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User profile for user: Birck Cox
Birck Cox Author
User level: Level 2
191 points

On a Mac Pro 2012-APFS formatting vs. HFS for Time Machine?

I was having some problems with 2 drives used for backup ("Disc unmounted improperly"), so I used Disk Utility on one of them to first aid and reformat the drive to see if that would help, but I inadvertently reformatted the drive as APFS rather than an older file system. I'm currently running Mojave 10.14.6, the highest I can go. Now the OS tells me I can't use the reformatted drive as a Time Machine because it's APFS, and, of course, I can't re-reformat the drive to an older file system. Is there any way around this dilemma?

Mac Pro, macOS 10.13

Posted on Jun 20, 2021 1:46 PM

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User profile for user: D.I. Johnson
D.I. Johnson
User level: Level 7
24,509 points

Posted on Jun 20, 2021 1:57 PM

To reformat the drive from APFS to HFS+ you will need to select the drive device in Disk Utility window. Make sure that Show all devices is selected.


Show all devices

This view lists the full device structure in the sidebar—each storage device, along with the containers (partitions) and volumes defined on it. You can use this view for all Disk Utility tasks. Certain tasks, such as erasing a storage device, can be accomplished only in this view.

  • In Disk Utility  on your Mac, choose View > Show All Devices.

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User profile for user: D.I. Johnson
D.I. Johnson
User level: Level 7
24,509 points

Jun 20, 2021 1:57 PM in response to Birck Cox

To reformat the drive from APFS to HFS+ you will need to select the drive device in Disk Utility window. Make sure that Show all devices is selected.


Show all devices

This view lists the full device structure in the sidebar—each storage device, along with the containers (partitions) and volumes defined on it. You can use this view for all Disk Utility tasks. Certain tasks, such as erasing a storage device, can be accomplished only in this view.

  • In Disk Utility  on your Mac, choose View > Show All Devices.

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User profile for user: Birck Cox
Birck Cox Author
User level: Level 2
191 points

Jun 21, 2021 10:35 AM in response to D.I. Johnson

Thanks for the tips on back-formatting an APFS drive to HFS. I succeeded, but the drive is still giving me some performance issues, so that may be a big part of my problem. I've included the Safe Mode report from Etrecheck. Both that report and the preceding one couldn't identify any major slowdown beyond "Poor Performance", without being more specific. I hope y'all can find something more revealing in the report. I can send the Normal Mode report if it will help.

Safe Mode Etrecheck report


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On a Mac Pro 2012-APFS formatting vs. HFS for Time Machine?

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