ConfusedInCA

Q: New OS and Time Machine

I've been using Time Machine since I got my first Macbook Pro which was running Snow Leopard. Since then each time a new OS was released I would buy a new external drive before performing a new backup. I was told by a Apple Support rep that I shouldn't use the same external drive after updating to a new OS.

 

In other words, if I had performed a time machine backup using (external-hard-drive-01) when using Snow Leopard, then after upgrading to Lion, I should use a new external hard drive (external-hard-drive-02). That if I plugged in (external-hard-drive-02) after upgrading to Lion, that time machine would wipe out all the data from the Snow Leopard backup and replace it with a new backup from Lion.

 

I've taken that advise over the years and now I'm left with 6 external hard drives. One for each operating system:

 

Snow Leopard - (external-hard-drive-01)

Lion - (external-hard-drive-02)

Mountain Lion - (external-hard-drive-03)

Mavericks - (external-hard-drive-04)

Yosemite - (external-hard-drive-05)

El Capitan - (external-hard-drive-06)

 

Anal? Yup. So here are my questions...

 

There are a lot of files on all these drives that I don't need on my Macbook Pro but don't want to lose them. However in all the years I've been using time machine, I've never needed to go grab any of those old files. I mainly wanted to have a current backup in the event I ever needed to restore but certainly don't want to lose any of these old files.

 

Since I'm not one to really need to fetch a file, I'm thinking that I'm wasting a lot of money on external hard drives for no reason.

 

In a perfect world, what I'd like to do is to take "external-hard-drive-01" - compress everything on that drive, save it as a zip file and upload it to my Amazon S3 account for safe storage. Then re-format that drive then use it to make a time machine backup for the new OS which is Sierra. This way I don't have to keep buying additional external hard drives. In the event I needed any files from the zip file, I could download the file from the Cloud to my computer, unzip it, find the file I need, restore the file then delete the entire zip file off my computer. Is this doable? Does anyone see any complications doing it this way?

 

Another idea that I wanted to explore was to take the first external hard drive (external-hard-drive-01) and restore all my files that I need, to my current hard drive. Then do the same thing with (external-hard-drive-02, 3, 4, 5). Once I have all my wanted files on my Macbook Pro, I can then use my latest external hard drive (external-hard-drive-06) and make a new time machine backup. I can then reformat all those drives and use them for future backups. If you think about it, all my external hard drives not only contains my personal files, but also the operating system I was using which I don't need. In retrospect, I prefer this option more than any other, but I also know that there are limitation of what you can't or worse yet... "shouldn't do" when trying to restore and backup files using time machine. You don't run into those hazards until "beep" hits the fan and you need to recover. Like dealing with your insurance company. They're your best friend until one day you need to file a claim. At that point you realize that they are not your friend and you end up dealing with someone known as "insurance adjuster" who gets paid "not" to pay or pay you back as little as possible.

 

Could you give me your thoughts and tell me what you would do in my situation? Thanks for reading this long post and in advance for your thoughtful reply.

 

JD

Posted on Oct 2, 2016 4:37 PM