When using a Seagate 1T external hard drive and Time Machine to back up hourly, if I delete photo files from the Mac hard drive before the next back up, are these retained on the Seagate drive or will they be lost (overwritten) in the next backu in the ne

Does Time Machine erase previously saved files if, say, photos are deleted from the Macbook upon the next update, or will they be stored indefinately despite the current status of the files stored on the computer? Eg. can I bckup photo files to a Seagate 1T disc and then delete them to make more room on the computer in the knowlwdge that they are always going to be on the Seagate disc? Sorry if this is very elementary but I have not used a back up before like this, and am not sure how successive backups are overlaid or retained. Thanks!!

TM is not designed to do what you ask. As Allan wrote TM is an incremental backup not an archival solution.
If you delete a file from the HD it will eventually be removed from the TM backup (if it ever makes it on to the backup at all).
How long before it is removed depends on a number of factors, TM disk drive size being one factor but not the only one.
Material that is impossible to replace and is important to you (image files usually fitting that description) need to be backed up to as least one other drive and preferably more for long term storage.

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Backing up photos on iMac using external hard drive and time machine

How do i back up photos from my imac using an external hard drive and time machine
Thanks in advance

Apple explains how to use Time Machine in http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1427.
Setting up and using TM is very simple to do, connect any external HD (format as Mac OS Extended (Journaled) using Disk Utility ) and your computer shoudl ask if you want to use that EHD for a Time Machine backup. If you have any questions visit your local Apple Store or reseller and they can answer how to setup and use TM and also should be able to offer suggestions on EHDs. My personal preference is OWC (www.macsales.com) Mercury Elite Pro due to the build quality and OWC's level of support.

Why can't I copy my photo files from my Mac Pro to the External Hard Drive?

Whay can't I copy my photo files from my Mac Book Pro to my External Hard Drive?

Are you trying to copy the actual files or the iPhoto Library? Are you tryuing to do it in iPhoto or in a finder window?

Here's a very basic question about 2 TB external drives and Time Machine.

Here's a very basic question about 2 TB external drives and Time Machine.
Ihave a Mac Pro with a .75 TB and 1 TB drive. It also has a 1 TB 2ndinternal drive. My current external drive is too small so I'll begetting a 1.5 TB or 2 TB drive.
Obviouslythe new larger 2 TB drive will backup everything on the Mac Prointernal drive with Time Machine. But there will be 1 TB of space leftover going to waste.
ShouldI partition the external drive so that the TM portion will be 1 TB andthe use the remaining extra partition for additional file backups withCarbon Copy?
Thanks for any insights.
I tried searching around on the new Apple discussion forum, but I find it much harder to use than the old forum I used to use.

The problem with terabyte drives is that that a 3 TB is about as big as you can get without going into RAID territory. Ideally, a Time Machine drive should be 3 times as large as all the drives you are backing up. So, if you have 2.75 TB of internal storage, you should have 8 TB of Time Machine space.
Of course, that is "should". If your TB drives are mostly empty, then you can get away with something 3 times the size of your used disk space. Just remember that you are pushing it. Linc is right about Time Machine needing space to work.
It is unlikely that you have regular churn on 2.75 TB of disk. I suggest identifying which drives and folders have the most activity and excluding those drives and directories that don't change much. It would be better to archive the data that doesn't change often and keep it out of Time Machine. Then you may be able to get away with a 2 TB Time Machine drive.

Question about 2 TB external drives and Time Machine.

Here's a very basic question about 2 TB external drives and Time Machine.
I have a Mac Pro with a .75 TB and 1 TB drive. It also has a 1 TB 2nd internal drive. My current external drive is too small so I'll be getting a 1.5 TB or 2 TB drive.
Obviously the new larger 2 TB drive will backup everything on the Mac Pro internal drive with Time Machine. But there will be 1 TB of space left over going to waste.
Should I partition the external drive so that the TM portion will be 1 TB and the use the remaining extra partition for additional file backups with Carbon Copy?
Thanks for any insights.
I tried searching around on the new Apple discussion forum, but I find it much harder to use than the old forum I used to use.

John,
I'm not sure why you posted in the iMac forum so I'm going to attempt to get you to the correct spot. I would recommend reposting in the Time Machine Forum, this is part of the OS X forums (Leopard or Snow Leopard) because you are using Snow Leopard (your profile indicates you are) please click Apple Support Communities and type Snow Leopard. Then you can narrow the search down by clicking Refine this List.
Roger

I have had a series of Macs. They have been backed up with Time Machine. I am trying to restore TM backup files from the older Macs using my new MacBook Pro. No go. What do I do ?

I have had a series of Macs. They have been backed up with Time Machine. I am trying to restore TM backup files from the older Macs using my new MacBook Pro. No go. What do I do ?

I am trying to restore TM backup files from the older Macs using my new MacBook Pro. No go.
Migration Assistant (Finder > Applications > Utilities > Migration Assistant) is the tool that you would use to restore backups from older Macs to another Mac.
Details are here: http://pondini.org/OSX/MigrateLion.html The same info applies for Mavericks and Yosemite. If you are saying that this is a "no go".....where are you getting stuck? What error messages do you see?

External Hard Drive and Time Machine questions

Hello, I am new here to the forums and I have looked all over for the answers to two questions that I have regarding external hard drives and the time machine feature.
For some background, I recently had a scare (water spill but luckily I had a keyboard cover on and the entire spill landed on the cover) with my Mid-2012 13" Macbook Pro (2.5Ghz) and due to almost losing all my data I've decided to invest in an external hard drive. However, rather than just purchasing a 500GB HDD to use as an external hard drive, I decided to kill two birds with one stone and upgrade my Macbook Pro as well by investing in the 480GB OCW Mercury Extreme Pro SSD. I'll be using the SSD as my internal drive so the original hard drive that came with my Macbook will serve as my backup external drive. Lastly, I plan to use the external drive solely for the purpose of backing up my MacBook in case something ever happens to my Macbook.
I am using this guide to help me with this whole process: http://circuitremix.com/?q=content/macbook-pro-solid-state-drive-upgrade-guide-a nd-performance-testing.
My two questions are:
1) When following the guide, it never mentions anything about the Partition Map Scheme. After being alerted to this and doing some additional research, is it better to go with the GUID Partition Table rather than the Master Boot Record?
2) After I have cloned everything onto my new SSD and replaced the HDD in my MacBook with it, should I erase everything on my HDD before setting it up with time machine? I was thinking about keeping the original data on the original hard drive (which would now be my external drive) just in case something goes wrong with time machine but I have read that people recommend solely dedicating the entire external hard drive for time machine backups.
Thanks in advance!

Format the new SSD in Disk Utility to Mac OS Extended (Journaled) and that will solve question No. 1.
After formatting, clone the new SSD using Disk Utility>Restore or Carbon Copy Cloner (down load from the Internet). Test the new SSD and if it performs as expected, do the physical swap.
Question No. 2. Erase the Time Machine HDD using Disk Utility and then install Time Machine. See this excellent website regarding Time Machine.
http://pondini.org/OSX/Home.html
If you want an external boot HHD, get another one and use Carbon Copy Cloner. This will give you redundancy in backups as well which is a good strategy. CCC also can update the contents in an incremental manner similar to Time Machine.
Ciao.

Slow external hard drive and time machine un able to back up

My Western Digital Elements 2 TB USB 2.0 Desktop external hard drive has become very slow to boot. I also use the same drive for time machine, which is now un able to back up. Is there anyway of increasing the speed, and fixing time machine without losing any data, as the drive is not backed up. Thanks.

If Disk Utility can't repair it, there are some expensive third party products that may be able to do so, strictly for the purpose of extracting whatever files remain intact. I have none in particular to recommend.
Some data is already certainly gone. The disk should be replaced regardless of any utility's ability to "repair" it.

External Boot drive and time machine?

Been away from the mac/s for awhile... Just recieved my new mac mini hooked up to an external drive, in this case a very nice mini stack V2 with 500GB and more importantly 7200RPM drive. When I first turned on Leopard I of course designated the external drive as my backup for time machine.
That done can I still use the external drive as a bootable drive? I want to gain the increase in performance from that hard drive by doing so.
If YES I just install my OS on to that drive and then once done select it as my boot drive in system preferences? Any help appreciated.

I'm not sure you would want to have a backup to the same drive you boot the system from, and Time Machine won't give you the option to select the same partition your boot copy of MacOS is in. You may be able to repartition the drive into two (or more) logical drives and do it that way, but realistically to get the best performance from the system you'd probably want to use the external not just as the boot drive, but also for data storage. That being so, you clearly wouldn't gain any real benefit backing up to the same drive even if you could do so, so you might perhaps instead designate the mini's internal drive for Time Machine use, or add a second external and designate that.

Using LaCie 1Tb Network drive and Time MAchine

I have read a number of thread here about issues with LaCie and Time Machine but cannot find the help I am looking for. I have a the Lacie device connected to my network and I have access through the Browser Administration utility to the drive, I believe I have set up the users and the shares correctly, and can connect to the share, but when i try to set up Time Machine it fails to recognize that the NAS drive is available, I am doing something wrong and it's probably very simple.
Any help would be appreciated.
Thanks
John

Here's Apple's public statement at http://www.apple.com/macosx/features/timemachine.html for what devices work with TM.
[You can designate just about any HFS+ formatted FireWire or USB drive connected to a Mac as a Time Machine backup drive. Time Machine can also back up to another Mac running Leopard with Personal File Sharing, Leopard Server, or Xsan storage devices.]

SimpleTech drive and Time Machine

I am a new Mac and Time Machine user. I have an external hard drive (a SimpleTech drive) that I am using for my Time Machine backups. When the external HD is plugged in, it is spinning, even when backups are not happening. Is this normal? I have also noticed that the drive continues to spin even when I shut the lid of my MBP and the computer goes to sleep. Shouldn't the drive go to sleep as well? Or is it supposed to continue to spin? Thank you!

Just a personal preference. I don't use TM, so the only timeMy ext HDs are up and running, I'm using them and don't want them to spin down/spin up while I'm doing stuff. Stopping and starting electronic things is what kills them—ever notice that light bulbs only go when turned on? The only thing I sleep are displays. As for laptops, I don't use them.

Network drives and time machine with Lion

Since upgrading to Lion my MyBookWorld network drive is no longer working with time machine. The drive is recognised as being there by finder and time machine but when I try and connect to it as registered user there is a warning saying There was a problem connecting to the server "MyBookWorld.Local". This drive was working fine until I upgraded to lion. There is no new firmware from Wesern Digital for the disc. It looks like that will be the solution. does anyone have any idea when that may be forthcoming?

Please follow these instructions:
Lion: Connecting to legacy (pre-Lion) AFP services - and Mac OS X (server):
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3258472

Airport extreme and external WD HDD and time machine help plz!

Hi, i have used the AEB with my WD external hard drive perfectly before, but after i moved to a different country, i tried to hook it up again, it does comes some problems now, and i think its because of the new updates.
first of all, i have 2 external HD which are connected to each other via firewire, 1 tb and 500 gb wd hard drives. i hook it to my AEB and it doesnt show on my desktop anymore! so my time machinese couldnt find the HD, next is, i used airport utility, and it detects only 1 of the HD not both, so i tried to hook the usb to my laptop and it shows 2 HD connected with 1 usb connection, so i wonder whats going on here, need help, desperately needs to back up thanks!
i want the old school way, which is the plug and play usb then it shows on my desktop via AEB, it worked i know, cuz i did it before, somehow, now it doesnt, im sure its the update, but at the same time, i cant downgrade as well, im sure there is some solution for this auto mount via AEB and time machine issue in this new 7.2.3 firmware thanks!

Welcome to the discussions!
All you probably really need to know is that +Apple does not support Time Machine backups to a drive attached to the USB port on the AirPort Extreme+ due to likely corruption issues. The odd thing about this issue is that problems won't necessarily occur immediately as most users who have had difficulties with this approach (including me) find that backups work OK...for a time.
The best advice we could offer is that if you decide to try this anyway, make sure that you have another backup plan in place for your important files.
Time Machine backups will be supported if you use the Time Capsule, or if you use a drive that is directly attached to the computer that supports Time Machine.
Message was edited by: Bob Timmons

Did my first back up today using external hard drive and time machine now i can't drag and drop

Hi, i did my first back up today using time machine it all went onto my external hard drive fine. Now i cant drag and drop anyhting. I assume ive cahnged some settings in time machine but cant figure it out what to do can some one help ?
thanks

Brandbasher wrote:
Thanks Pondini but i have closed time machine, removed external hard drive.
Did you eject it first?
Now i cant drag and drop anything on my desk top, or mail or any other application. Ive tried moving folders, documents none of it works. Even moving around documents within a folder, it wont let me chnage the position of files.
That shouldn't be related to Time Machine (especially if the backups aren't mounted).
What happens when you try those things? Do you get any messages? Anything you can post a screenshot of?
Have you tried a Restart?
Does it happen in another user account? (If you don't have one, create one via System Prefs > Users & Groups.)

Using external hard drive as both a boot drive and time machine backup

My internal 1TB hard drive on my iMac is dead and I don't have the money to replace it at the moment.
I have everything backed up on an external 1TB drive using Time Machine. As a workaround for the time being,
Is there any way I can install the system on the external drive and use that as the boot drive without erasing the Time Machine
Backups? It seems to me I would have to have two partitions for the external drive, one for the system, and
one for Time Machine. But is there any way to add a partition without erasing the existing one with
Time Machine only on it?
Sorry if line breaks here are weird. Doing this from iPhone.

Neil , I have a mid 2010 27" imac running 10.6.8 and i want to install Lion , when i purchase Lion from app store will it give me any install options as I would like to be able to dual boot using SL and Lion , I have 500 gigs left on my 1 tb drive (should I do this) or would I be better of using an external bootable drive as I also want to use Ubuntu and or Linux down the line.
Any and all support , help and advice will be appreciated.
If you would like to e-mail me you can find it on my profile page.
Thanks

When using a Seagate 1T external hard drive and Time Machine to back up hourly, if I delete photo files from the Mac hard drive before the next back up, are these retained on the Seagate drive or will they be lost (overwritten) in the next backu in the ne

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