When a time machine drive is full, can I disconnect it, keep it and start a new Time Machine drive ?

Question

Level 1

9 points

Ok, I want to keep my old time machine drive, but disconnect it and start a brand new time machine drive.

I want the old one just in case ? ... and start the new one as at now.

Can this be done ?

MacBook Pro 15″, macOS 10.14

Posted on Jun 4, 2020 5:19 PM

Reply

Answer 1

Best reply

Level 4

1,720 points

Yes. In TimeMachine preference, you can add more than 1 for backup.

You can start a new one any time as your desire. You also can label it different name to differentiate your first/second etc..

Multiple backups - is always a good practice.

You might consider Carbon Copy or SuperDuper to make a bootable back up.

Reply

Answer 2

Level 1

9 points

Samtenor, thanks for your reply. Hoping you can be a bit more specific.

If I add new drive and keep old attached - Does time machine start using the new drive only ? Your image suggests you now have 2 drives but 'both' backing up to 1 June. I don't want that ... I want eg 1/1/2015 - 1/5/2020 and then 1/5/2020 to current date..... and prefferably be able to unplug the older drive and be able to plug it in should i need to go back before 1/5/2020 as per example ?
If I add new drive, but unplug old, the assumption is that you just start creating backups on new drive. But if I plug in old drive... can I just access anything still ? - see above example.

When I open Time machine I don't have the add or remove backup disk option? Nor do I see where I can add the dates of backups like your 2 show ?

Reply