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Patricia Henwood

Q: Can I use Time Machine to backup a volume on one external HD to another external HD

I'm trying to work out the most efficient way to include my iPhoto library in my Time Machine backup when it runs.  The iPhoto library is located on a partition of a 1TB Lacie Rugged external drive, and my Time Machine backup destination is a 700GB partition of a 2TB Lacie Rugged external drive.  To date I haven't included the iPhoto Library in the Time Machine backup but I do keep a copy of my iPhoto library on a separate partition on the 2TB Lacie Rugged.

 

It occurs to me that a 'full' Time Machine backup should include the iPhoto library and I was wondering how I go about including the iPhoto library from the 1TB external drive in the Time Machine backup?

 

I would be grateful for any suggestions

 

Cheers

Tricia

MacBook Pro with Retina display, OS X Yosemite (10.10), 2.6GHz; 8GB; 250GB PCIe

Posted on Jan 26, 2015 7:12 PM

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Q: Can I use Time Machine to backup a volume on one external HD to another external HD

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  • by Niel,Helpful

    Niel Niel Jan 26, 2015 7:17 PM in response to Patricia Henwood
    Level 10 (313,402 points)
    Mac OS X
    Jan 26, 2015 7:17 PM in response to Patricia Henwood

    Remove the external drive from the list of items set to be excluded from the backup, and then add everything else on it. If the partition containing the iPhoto library isn't dedicated to it, it may be easier to create one which is or move the other files off that partition.

     

    (121054)

  • by Patricia Henwood,

    Patricia Henwood Patricia Henwood Jan 26, 2015 7:29 PM in response to Niel
    Level 3 (937 points)
    Jan 26, 2015 7:29 PM in response to Niel

    Thank you for such a lightning-fast response Niel :-)  Can I just double check with you the following ...?

     

    The external drive where my iPhoto library is located has three partitions - Time Machine Backup, Pictures (where the iPhoto library is located) and SuperDuper Bootable Clone.

     

    When you say 'Remove the external drive from the list of items set to be excluded from the backup, and then add everything else on it' - am I correct in thinking that I should remove Pictures partition from the items to be excluded but leave the Time Machine Backup and SuperDuper Bootable Clone as excluded items?

     

    On my 2TB external drive (the one I'm backing up to) there are 5 partitions - Time Machine Backup, SuperDuper Clone, Pictures, Photo Archive and Document Archive.  The Time Machine Backup is 700GB of which I still have 473GB available - when I include the Pictures folder that contains the iPhoto library that will use up another 148GB but I think there's still plenty of room to use it.

     

    When you say if the partition contain the iPhoto library isn't dedicated to it it may be easier to create one which is, the only item I have on the Pictures volume is the iPhoto library so I think that it's dedicated to it.  I was going to add images from the Pictures folder on my MacBook Pro but haven't done so at this stage so I won't do so.  It wouldn't matter though, would it, if I copied the images from the Pictures folder on my MBP to the 'Photo Archive' partition of the EHD?

     

    Thank you once more for your reply.

     

    Tricia

  • by Niel,Solvedanswer

    Niel Niel Jan 26, 2015 7:32 PM in response to Patricia Henwood
    Level 10 (313,402 points)
    Mac OS X
    Jan 26, 2015 7:32 PM in response to Patricia Henwood

    1. Yes.

    2. No. Note that you should avoid having all the copies of a file on a single drive.

     

    (121056)

  • by Patricia Henwood,

    Patricia Henwood Patricia Henwood Jan 26, 2015 7:37 PM in response to Niel
    Level 3 (937 points)
    Jan 26, 2015 7:37 PM in response to Niel

    Excellent, thank you so much.  I think I should be fine if I have the iPhoto library located on one external HD and the backup on another external HD, shouldn't I?  I also have an old (2008 MacBook aluminium unibody) that I put a 750GB HDD in a couple of years ago and there is also a full copy of the iPhoto library there too - basically, a last resort if anything were to happen to either of the external HDs, hopefully not to both at once ...

     

    Tricia

  • by Niel,

    Niel Niel Jan 26, 2015 7:39 PM in response to Patricia Henwood
    Level 10 (313,402 points)
    Mac OS X
    Jan 26, 2015 7:39 PM in response to Patricia Henwood

    Correct.

     

    (121058)