Ejecting External Hard Drive + Time Machine

[CBX]

Ive just brought an external drive (Lacie Quadra) to use with Time Machine.

I plan on leaving it turned on (set to auto) my iMac will pick it up on start up and then do the hourly backups without me needing to do anything.

My question is should I "eject" the external hard drive before powering off the iMac or can I just close the iMac?

 

[logana]

Just turn the Mac off and the disk will be ejected as part of the shut-down process although there is no harm in ejecting it before you shut-down the Mac. You will get a warning if the disk is actually backing up at that moment.

The disc will re-mount when you start the Mac.

 

[CBX]

Cheers,

Wasnt sure if it was like disconnecting a usb device on windows where you need to safely remove it etc

 

[CBX]

One other question -

Does Time Machine back up all profiles on the iMac?

 

[soberbrain]

I couldn't find Apple documentation to confirm, but I've read in forums that Time Machine works on the entire machine, so if it has a single user or multiple users all of them are backed up at the same time. So if you have TM on, it's on for all users on the machine.

Try running TM on one user account and then log into another account after the back up is done and launch the TM "time travel" app to see if the user was backed up.

 

[CBX]

Try running TM on one user account and then log into another account after the back up is done and launch the TM "time travel" app to see if the user was backed up.

Thanks.
Will do.

 

[logana]

Yes - I use Time Machine but only one user so don't really know - but agree that it backs up the machine so should include all users.