How to use Time Machine with a laptop?

I think as default it will backup on the hour even the first time, so giving TM the go ahead doesn't always result in immediate action.

When you get the macbook pro, you can do a migration assistant or a fresh leopard install directly from a Time Machine backup.

As long as no-one tells me how to use a SMB or NFS network volume with Time Machine (which it seems is impossible now), it sure isn't great for me. Actually I'll have to conclude that T. M. is nothing more than a flashy piece of junk!

I can't believe how little Apple cares about Mac OS users in a corporate environment (non-home user). I have access to servers with terabytes of storage and Apple doesn't think it's worth using them for backup (at least not with its own piece of Time Machine junk).

I am really angry: that's such a letdown. What's left of Leopard if even Time Machine is useless? An uglier dock, I suppose. The old .Mac Backup application was precisely as good (bad).

Doesn't care about corporate users? That problem is already solved--it's called rsync with hardlinks.

If you're 'corporate,' you have a UNIX dept. They can help you out. If you don't have a UNIX dept, you're not really corporate. See http://www.mikerubel.org/computers/rsync_snapshots/. That should get you started.

After all, while TM is very cool, you can completely do it yourself with rsync.

"After all, while TM is very cool, you can completely do it yourself with rsync."

Not quite true. According to http://arstechnica.com/reviews/os/mac-os-x-10-5.ars/7 TimeMachine uses the new FSEvents architecture: TimeMachine does not rescan your entire Harddisk. This would take quite some resources. Instead, it registers to FSEvents sent by the filesystem whenever something new happens.

You can't do this with rsync, rsync has to rescan the entire harddrive. Which is not that bad for a daily backup. On my servers I use the Open Source Dirvish project to do this, it works very well.

What an rsync solution has in common with TimeMachine is the way the files are stored in the backup using hard links.

Cheers
Florian

You're right about the system load - I'm running TM on my MacBook Pro right now and both processors are using between 59-72% of the processor.

This is a 'dry run' for TM for me. I'm using the 100Mb partition on which I generally run Synchronize Pro (which I love, which creates a bootable drive, which I can run at any time, and which I can easily restore when my internal does finally die (and I've never had a Mac laptop in which the internal drive didn't die during the AppleCare warranty period).

But I wanted to see what TM was 'about' and, thus, I'm running it. Next week I may return to Synchronize Pro, but for now... I just want to check it out.

I agree with Chris, what is the point of backing up on the same drive as your info is stored, the point of a backup is to be able to recover once your primary drive goes down. Its like have life boats permanently attached to the ship....

What would you have done before Time Machine? Assuming you back up your iPhoto library every now and then, unless you carry your backups with you everywhere you go, you'd still have to go home and get them.

You could use a pocket drive to do your backups, then pop it in your bag along with the laptop when you leave.

Does Time Machine work with portable devices that use Airport Extreme? I have a USB hard drive on AirPort Extreme that connects when I am in the area. Will Time Machine take advantage of this drive and automatically sync the current state of the MacBook Pro with latest state of the USB Hard Drive?

This sync technology has been in use for years so I expect Time Machine takes advantage of it too but I can find no reference to this feature. What is the answer?

Jim

Silly me... replying to my own message...

I gave TM a 24 hour look-see and am now back to Synchronize Pro. I just want a back-up when I want to back up and don't want to sync on Apple's schedule when I work with an HD connected or unconnected. When I get a new iMac with a Tb of external space maybe I'll try it again.

My conclusion, though, is that TM is really not for portable users.

I don't care what anybody here says. Time Machine is a useless feature of Leopard if you use a notebook. I am sorry but I don't understand why we cannot choose to use the same ******* drive? I am not talking about fully backing up information. I am talking about accidentally deleting a picture or music file and going "back in time" to recover it. Time Machine was poorly thought out for notebook users.

Maybe Time Machine just wasn't designed to do what YOU want it to do. My Toyota Camry Hybrid is TERRIBLE at off-roading - I'm totally ***** angry at Toyota. wha???

I thought I read somewhere in the Time Machine documentation that it can use partitions for its backups. Can it use a partition of the primary drive? This would be useless as a true backup, as others have noted, but might get you the anti-oops tool you're after.

Another option ... don't empty your trash so fast.

As a macbook pro user who has already been saved once by TM in the one week that I've been running it, I take exception to this. There are about a million programs that do what you are looking for - incremental backup of specific sets of data. Heck, just alt-drag the folders that you are interested in to some other folder named "backup" once a week. If you close your eyes you can even pretend that windows are flying through space if you want to - maybe that will help.

TM serves exactly the purpose for which it was designed - easy-to-use, comprehensive system backup and restoration which requires little to no user intervention and can be operated by people who may not even know that they should be backing up in the first place. It serves this purpose so phenomenally well, in fact, that it boggles my mind that someone didn't think of doing it this way years ago. If you ask me (which you didn't), this is the coolest piece of software that apple has put out in a long time - especially once the bugs are fixed 😉

I'm also using a Macbook. I will install Leopard today or tomorrow and will be using a 250GB external drive for Time Machine.

At this point, the external drive has three partitioned: a bootable clone of my Macbook, a bootable clone of my fiancee's Macbook, and a regular "storage" partition. All three are Mac OS Journaled, so there shouldn't be any formatting issues.

Question: where will Time Machine do its backups? In the storage partition? Will I have a choice? The whole point of the bootable clones is so I can go back to Tiger if there are issues with Leopard. So if I use Time Machine, I don't want to lose the clones. Will Time Machine work with my situation?

This forum is great. Thanks in advance.

If your external drive is partitioned, then you will have a choice of which partition to use. Essentially, you're picking the volume for Time Machine to use, where each partition represents a separate volume on your desktop (as seen in the Finder when you attach the external disk).