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How can I set my Airport Time Capsule to automatically delete the oldest backup so it doesn't get full, or can I? I've not been able to find anywhere in the Airport Utility where you can configure it other than verifying or deleting.
Thanks!
Tim
MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.5.1)
In theory, Time Machine will delete the oldest backups to make room for new backups.
BUT....this will only work when Time Machine has to delete older small "incremental" backups to make room for new small backups with very little data.
IF....the Time Capsule is full, or close to full, and a significant amount of new data has been added to your Mac.....such as an operating system update, or new videos and images.....then Time Machine cannot delete enough data to make room for the new "larger than normal" backup. A message appears that the backup is too large for the Time Capsule to handle.
WHEN....this occurs, you have a few options:
In theory, Time Machine will delete the oldest backups to make room for new backups.
BUT....this will only work when Time Machine has to delete older small "incremental" backups to make room for new small backups with very little data.
IF....the Time Capsule is full, or close to full, and a significant amount of new data has been added to your Mac.....such as an operating system update, or new videos and images.....then Time Machine cannot delete enough data to make room for the new "larger than normal" backup. A message appears that the backup is too large for the Time Capsule to handle.
WHEN....this occurs, you have a few options:
I use Time Machine to back up the USB drive, as well as another software application called Carbon Copy Cloner. So, I have Time Machine backups on each USB drive and a "clone" of the Mac on each drive as well.
Time Machine has proven more reliable backing up to a USB drive than it has to a Time Capsule. Like countless other users, I've had issues with corrupted Time Machine backups to the Time Capsule. You will see this message when that occurs:
When this message appears....and it will for you as well....the only question is when, not if.....Time Machine erases all your old backups and starts over again.
The Carbon Copy "clone" is useful if the Mac is having an operating system problem. I can simply start up from the clone and keep working, since it is a mirror image of the Mac in every respect.
In theory, the Time Capsule should delete the oldest backups to make room for the new ones. As you have experienced, this is not always the case ... and this can be caused by a number of reasons. One of them could be due to a backup with a large amount of new data. An example would be if you use Parallels and make any chances to the VM. This would require that Time Machine backup the entire VM, which can be several GBs.
You basically have two choices going forward:
Thank you, that gives me several options. I assume the USB drive would need to be at least the size of the Time Capsule or greater? But, a person could maintain set of a USB drives on a regular basis, I guess, too.
Tim
I assume the USB drive would need to be at least the size of the Time Capsule or greater?
Yes, if you are planning to copy (archive) all of the data on the Time Capsule drive over to the USB drive....and then erase the Time Capsule drive and start a new backup to the Time Capsule drive.
If you don't want to copy over the data on the Time Capsule drive to the USB drive, and instead plan to use the USB drive for future backups, then you would likely want a larger USB drive.....4 TB or larger....for backups.
Few of us ever need to go back and pick up a file from months or even years back in the past, but users seem to have a difficult time erasing their backups and starting over again.
My neighbor has backups going back almost 4 years. He knows that he'll never use or need them, but he just can bring himself to erasing the drive and starting over. Instead, he just keeps adding new drives for more backups.
But, a person could maintain set of a USB drives on a regular basis, I guess, too.
Not sure how this would relate to a Time Capsule, but if you are saying that you could back up your Mac to a USB drive that is connected directly to the Mac, that would be true. Backups this way are faster and more reliable than backups to a Time Capsule.
Thank you for the replies and help, sounds as though it is better to back-up the Mac to USB drives. Not sure if this will make much difference, but I assume it's not a good idea to have more than one device backing up to one Time Capsule? Having an iMac, MacBook Pro, iPad, iPad Pro, etc., each should be backed up individually?
Tim
The Time Capsule is designed to back up multiple Macs with the practical limit probably being 4-5 Macs. This is a convient feature of the Time Capsule. The downside....as you might have already guessed.....is that if the Time Capsule hard drive has a problem, you lose the backups of all of your Macs.
iPhones, iPads, and other iOS devices do not back up to a Time Capsule. They back up to either iTunes on your Mac or to iCloud. So, for example if an iPhone backs up to iTunes on your Mac, when your Mac backs up to the Time Capsule, then the backups of the iPhone are included in the Mac backups. So, you could say that an iPhone or iPad backs up indirectly to a Time Capsule.
Personally, I use a Time Capsule to back up 3 different Macs. But, I also have a USB drive for each Mac to back up directly as well. You can easily guess which backup method is the fastest and most reliable.
Do you do a file copy from the Mac to the USB drive or use a software backup? Not sure the a file copy would get all important, system files.
Tim
My Airport Time Capsule is Full.
