I have an external drive that i'd like to back up automatically (my music collection) but under the Time Machine Preferences/Options I can't take it out of the Exclude list as the "minus" button is greyed out.
I saw someone else had this problem, but no solution was reached.
Anyone overcome this bug?
TIA!
MacBook Pro 15″, OS X 10.11
How is the disk formatted? There was some related discussion in this query:
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/253793316?sortBy=best
Here is the relevant post (I think):
SOLUTION:
I copied the contents of the external SSD drive that wouldn't let me delete it from the Time Machine "Options/exclude from backup" dialog" to a new location, re-initialized the external SSD disk in a different format (Mac OS Extended (Journaled)) copied the original contents back to that external SSD drive and was then able to select/delete from the time machine/options dialog which included it in the backup.
How is the disk formatted? There was some related discussion in this query:
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/253793316?sortBy=best
Here is the relevant post (I think):
SOLUTION:
I copied the contents of the external SSD drive that wouldn't let me delete it from the Time Machine "Options/exclude from backup" dialog" to a new location, re-initialized the external SSD disk in a different format (Mac OS Extended (Journaled)) copied the original contents back to that external SSD drive and was then able to select/delete from the time machine/options dialog which included it in the backup.
You nailed it! Thank you so much for the help! Once I'd formatted it as Mac OS Extended (Journaled), I was able to remove it from the "excluded" section!
Thank you for your reply! However in MacOS Sonoma the "-" to remoe the drive is greyed out.
It's a little hard to see here, but...
Welcome!
What macOS version are you running? OS X10.11 as shown in your profile or something else? That may make a difference.
In at least 10.14 Mojave and older, you can instruct TM to backup external drives by doing system Preferences > Time Machine and clicking the "Options..." button. That brings up this window:
Us the "+" button to add drives. NOTE: the drives must be mounted before doing this.
👉🏻 HOWEVER....I must give you a caveat:
I generally recommend against backing up externals unless they are very fast externals with 2000+MB/sec transfer rates. Most regular (cheap) externals people have are dreadfully slow (50-150MB/sec) and it will take a long time for TM to do even its normally fast incremental backups. That can cause system stutters that could interfere with your workflow.
Your decision.
How do I INCLUDE external drives in TimeMachine backups?
