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Can I set Time Machine to backup both my hard drive and an external hard drive?

Hi. I've been working with a lot of family video lately and my internal hard drive has filled up significantly. iMovie doesn't seem to have a good archiving facility like Adobe InDesign which I use at work were all the relevant files are gathered together into one folder. Apple advised me to relocate my movie files to an external hard drive and herein lies my query.

Is there a way for me to set Time Machine to backup both my iMac's internal drive and the external hard drive that would contain my movie files? I've been using Time Machine for my backups for a few years now, but backing up the external as well has me stumped. If Time Machine could be used then all the necessary file accociations etc would be safely backed up as well - that's why I don't want to have to manually backup the external.

Anyone have any ideas? Thanks!

Time Machine-OTHER, Mac OS X (10.7.2)

Posted on Feb 11, 2012 4:04 AM

35 replies

Cornmeal

Level 1

14 points

Dec 29, 2016 4:14 PM in response to keg55

Similar to Horatio Caine, I was interested in backing up an external drive (on which I keep all of my photos) to my Airport Time Capsule using Time Machine. I followed your (keg55) instructions to remove the drive from the list of Exclusions in the Time Machine preferences, and everything seemed to have gone smoothly. However, I wanted to double check that it was backed up by entering Time Machine to see that the files are there (I did this when the external disk was disconnected). But, when I entered Time Machine I didn't see the external disk there or any of the files that are on it. FYI...my external drive is encrypted and requires a password to be accessed. When I want to back it up, I hook the drive up to my computer, enter the password to access it, and force Time Machine to perform a back up.

How do I verify that the back up of the external disk has been successful? Furthermore, if the external disk were to be lost, stolen, or destroyed, how would I recover its information from my Time Machine back up?

Thanks

Jan 15, 2017 2:08 PM in response to Radiation Mac

No, that.s wrong. You can back up as many drives as you like.

Apr 9, 2017 11:47 PM in response to Pondini

That's good information!

But what then is the procedure when one of the backupped external drives crashes and you will have to restore...?

Jun 18, 2017 12:57 PM in response to keg55

I'm trying to add additional drives to get backed up, and I've removed it from the exclude list, but it doesn't seem to be backing up. Any trouble shooting ideas?

natweb

Level 1

4 points

Sep 26, 2017 1:00 PM in response to Horatio Caine

I don't see my other External Drive when I open the "options" under Time Machine!?

Is this a problem with Sierra? Because I could do it with the previous version.

Can I set Time Machine to backup both my hard drive and an external hard drive?