need for backing up media files if use time machine?

[Appletise]

l am 'new' to time machine and computers in general. I am using my 1TB touro USB for time machine.
Does this mean l dont have to back up/save all my important media files as they are saved in time machine? or do l have to manually save the media files and folders for back up on my 1TB touro USB or is this simply wasting space, by duplicating a media file? the reason I ask is I am unsure of the time machines size since there are several back ups and my mbpr HD being ~250GB, yet there seems to be a lot of space in the HD. Hope I am making myself clear

 

[Gregg2]

Where are these files you're concerned about?

 

[Weaselboy]

I'm kinda confused also. Are these media files you are concerned about on the internal, Macintosh HD drive? If they are, they will be backed up as part of the Time Machine backup to the Touro drive.

But if you have them on the Touro they are not really backed up anywhere.

 

[Appletise]

yes media are in my mbpr internal HD. so they are already backed up then? l must be backing them up again then by manually transferring files and folders in my mbpr internal HD to my touro 1TB, therefore wasting space? to be assured of their back up l think l will go to my local mac store and connect it to one of their macs to check the media files and folders right?
how about my buffalo 1TB USB3.0 hard drive? Can l get that to do a time machine backup as well? how? thx.

 

[Weaselboy]

yes media are in my mbpr internal HD. so they are already backed up then? l must be backing them up again then by manually transferring files and folders in my mbpr internal HD to my touro 1TB, therefore wasting space? to be assured of their back up l think l will go to my local mac store and connect it to one of their macs to check the media files and folders right?
how about my buffalo 1TB USB3.0 hard drive? Can l get that to do a time machine backup as well? how? thx.

Correct, if the media files are on your internal drive they will be backed up to a Time Machine backup.

By default, external drives are excluded from TM backups, so if you want the Buffalo drive's files to be backed you you will need to of into TM options and remove that drive from the excluded list.

 

[inscrewtable]

OP, you know, I'd forget about TM and instead use SuperDuper to make a bootable clone of your internal HD. Really it's simpler and you know where you stand all the time.

 

[Apple_Robert]

Never rely on one backup source. When possible, always make a backup of your backup.

I use TimeMachine as well as Carbon Copy Cloner for complete system backups, and OneDrive at times, for backing some important files, even though they are supposedly backed up by the aforementioned programs.

In my opinion, it is good (every so often) to test your backups to make sure everything is as it should be. The last thing you want to have happen, is to lose a file because your Mac goes down, or some other misfortune, and you find out the hard way, that what you thought was backed up really wasn't or was corrupt and of no use.