Desktops
Q: time machine failure/replacement questions
I have an old time machine that's been failing, and I'm going to buy a new drive. When I get the new drive:
- how do I format it?
- is there any advantage to making it be bootable?
- if so, how would I make it be bootable?
- is there any way to copy the contents of the current time machine drive to the new drive? The old drive time machine drive is 500GB, and I don't hae 500GB free on my system drive. Should I just disconnect the old drive and connect I only if I can't find a file? By the way, 500GB drives don't seem to be available anymore. The smallest drive available now is 1TB.
- Is it possible that the time machine failures I've been having are with the tine time machine software, not the drive? I'm running mountain lion. I don't want to upgrade OSX, because I don't know if any applications will break.
- the reason why I ask question 5 is that when the drive fails, I turn off the mac, unplug/replug the time machine, turn on the mac. It's possible that booting the mac is enough, and I don't need to unplug/replug the time machine. Thoughts here?
iMac, OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.5)
Posted on Jan 6, 2016 5:36 PM