Maz K

Q: Time machine backups - excluding Bootcamp but want one folder included

Hi there,

 

I use Bootcamp occasionally for some software that is not available on a Mac as well as MS Office,  but unfortunately, I had the partition set to 150 Gb when I set it up which is way too much. I don't want to reformat etc. to reduce the size so just recently, I decided to use that partition for my iTunes folder plus Gb's of work documents which suits me just fine.

 

I have Time Machine setup to backup my Mac and whereas before I had Bootcamp excluded, I am now trying to have the settings so that all of Bootcamp is excluded EXCEPT for 2 folders - iTunes and Personal. I can't see a way to do this because since I have Bootcamp excluded, the subfolders are non-selectable. I tried one way where instead of selecting all of Bootcamp, I did a CMD-A and selected all with an idea of deselecting folders, but even this way, I am unable to deselect the 2 folders because all folders are greyed out.

 

So the question is - Is it possible to exclude Bootcamp and at the same time to de-exclude the 2 folders? If not, I suppose my option would be to backup (well, actually copy!) the 2 folders to my TM drive.

 

Thanks,

 

Maz

MacBook Pro with Retina display, OS X Mountain Lion (10.8), ... and I love it ...

Posted on Aug 21, 2014 2:44 AM

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Q: Time machine backups - excluding Bootcamp but want one folder included

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  • by John Galt,

    John Galt John Galt Aug 21, 2014 3:50 AM in response to Maz K
    Level 8 (49,226 points)
    Mac OS X
    Aug 21, 2014 3:50 AM in response to Maz K

    Hi Maz K


    You ought to be able to remove the Boot Camp partition from the exclusion list, and then drag the contents of the Boot Camp partition to the exclusion list except the iTunes and Personal folders. It seems as though that is what you described; if it's not working for you I have no explanation.


    Another workaround to consider is to create a third partition for the sole purpose of containing your iTunes and Personal folders, and exclude the entire Boot Camp partition.

     

    Either one ought to work.

     

    Edit: This is posted in the Snow Leopard forum. If you want it moved to Mountain Lion let me know and I'll ask a Host to move it.

  • by Maz K,

    Maz K Maz K Aug 21, 2014 8:32 AM in response to John Galt
    Level 1 (10 points)
    iPhone
    Aug 21, 2014 8:32 AM in response to John Galt

    Hi John,

     

    If you can get it moved, that would be great. I did a search before I posted but I'm not sure about the forum you mentioned.

     

    I tried what you suggested in remove the BC partition from the exclude list and having all folders except the ones I want excluding but it doesn't seem to want to backup those 2 folders. They are about 40 Gb so my TM backup should increase by that amount but it just wants to backup the same original amount of 300 GB. Don't understand this! Also, by creating another partition, can I grab some from the BC partition which is 150 GB and make that 100 and the iTunes partition 50 Gb? If so, that would answer my problems I suppose. Other than that, it would be a manual copy of 40 Gb every few days instead of (incremental) backups...

     

     

    Thanks,

     

    Maz

  • by Loner T,

    Loner T Loner T Aug 21, 2014 8:40 AM in response to John Galt
    Level 7 (23,970 points)
    Safari
    Aug 21, 2014 8:40 AM in response to John Galt

    John Galt wrote:

     

    Another workaround to consider is to create a third partition for the sole purpose of containing your iTunes and Personal folders, and exclude the entire Boot Camp partition.

     

    Either one ought to work.

    A single-disk Bootcamp and OSX installation should not be partitioned any further otherwise it causes Bootcamp problems, due to Apple's use of a Hybrid MBR to support Windows. (Windows EFI installs on Macs do not have this restriction). Resizing Bootcamp is also not supported.

     

    Boot Camp 5.1: Frequently asked questions

     

    How can a Windows partition be resized after Windows is installed?

    You need to delete the Windows partition using the Boot Camp Assistant, and start over to change the size of the Windows partition. Back up your important Windows files first.

  • by Loner T,

    Loner T Loner T Aug 21, 2014 8:43 AM in response to Maz K
    Level 7 (23,970 points)
    Safari
    Aug 21, 2014 8:43 AM in response to Maz K

    One option is to put the iTunes and Personal folders on an external drive and share it between the two OSes. You can also use virtualization products for sharing directories, which can then be backed up via TM.

  • by John Galt,

    John Galt John Galt Aug 21, 2014 2:11 PM in response to Maz K
    Level 8 (49,226 points)
    Mac OS X
    Aug 21, 2014 2:11 PM in response to Maz K

    The verification that the other folders are being backed up is to "Enter Time Machine" with one of those folder selected, and determine if you can navigate to an earlier backup.

     

    I don't pay much attention to the overall size of the backup, since the values reported by "backing up xxx of yyy" include a significant amount of overhead and don't reflect the actual number of bytes copied. The same applies to Console messages. See the following excerpt:

     

    Aug 21 21:15:10 iMac5.local com.apple.backupd[2940]: Found 1650 files (415 MB) needing backup

    Aug 21 21:15:10 iMac5.local com.apple.backupd[2940]: 9.43 GB required (including padding), 178.86 GB available

    Aug 21 21:17:57 iMac5.local com.apple.backupd[2940]: Copied 1940 items (366.6 MB) from volume Macintosh HD. Linked 3596.

    Aug 21 21:20:17 iMac5.local com.apple.backupd[2940]: Will copy (179 KB) from Macintosh HD

    Aug 21 21:20:17 iMac5.local com.apple.backupd[2940]: Found 119 files (179 KB) needing backup

    Aug 21 21:20:17 iMac5.local com.apple.backupd[2940]: 8.93 GB required (including padding), 178.49 GB available

    Aug 21 21:20:59 iMac5.local com.apple.backupd[2940]: Copied 173 items (182 KB) from volume Macintosh HD. Linked 646.

    Aug 21 21:21:16 iMac5.local com.apple.backupd[2940]: Created new backup: 2014-08-21-212115

    Aug 21 21:21:21 iMac5.local com.apple.backupd[2940]: Starting post-backup thinning

    Aug 21 21:21:21 iMac5.local com.apple.backupd[2940]: No post-backup thinning needed: no expired backups exist

    Aug 21 21:21:21 iMac5.local com.apple.backupd[2940]: Backup completed successfully.

     

    The only accurate values are the ones following "Copied xxx items" and those only reflect the required changes. As you can see, it's not much. This may or may not be related to what you describe, so you should verify for yourself the folders are actually being backed up after deciding upon the method you would prefer to use.

     

    It goes without saying you'll want to have a recovery plan, should the source become erased as a result of altering its partition map.

  • by Locokatracho,

    Locokatracho Locokatracho Mar 8, 2016 8:26 AM in response to John Galt
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Mar 8, 2016 8:26 AM in response to John Galt

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