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Level 2

440 points

time machine to HD on network?

Hi,

We have a 2tb firewire 800 drive connected to an imac which in turn is connected to our network. Each of us works off this 2TB on a daily basis. there's about 1TB left free at the moment and I'd like each of our machines to be set up with Time Machine enabled so that we all backup to that drive also.

If I point Time Machine on each of the machines to this mounted 2TB drive, will it automatically setup a folder for each user's machine's TIme Machine?

I'm worried it will wipe all our working folders on this drive? or can you setup a Time Machine folder on the drive?

thanks in advance.

MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.7.4), 17" 2.5GHx Intel COre i7,16gb ram,

Posted on Jul 6, 2012 1:43 PM

18 replies

Linc Davis

Level 10

209,547 points

Jul 6, 2012 6:15 PM in response to Antonio Conte

You shouldn't back up a backup for two reasons: (1) If anything is wrong with the first backup, it will also be wrong with the copy; and (2) if you copy a disk image file while it's changing, the copy may be corrupt and unmountable.

To be safe, you need at least two complete, independent backups of all data, at least one of which must be off site at all times.

You can shrink a partition in Disk Utility, but doing so may not save you any time, because many file extents may need to be moved. You must of course back up before attempting such an operation. I would just create a new partition map.

Antonio Conte Author

Level 2

440 points

Jul 7, 2012 10:08 AM in response to Linc Davis

I wonder if my best bet is to get a time capsule to backup all of our machines? and then.... how can I backup time capsule?

Linc Davis

Level 10

209,547 points

Jul 7, 2012 10:28 AM in response to Antonio Conte

If the Time Capsule is a backup, it doesn't need to be backed up. I've reached my time limit in this thread. Good luck.

time machine to HD on network?