Time Machine can be configured to use a network (SMB) drive. But, I see conflicting information about what format that disk needs to be -- some setups suggest just a regular linux filesystem, others HFS. Then, others suggest installing netatalk.
Can someone clarify?
I am on MacOS Monterey 2.13.1 and my external "server" is a Rasberry Pi 4, the mounted drive is 4TB (Maxtor USB3.0).
Definitely not Netatalk. It is a hack of AFP and Apple has dropped AFP.
Your SMB server must support the Time Machine over SMB specification. Any current version of Samba should support that. I think 4.8 was the first version that supported it.
Any file system is sufficient, but I would use a modern one—Time Machine won’t be writing directly to it. Time Machine will create a sparse bundle disk image using an appropriate file system (APFS) on the network share.
Definitely not Netatalk. It is a hack of AFP and Apple has dropped AFP.
Your SMB server must support the Time Machine over SMB specification. Any current version of Samba should support that. I think 4.8 was the first version that supported it.
Any file system is sufficient, but I would use a modern one—Time Machine won’t be writing directly to it. Time Machine will create a sparse bundle disk image using an appropriate file system (APFS) on the network share.
Time machine network drive, disk format?
