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SuperDuper and Time Machine on same HDD?

2012Tony2012

2012Tony2012

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Dec 2, 2012
741
3
I have an 500GB External hard drive that I want to use for my Imac to make complete SuperDuper backup images onto and then also to use to make Time Machine backups.

Can someone please tell me my exact steps needed to make that happen?

Do I need to format the 500GB External hard drive into 2 partitions? And if so, how do I format the 500GB External hard drive? What file system for both partitions and what application do I use to create 2 partitions and to format the 500GB External hard drive?

Please if someone could give me a step by step guide I would really appreciate it and be very grateful:)
 
2012Tony2012

2012Tony2012

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Dec 2, 2012
741
3
old-wiz said:
split the HDD into two partitions, use one for superduper and one for time machine. use osx extended journaled. they won't coexist on one partition.
Click to expand...

How do I make 2 partitions? In iMac?

And I read that Journaling is best suited for servers requiring high availability, servers containing volumes with many files, and servers containing data that is backed up at infrequent intervals... That's what Apple Website says.

So seeing journaled can slow down system performance, why use it? Especially seeing I am not running an intense server and seeing I rarely get power cut off and even if I did, it wouldn't matter.
 
Last edited:
ECUpirate44

ECUpirate44

macrumors 603
Mar 22, 2010
5,750
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NC
2012Tony2012 said:
So use iMac disk utility to create 2 partitions? Then tell SuperDuper to use one and tell TM to use the other?

And is it possible to tell TM to only backup once per day instead of every hour?
Click to expand...

Yep. And no, but just plug in the drive when you want to back up and unplug it when you're done.
 
rnb2

rnb2

macrumors regular
Jan 23, 2006
222
11
West Haven, CT, USA
2012Tony2012 said:
I have an 500GB External hard drive that I want to use for my Imac to make complete SuperDuper backup images onto and then also to use to make Time Machine backups.

Can someone please tell me my exact steps needed to make that happen?

Do I need to format the 500GB External hard drive into 2 partitions? And if so, how do I format the 500GB External hard drive? What file system for both partitions and what application do I use to create 2 partitions and to format the 500GB External hard drive?

Please if someone could give me a step by step guide I would really appreciate it and be very grateful:)
Click to expand...

You don't have to do anything special - SuperDuper! is smart enough to recognize a Time Machine folder and leave it alone. Just plug the drive in and let Time Machine run at least once to create the backup folder, then run SuperDuper! as normal. Make sure (as always) that you are running the latest version of SuperDuper, of course, but this capability has been there since shortly after Time Machine arrived.
 
hfg

hfg

macrumors 68040
Dec 1, 2006
3,621
312
Cedar Rapids, IA. USA
If you elect to put both on the same partition, be aware that TimeMachine will continually grow in size to eventually consume all available disk space. This may not be an issue with your setup and time frame, but you should realize that you may encounter a full disk at some point and SuperDuper will be unable to accommodate additional files.
 
2012Tony2012

2012Tony2012

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Dec 2, 2012
741
3
I've created a Time Machine backup on my external USB HDD, and now I want to do a SuperDuper backup.

But if I keep using the same HDD for Time Machine backups, won't the Time Machine backups eventually start deleting the SuperDuper backup?
 
O

old-wiz

macrumors G3
Mar 26, 2008
8,331
228
West Suburban Boston Ma
2012Tony2012 said:
I've created a Time Machine backup on my external USB HDD, and now I want to do a SuperDuper backup.

But if I keep using the same HDD for Time Machine backups, won't the Time Machine backups eventually start deleting the SuperDuper backup?
Click to expand...

Time machine will eventually start overwriting the time machine backups, not superduper backups. However once Time machine fills the free space your next attempt to run superduper may fail if it needs more space.

To be truly safe, I keep them on separate physical drives; then if the physical drive fails you have only lost one or the other, not both.
 
2012Tony2012

2012Tony2012

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Dec 2, 2012
741
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I ended up deciding to create 2 partitions, one called Time Machine and the other SuperDuperBackup.

When I get more money I will buy a second USB HDD to use TM and SD on separate hard drives. But in the meantime I need to use them both on the same hard drive with 2 separate partitions.
 
GGJstudios

GGJstudios

macrumors Westmere
May 16, 2008
44,545
943
2012Tony2012 said:
I ended up deciding to create 2 partitions, one called Time Machine and the other SuperDuperBackup.

When I get more money I will buy a second USB HDD to use TM and SD on separate hard drives. But in the meantime I need to use them both on the same hard drive with 2 separate partitions.
Click to expand...
I recommend Carbon Copy Cloner for creating bootable backups, as it also clones the OS X recovery partition, which SuperDuper! doesn't do.
 
slffl

slffl

macrumors 65816
Mar 5, 2003
1,303
4
Seattle, WA
I'm not sure how SuperDuper works, but Time Machine just creates a folder. You don't need to dedicate a partition to it. If SuperDuper works similar, then you just need one partition and both apps can use it.
 
talmy

talmy

macrumors 601
Oct 26, 2009
4,726
332
Oregon
slffl said:
If SuperDuper works similar, then you just need one partition and both apps can use it.
Click to expand...

It isn't similar. It makes a clone (functional duplicate) of the source drive, so as soon as you run it the Time Machine backup will be deleted.
 
2012Tony2012

2012Tony2012

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Dec 2, 2012
741
3
GGJstudios said:
I recommend Carbon Copy Cloner for creating bootable backups, as it also clones the OS X recovery partition, which SuperDuper! doesn't do.
Click to expand...

I am using Snow Leopard and SL doesn't create a OS X recovery partition, so I don't need to backup a OS X recovery partition as I don't have one. AFAIK, the OS X recovery partition only began with Lion? So SuperDuper will be OK?

----------
talmy said:
It isn't similar. It makes a clone (functional duplicate) of the source drive, so as soon as you run it the Time Machine backup will be deleted.
Click to expand...

Hi there One Eye :D

So you think what I did in creating TM for it's own partition and SD with it's own partition was a good idea?
 
2012Tony2012

2012Tony2012

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Dec 2, 2012
741
3
GGJstudios said:
Since you didn't specify your version, it seemed appropriate to mention it.
Click to expand...

Agreed. And as soon as I move up to Lion or Mountain Lion, I will start using CCC to backup rescue partition as well.

BY the way, why is it important to backup the rescue partition? It isn't touched or modified is it and should always be there as is? And if I do a clean install it's created again anyway, isn't it?
 
GGJstudios

GGJstudios

macrumors Westmere
May 16, 2008
44,545
943
2012Tony2012 said:
Agreed. And as soon as I move up to Lion or Mountain Lion, I will start using CCC to backup rescue partition as well.

BY the way, why is it important to backup the rescue partition? It isn't touched or modified is it and should always be there as is? And if I do a clean install it's created again anyway, isn't it?
Click to expand...
It would come in handy if your internal drive failed completely. You wouldn't have to re-create it or reinstall anything; just boot from your CCC backup. There are a few other slight advantages to CCC, which is why I prefer it, but SD works fine.
 
2012Tony2012

2012Tony2012

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Dec 2, 2012
741
3
GGJstudios said:
It would come in handy if your internal drive failed completely. You wouldn't have to re-create it or reinstall anything; just boot from your CCC backup. There are a few other slight advantages to CCC, which is why I prefer it, but SD works fine.
Click to expand...

Good point. Thank you.

Do you mind if I asked what other few slight advantages to CCC are there that I may not be aware of? And are you talking about the Free SD and Free CCC, because I can't buy any of them at this stage so need to use the free version.
 
GGJstudios

GGJstudios

macrumors Westmere
May 16, 2008
44,545
943
2012Tony2012 said:
Good point. Thank you.

Do you mind if I asked what other few slight advantages to CCC are there that I may not be aware of? And are you talking about the Free SD and Free CCC, because I can't buy any of them at this stage so need to use the free version.
Click to expand...

You can use 3.5.1 ($40) or 3.4.7 (free, and works well on OS X 10.6, 10.7 and 10.8).

The features work the same in both versions. CCC also does incremental backups, which the free version of SD doesn't do.
 
2012Tony2012

2012Tony2012

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Dec 2, 2012
741
3
GGJstudios said:
You can use 3.5.1 ($40) or 3.4.7 (free, and works well on OS X 10.6, 10.7 and 10.8).

The features work the same in both versions. CCC also does incremental backups, which the free version of SD doesn't do.
Click to expand...

I thought only the PAID version of CCC does incremental backups? :eek:
 
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