How do you choose which disk is to be your Time Machine backup disk?

Question

How do you choose which disk is to be your Time Machine backup disk?

I'm ready to use a new larger backup disk for Time machine, Even though the disk I have been using is the same size as my computer Hard Drive, Time machine now has more it wants to backup and wants a larger disk... I don't understand why as it seems all Time machine needs to do is to backup your computer , not any external drives which only contain working files.... Anyway, I need to specify a new larger disk for Time Machine to use now and don't know how to do this... I have the new empty external drive pugged in and ready.... Can someone help me with this please and thanks in advance....

Ken

MacBook Pro 15″, macOS 10.15

Posted on Aug 1, 2020 7:34 PM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

Saskatchewanobie Author

Level 1

8 points

Aug 2, 2020 9:54 AM in response to Saskatchewanobie

I have this resolved now, It was not revealed as menus can be hidden at times but after several times of looking at time machine, the last time I looked it showed a menu with a choice of a 'lock' symbol which I could unlock and then make changes to which drive I wanted to become Time Machines target drive. Problem solved. Thanks to everyone for input.

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Answer 2

BDAqua

Level 10

245,477 points

Aug 1, 2020 9:42 PM in response to Saskatchewanobie

Hi Ken,

Transfer Time Machine backups from one backup disk to another

You can move a Time Machine backup from one disk to another, then use the new disk to continue your Time Machine backups.

Connect both backup disks to your Mac

Start by making sure that both your old backup disk and your new backup disk are connected to your Mac and mounted. That means they should both appear on your desktop or in the sidebar of Finder windows.

If your old or new backup disk is an AirPort Time Capsule or other networked backup disk, connect it to your Mac using Ethernet for the fastest transfer speed...

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT202380

PS Time Machine will backup all Drives connected that are not specifically excluded in TM's Ptions>Exclude pane.

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Answer 3

Aug 1, 2020 10:15 PM in response to BDAqua

I have already erased the drive that was the Time Machine backup, it was too small and Time Machine said it could not copy to it so I erased it so now it's gone. I have a new larger disk in place to be the Time Machine disk... so you are saying there is no way to point Time Machine to the new dedicated hard drive?

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