Formatting a new WD Hard drive

You will need to format it if it isn't already HFS+ in order to make it work with Time Machine. You will lose the WD utilities, but you don't need them.

Any drive formatted for Mac computers, Extended (Journaled), can be used for Time Machine. There is Nothing Special that has to be done to any drive for it to work with TM. As long as it is formatted Mac Extended (Journaled).

You do NOT Need or Want the Western Digital Utilities. Just a bunch of Junk Software that is Not Needed.

Don't use the Erase Tab, Feature. Instead use the Partition Tab and Select "One Partition" from the Partition Layuout drop down. Then give it a name, Format Mac Extended (Journaled) and under the Options button, below the Partition Layout area, select GUID as the Partition Table, if it isn't already selected, then exit, OK, out of the Options windows and click the Apply button.

Erasing the Complete Drive, selecting the Drive Name (Manuifacturers Name) doesn't work most of the time if anytime. It works on Partitions but not on complete drives.

There is Always a DRIVE NAME which the Manufacturer assigns.

There always has to be a Partition, or multiple partitions. You can't format a RAW drive without making a partition (Actually in OS X there will always be 2 partition on any Physical Disk. One that you create to store data on and another that the OS makes to hold the EFI information).

Yes you will always see the Physical Drive Name, Manufacturers Name, and then under that (and slightly to the right) the Partition(s) Name(s).

That is just how it is. Just Look Up to the top of the list. You see the Drive Name of your internal Disk and then below that the partition name, Macintosh HD.

If you are going to use that same drive for both Time Machine and to Store Files on it, separate from the Time Machine Backups, it is best to create Separate Partitions for each use. One for Time Machine and one to Manually Store Files on.

Better is to have 2 independent, separate, physical drives. As if that one drive fails all the data on it is gone, TM and manually backup files.

Redundancy is the key to never losing all your data.

Yes that is correct. By default Disk Utility will create both partition splitting the drive in half. You can change that by dragging up or down between the partitions in the Partition Layout area.

No a TM backup is not a clone and until Lion came out you could not boot from the TM backup drive. Since Lion TM create a separate area on the TM backup drive that stores/contains the Recovery HD files so that drive is now bootable to the Recovery system and from that you can use it to restore from the TM backups. Prior to Lion you needed to boot the bsystem from the Original system discs that came with every Mac. But since Lion, and now Mt Lion do not come with system discs Apple made TM include the files from the built in Recovery HD partition on the internal drive.

If you also want to have a clone, which isn't a bad idea, then you will need either another drive or another separate partition on your one external for a Clone of the system.

Or you can do as most computer users do and just skip all of it and then wonder why you lost all your important files. I run into that everyday. Mac and Windows users are the same. They buy a new computer and expect nothing to EVER go wrong.

Good Luck & Best Wishes.

Shootist007, greetings: you said; ". .until Lion came out you could not boot from the TM backup drive. Since Lion TM create a separate area on the TM backup drive that stores/contains the Recovery HD files so that drive is now bootable to the Recovery system and from that you can use it to restore from the TM backups."

On my MBP with Lion, I do not find that to be the case. When I start the MBP with the Time Machine HHD connected and the OPTION key engaged, the display shows only the MBP HDD and the recovery partion. There is no Time Machine HHD displayed.

If I click on the Time Machine icon on the desktop, I get only the Backups.backupdb folder and no evidence that there is a recovery file.

This suggests to me that Time Machine is NOT a bootable HDD. Am I missing something?

Ciao.

you have to boot in recovery mode by holding command-R

djcastaldo, greetings: That allows you to recover/restore user data from Time Machine. That does not mean it is a bootable HDD.

Ciao.

Prior to Lion, you could not restore from a TM backup at boot time. Now, you can restore at boot time without actually loading the Operating System.... and then boot your computer, with fully intact restored operating system, from the restored backup. This is what was meant by the comment you did not understand.

Then something is wrong with your TM backup drive or it was used as a TM backup drive with an earlier version of OS X before you started using it with Lion or Mt Lion.

On the First Backup with TM on a fresh drive, not used before or erased or re-partitioned, and Lion/Mt Lion the Recovery HD files are copied to the TM backup drive in a separate partition, Yes Hidden just like on the internal drive.

Holding down the Option key when starting the system and the TM drive connected will give you a USB Icon drive that will say Recovery.

I'm not at my Mac right now but will post a picture of my system and that Option key boot menu screen when I get home.

I actually have to of those USB Icon Recovery drive as I use the same drive for both Lion and Mt Lion backup on separate partitions.

Ogel you should stop with the Greetings USERxxxx as that is a sure sign that you find fault with someone or what they say. You are just being deceitful in your initial reply with trying to be a Nice guy with the Greetings. Like you really care.

I have said this many times to you, and others. I do NOT post False information. If I post it, and do not include any disclaimer like "I Think" or "I would think", then what I post is Facts as I know them and have used it myself.

Sure you could restore a system from a TM backup at Boot Time. But you had to Boot the system from the original system disc or a Upgrade disc like a retail Snow leopard disk you used to upgrade from Leopard.

All those system discs included a Recovery system for starting the system and running Disk utlity or the AHT or Restoring from a TM backup.

djcastaldo wrote:

Prior to Lion, you could not restore from a TM backup at boot time. Now, you can restore at boot time without actually loading the Operating System.... and then boot your computer, with fully intact restored operating system, from the restored backup. This is what was meant by the comment you did not understand.