard drives and still access old Time Machine backups?

I have a Mac Book Pro linked to 2 1TB external hard drives, one used as my Time Machine Back up, the other used as a manual ad hoc back up and to store even older files.
The TM back up drive is now full. If I just unplug it/switch it off and plug in and set up a new 2TB hard drive as my TM back up, will I still be able to access the back ups on the original TM drive if necessary, through TM?
Wil it be a start over situation with the new drive, performing a complete back up to begin with?
Or would you advise me to transfer the old back folder to the new drive, given that it will be larger?

Hi den.thed,
Thank you for this - I think the easy option by far appears to be to leave existing backups on disk 1, and plug in disk 2 and start over.

HT201250 Do I have to have an external hard drive to back up to Time Machine?

I have never set up Time Machine on my iMac and I'm having a little trouble. It's not giving me the option to use Time Machine as the backup. Does it require an external hard drive?

Does it require an external hard drive?
Short answer: Yes (or a time capsule).
Long answer: Mac 101: Time Machine - Support - Apple
charlie

Using external hard drive connected to desktop as time machine disk for laptop

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