How to Backup your Hard Drive without Time Machine

I guess I would want to do it a little different, in that I would select all then want to deselect "users" or, at least, eliminate the documents under my username (probably the smarter move) as they are, by far, the bulk of the storage and I have them backed up, already, every which way from Sunday.

So, using this form of backup, one could restore the system? I'm mostly worried about downloading an upgrade to the system that will, at some point in the future, be too much for my machine to handle because it has become too old.

Does that mean it won't act as a restorable copy of the operating system?

Whickwithy wrote:

Does that mean it won't act as a restorable copy of the operating system?

Correct.

I found an answer that satisfies, finally, concerning how to backup OS X only and, yes, it uses Time Machine.

This seems like a really thorough site for questions on Time Machine and probably a lot of other things.

http://pondini.org/TM/10.html

I can set Time Machine up to not backup my files by deselecting various folders. All I really want is a backup of the next-to-latest OS X. I don't trust hard drives to back up anything. The mechanical parts are a little more prone to failure than a memory stick. The size of an unrestrained Time Machine seems like to gobble up well north of a Terabyte, thus a memory stick would not suffice. Just backing up OS X seems like I could get away with a 128 GB memory stick. I don't think I would need to go to 256 GB.

North of a Terabyte? what have you been reading, stop it.

The first time backup using Time Machine will be the same size as the data being backed up (+/- a few percent), subsequent backups will add any changed files to that total. Unless you start with "North of a Terabyte" you will not find Time Machine requiring "North of a Terabyte"

Sorry. Thanks for the clarification. I do have a lot of files, though. With just the operating system, I should be able to backup with less than 64GB.

To a USB key? or a real drive.

It's a USB memory stick using flash memory. I'm a little baffled at the moment that I thought it said it would back up a few minutes ago, but the stick still looks empty.

What are you doing, is this drive formatted for use with Time Machine (MacOs Extended Journaled) and does it have the correct partition type (GUID) 64 GB at flash drive speeds will take many many hours, bear that in mind. I would not cheap out on this procedure, use a real drive correctly setup for backup (Time Machine) use.

Frankly it seems that you are not attaching the importance to this task that it merits, does it not matter if you lose your files? (If so why backup at all)

"Your Time Machine drive needs to be formatted as Mac OS X Extended (Journaled). If you select an NTFS or FAT-formatted drive, Time Machine prompts you to reformat the drive. Important: Reformatting erases any files on the destination drive. If you're not sure if you want to erase the drive you connected, choose a different drive"

I gotta say I'm a bit baffled at the moment. It started to back up, after it reformatted the disk etc. Got to about a couple of GBs and, then, says it was disconnected. So, I'm working on that now. It is a slower version of USB, so I'm planning on getting a USB3.0 stick to replace it.

I think you are a bit biased and inaccurately. The reliability of a solid state drive, like a memory stick is much higher than a rotating disk with mechanical parts. So, it's not a matter of cheaping out. I have no desire or need for the Time Machine to back up my files. I do that, on my own, using other memory sticks. I keep one unattached at all time to assure that nothing can come and wreck everything I have. All I want Time Machine to do is backup the operating system. Actually, I'm not all that worried about it in the short term but, long term, the hardware in any given system does not keep up with the changes to the software and, at some point in the fairly distant future, I expect to hit a wall as far as updating the operating system - my hardware will not support it, at some point. That's almost a surety. The new hardware systems will have potentials of which the software developers will take advantage and the older systems will not be able to keep up with the software.

So, I would argue that anyone using a hard drive for their backups is out of their minds. If that is the only backup you have, you are a great risk. You drop an HD and it is likely toast, burnt toast. No recovery possible in many cases. Not so with a memory stick. Unless I drive over it with my car or take a shotgun to it, it is probably going to survive. Actually, it would probably survive being run over. Heck, I don't even completely trust that so, for essential files, I store them in a place online that has continuous, offsite backup. And, if you leave the Time Machine storage attached (or any storage), you run the risk of it getting corrupted by a virus attacking the computer. Believe me, I will have, at least one copy of the Time Machine unattached.

Since Time Machine accepted and erased (reformatted?) the memory stick, I figure I'm good to go on that front but....maybe not considering what it's doing. I may end up using disk utility if it keeps acting funny.

Yes, what would I know, you just do it your way.

Good luck.

Thanks for all of the help. With USB3.0, I should be able to download the whole system in about a minute.