Using Mac mini with an external drive?

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smcrea Author

Level 1

5 points

Using Mac mini with an external drive?

I have an old iMac with a 10TB drive. Its now time to update.

My challenge is a storage challenge. We have a lot of photos, family movies, a large music library etc.

We use homeshare so we can watch movies from the main computer on Apple TV's around the house.

We use crash plan as a backup solution as well as time machine.

We have lots of documents etc.

If I choose a Mac mini with a large external drive then is it possible to:

1) Run my photos library form the external drive?

2) Run my TV app with all my home movies from the external drive

3) Run my Music App with all my music library from the external drive

4) use homeshare to that I can view movies and listen to music on the Apple TVs around the house

5) Can I run my email from the external drive

6) Can I put my documents folder on the external drive.

5) Use Time Machine (will it backup the external drive or will it run home and backup the Mac mini internal drive. Can Time machine backup both internal and external drive.

6) Use crash plan for the external drive

Basically have only the OSx on the Mac mini internal drive and have everything pointing to the external drive. What are the exceptions?

Thanks!

Posted on Dec 31, 2021 12:04 PM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

woodmeister50

Level 7

20,437 points

Dec 31, 2021 12:25 PM in response to smcrea

You can put all of your stuff on an external drive and it will pretty much work as before.

You will need to check with Photos, Music, etc. on how to move libraries to external storage and have the apps use them. Your home sharing will work just as before except your libraries will be on the external drive.

Time Machine can do the internal and any other drive you chose to add to it. Just make sure the drive that you will be using for Time Machine is large enough to back everything up.

Email will run on the internal drive, as it does now.

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Answer 2

smcrea Author

Level 1

5 points

Dec 31, 2021 2:48 PM in response to woodmeister50

How about Mail? Can you store that on the external drive.. I'd really like everything in one place and not some stuff on the external drive and some stuff on the Mac mini.

I just like things tidy and organized :-)

How about putting my applications folder on the external drive and running everything from there?

Thanks!

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Answer 3

Jan 1, 2022 4:40 AM in response to smcrea

smcrea wrote:

How about Mail? Can you store that on the external drive.. I'd really like everything in one place and not some stuff on the external drive and some stuff on the Mac mini.

If your mail accounts are IMAP, all your mail is stored on the servers anyway unless you specifically moved them to "On My Mac".

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Using Mac mini with an external drive?

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