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Colin Cohen Author

Level 1

65 points

iCloud for back-up vs storage

I'm very confused! At the moment I just use free allocation for some Pages and Numbers docs, for moving stuff between Mac and iOS I actually find Dropbox easier.

I can see that some apps I use on both platforms have also set up folders, but even if I arrange by size in iCloud.com it does not show the space used [how could that be missing as a feature when even the worst cloud storage shows it … ‽].

2Tb shared with my wife should be enough to sync all our devices [the 1Tb I'd need includes my iOS devices that back up to my Mac using iMazing but could I exclude them from the cloud on the grounds that I'm not likely to trash the mobiles and my Mac at the same time?].

As I understand it iCloud will sync the devices, but not back them up in the way that TimeMachine does [I've given up on that after my nth external drive died] so no versioning. however I have no understanding and can find nothing on the visible structure of iCloud. Will it be just like I now have for free with a completely flat structure, or will it mirror my Mac structure as does, for example Backblaze?

With the latter I can view my backed up Mac on my iPad and drill down. I'd love to be able to do that and, for instance, have most of my photos on my iMac and visible to iOS via iCloud.

As I said, I'm very confused.

Cheers, CC

iMac 27″, macOS 10.14

Posted on Jun 15, 2020 9:01 AM

Top-ranking reply

LACAllen

Level 8

43,500 points

Posted on Jun 15, 2020 9:41 AM

As I understand it iCloud will sync the devices, but not back them up in the way that TimeMachine does [

This is true. Time Machine is in no way similar to iCloud Backups.

See >>> https://support.apple.com/en-ca/HT207428

iCloud backups are an entire archive that you can't view. They are overwritten as new ones are created. So you can't pick a point in time to go back to. They provide redundancy back to the last backup created.

for instance, have most of my photos on my iMac and visible to iOS via iCloud.

Using the iCloud Photos syncing is all of your photo library or none. No cherry picking.

Same for leaving your photos in your iCloud backup. All or nothing.

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iCloud for back-up vs storage

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