Backing up external hard drive using Time Machine

[idontunderstandcameraroll]

I'd like to backup an external hard drive using Time Machine (as this would keep back ups up to date, rather than me having to drag across everything from one hard drive to another every time I try to to 'backup').

So, I have two hard drives, which I've partitioned as follows:

Disk 1 has two partitions, 'HD' and another.
Disk 2 has two partitions, 'HD Backup' and another.

(In the screenshot below, only the Disk 1 'HD' partition and Disk 2 'HD Backup' partition are mounted. The other partitions of each disk are irrelevant here, so neither of them are mounted.)​

Since I only have 256GB storage on my Macbook Pro, I use 'HD' to store all my iTunes files, as well as some other files. (It's in ExFAT format so that I can use it on Windows, too.)

At the moment, 'HD' is the only place I have all those iTunes files, hence the need to back up. So, my plan had been to use 'HD Backup' as an extra Time Machine but to:

i) exclude 'Macintosh HD' (i.e. the SSD of the Macbook Pro I'm doing this on), and;
ii) include 'HD'.​

As you can see from the screenshot, I can exclude Macintosh HD but I can't remove 'HD' from this list.

Why is this? Is it because 'HD' is a partition, not the whole drive? Is it because the 'HD' partition is formatted in ExFAT? Or is it for some other reason? My guess is that the ExFAT formatting is the problem, since I can include a separate, old hard drive that's MacOS Journaled. Any help much appreciated!

 

[Fishrrman]

I'd suggest that before you commit to Time Machine, that you also give either CarbonCopyCloner or SuperDuper a try as well.

Both are free to download and use for 30 days.

In my opinion both will create backups that are superior to anything TM will do...

 

[chscag]

I agree with using CCC or SD as both are superior to Time Machine, however, the OP states he needs to be able to use one of the drives from Windows, hence, the exFAT format. CCC and SD will only clone to drives formatted as HFS+.