I have an iMac with Big Sur OS. When I connect an external hard drive to back up I only have read permission. Is that normal

How did you format the External Hard Disk, to use an external HD to use for Time Machine, most set it for Mac OS Extended Journaled.

If the drive is dedicated to TM only then it is read only. If you have the drive partioned to also hold other files then that can be accessed. However, it is best practice to have a drive for TM only (dedicated) if for nothing else if the drive fails you will not have lost everything. You don not want all your eggs in one basket as the saying goes.

Thanks,

Lets try restarting in Safe Mode with no wired external peripherals (EHDs, printers, scanners etc.) connected. Then restart normally and re-test.

Use Safe Mode to isolate issues with your Mac

Maiziemcdoy wrote:

I have an iMac with Big Sur OS. When I connect an external hard drive to back up I only have read permission. Is that normal

Assuming you designated that hard disk drive for Time Machine, yes.

What is the format? Please do not tell me it has been formatted corrected, just tell me the format.

John Galt is correct. If this is a TM drive then you have read only permissions.

The drive would need to be partitioned using Disk utilities but not sure it is a good idea to do that after TM has been setup as it might ruin the backup. TM is very fussy that way. Is there some data that you need to access that you believe is on the TM drive that is not within the TM directory?

I have the same issue with Seagate, and they've told me it's up to Apple to fix this. Unlike you, I need to be able to have all permissions/ownership, so I can create and change folders+files manually.

Why? I have 2x previous external hard drives, and it never switched my backups to read only. Is this a new thing?

Since 2018, I've been able to use the same hard drive for Time Machine back ups, but also as a (very large) USB stick (where I can manually add files and folders onto it).

Is there a way I can change the settings for this to be the case? I can't rely solely on Time Machine for what I need external hard drives for...

Hi there!

How do I change the settings for any external hard drive to NOT be TM only? I haven't ever done it intentionally before, it's always just been set like that.