Apple Event: May 7th at 7 am PT
Hi,
I'm trying to use Time Machine to backup my Mac and my external drive (LaCie 2TB HDD) where all my photos are stored. When I look at the settings under "exclude these items.." my external hard drive is there and grayed out, meaning it won't be part om the Time Machine and I can't change it.
Are there any solutions for this problem?
iMac 27″ 5K, macOS 11.6
My bad, I should have been more specific. I'm using 2 external hard drives; one as an extension of the Mac which I have only pictures and videos stored (LaCie 2TB HDD), and the other one as a backup aka Time Machine (Seagate 6TB).
But you have a really valid point there.
SOLVED: The format for the LaCie hard drive was in "ExFat", which apparently Time Machine didn't support. So I reformatted the hard drive to "Mac OS Extended (Journaled)" which made me able to back up the drive as well. It even made reading and writing speeds faster.
My bad, I should have been more specific. I'm using 2 external hard drives; one as an extension of the Mac which I have only pictures and videos stored (LaCie 2TB HDD), and the other one as a backup aka Time Machine (Seagate 6TB).
But you have a really valid point there.
SOLVED: The format for the LaCie hard drive was in "ExFat", which apparently Time Machine didn't support. So I reformatted the hard drive to "Mac OS Extended (Journaled)" which made me able to back up the drive as well. It even made reading and writing speeds faster.
NEVER EVER use the same EHD to store data on (in your case your photos) and for a backup. Why, very simple....all EHD's die and your LaCie will too and when that occurs you will have lost both your data (the photos) you will have lost their backup. Get yourself another EHD and use one for data storage (your photos) and another for backup. When most experienced users use are OWC Mercury Elite Pro series of EHDs. The reason they are so popular is they are reliable, come pre-formatted, are reasonably priced and OWC offers great support.
Personally, I have never had luck with LaCies however some like them. With OWC, I have some enclosures that are over 15 years old that still work great.
Nice except each unit only houses one HDD. To backup two HDDs like you suggested one would have to purchase two OWC units. I personally use a Mediasonic ProBox which houses 4 external hard drives. Formatting a HD is simple in disk utility.
Glad you figured it out!
FYI if your TM is dedicated to backing up Big Sur it will reformat to APFS regardless what you formatted it to.
That's fine, OWC has MANY solutions that house multiple drives. You may want to shop in their site to see their offerings at www.macsale.com. They have enclosures that will house up to 8 drives.
Use Time Machine to backup external drive
