Lacie d2 quadra 2TB, Time Machine

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Level 1

30 points

Lacie d2 quadra 2TB, Time Machine

I'm new to the time machine usage. I had a 160gb lacie external that wasn't large enough to back up my imac's internal hard drive. I just bought a Lacie d2 quadra with 2TB of space, way more than needed for a simple backup. I have no idea what to do except reading the quick install guide, where you just plug up and it's ready to turn time machine on. So I turned it on last night and it did it's magic. This morning I open up the lacie to see how files were stored/backed up. It's all in folders with dates, hourly backups so there are already multiple folders with the same data backed up each hour. After looking on time machine I read "the oldedst backups are deleted when your disk becomes full". Will it continue to fill up my 2TB of the lacie? I just simply wanted my internal hard drive backed up and my 160gb external also if possible (or just a copy of it saved). Do i need to 'partition' my 2TB hard drive? I don't even know if that's the right word, but wouldn't that decrease the size of the back up space so it can begin to "delete" oldest backups when full?

I think my question is: Will I need to partition my 2TB external hard drive to make backups? If so what space will it need & how to do this. Will doing this keep it from filling up the 2TB space? I'm wanting to keep my imac's internal hard drive pretty empty so it's working power is at maximum.

question: What do you do with itunes and iphoto? Continue to leave them on the internal drive and filling up space? Or could I move one or both to the 2tb external without issues? What's the directions for that also?

Sorry I couldn't find an answer to these, but hoping I can be directed to the right answers, Thanks!

iMac (20-inch Late 2006), Mac OS X (10.6.8), 2.16 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 4 GB 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAM

Posted on Feb 2, 2012 8:20 AM

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Answer 1

Feb 2, 2012 8:58 AM in response to D W

I'm not sure that Time Machine is what you really want, though it will backup both your internal and smaller external without the need to partition.

Don't worry about the apparent multiple copies.

Have a read of Pondini's TM articles; http://pondini.org/TM/Home.html

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Answer 2

D W Author

Level 1

30 points

Feb 2, 2012 6:15 PM in response to noondaywitch

(I have TOO many questions!) That's a helpful link thank you.

I was leaning toward a partition because I thought the backups would fill the whole 2TB hard drive by adding a new folder every hour. What do you mean when you say: "Don't worry about the apparent multiple copies." - is that because it's not increasing it's physical space as it saves? [I think I understand that question after reading: http://pondini.org/TM/Works.html]. I guess the backup is only going to be the actual physical size of the original internal hard drive, no matter how many folders it shows -- But will the amount of folders keep growing with a new folder every hour, making a gazillion folders? I put a stop to the auto back up until I know what is going on.

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Answer 3

Feb 3, 2012 9:24 AM in response to D W

I'd sooner let Pondini himself answer that, but I do know that it's nothing to worry about. My current TM backup has been running nearly a year now, backing up a 640 GB drive with about 450GB of data and apps, and whatever appears in the interface, it still hasn't used 1/3 of the 1.5 TB drive.

Best thing to do with TM is turn it on and let it get on with it. If you want reassurance, just do a test recovery of an odd file now and then. But read Pondini again before doing that!

The alternative is to clone the internal drive to an external. In that case, you would be best partitioning the backup drive, so the extra external can be backed up to it seperately.

Many of us out here use both TM and a clone - belt and braces. Each has it's useful points, and the clone is bootable, which TM ain't.

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Answer 4

D W Author

Level 1

30 points

Feb 3, 2012 10:47 AM in response to noondaywitch

I'd like to learn about a bootable clone and it would be nice to have... for now I partitioned my 2tb into two parts. I read on the forum somewhere that it's good to partition your backup at least 1 1/2 times larger than the source. For the two drives I have, it added up to 410gb. I added 1 1/2 times to get 615gb, I don't know why, but that wasn't enough space and it didn't partition. So I came up with 410+410+205=1025 (1.03tb) - looking at your 640gb being backing up to a 1.5tb, does this sound right: 410gb needing 1.03tb for backup space?

I went ahead... in disk utility I selected + (plus) to add a partition to the existing one. It kept the backups that Time Machine made earlier and added a new partition. It was about 970gb for the new partition and 1.03tb for the backup partition. It went pretty fast and I turned time machine back on. I will see in a few minutes when it backs up if all is ok.

Thanks for your help!

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Answer 5

Feb 3, 2012 3:10 PM in response to D W

Yea, that's plenty of space for an internal that size. It gives you a good depth of backups eventually, so if something is wrong and it's a while before you notice, you have a good chance of being able to locate a good copy.

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Answer 6

Pondini

Level 8

38,863 points

Feb 3, 2012 5:12 PM in response to noondaywitch

noondaywitch wrote:

I'd sooner let Pondini himself answer that, but I do know that it's nothing to worry about. My current TM backup has been running nearly a year now, backing up a 640 GB drive with about 450GB of data and apps, and whatever appears in the interface, it still hasn't used 1/3 of the 1.5 TB drive.

Best thing to do with TM is turn it on and let it get on with it. If you want reassurance, just do a test recovery of an odd file now and then. But read Pondini again before doing that!

The alternative is to clone the internal drive to an external. In that case, you would be best partitioning the backup drive, so the extra external can be backed up to it seperately.

Many of us out here use both TM and a clone - belt and braces. Each has it's useful points, and the clone is bootable, which TM ain't.

I concur entirely. 🙂

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