How do I transfer Time Machine backup to another hd?
I'm running out of space on my external HD that I'm using for Time Machine. How do I upgrade to a larger external HD?
iMac, OS X Yosemite (10.10.2), 8 Gigs Ram
6 replies
First, get a larger drive that has been properly partitioned and formatted for OS X. With both drives connected clone the old drive to the new drive:
Clone using Restore Option of Disk Utility
1. Open Disk Utility in the Utilities folder.
2. Select the destination volume from the left side list.
3. Click on the Restore tab in the DU main window.
4. Select the destination volume from the left side list and drag
it to the Destination entry field.
5. Select the source volume from the left side list and drag it to
the Source entry field.
6. Double-check you got it right, then click on the Restore button.
Destination means the new backup drive. Source means the old backup drive.
Thank you for all your help, everyone!
Why is this taking so long?
Are you source and destination connected with a Wired connection?
In the past I have used Time Machine: How to transfer backups from a current backup drive to a new backup drive - Apple Support.
Another option is to format the new drive to JHFS+, copy Backups.backupdb in it's entirety to the root of the new drive, and then use tmutil CLI to inherit the new backup. The verification may take a bit on the new drive.
Please see man tmutil for details.
inheritbackup{machine_directory | sparsebundle}
Claim a machine directory or sparsebundle for use by the current machine. Requires root privileges.
Machine directories and sparsebundles are owned by one computer at a time, and are tracked by unique identifiers rather than com-
puter name, host name, or ethernet address. The inheritbackup verb reassigns the identity of the specified item, reconfiguring it
so the current host recognizes it during backups. When inheriting a sparsebundle, the machine directory within will also be
claimed.
Inheriting is typically only one step in the process of configuring a backup for use by a machine. You may also need to use
setdestination, associatedisk, or both, depending on the situation.
One machine can own multiple machine directories and sparsebundles, but it is ill-advised for them to reside in the same place.
In such a situation, which will be chosen during a backup is undefined. As a result, inheritbackup will attempt to detect possi-
ble identity collisions before making changes.
How do I transfer Time Machine backup to another hd?