Freeing up memory on an older macbook w/ time capsule

[jdlyons]

I purchased a 500GB time capsule awhile back in hopes of killing two birds with one stone. I wanted it to:

1) serve as my wifi base (which it is doing very nicely)

and

2) Allow me to backup all my files on my macbook in order to free up some memory.

I guess my question really is, once I've backed up all my content to the time machine (acting as an extra hard drive), is it safe to just delete the content from my macbook that I am ok with not accessing when away from my time capsule? For example, all that music I still want to keep but dont necessarily listen to on a regular basis? I am completely full on my macbook and need extra room. I dont anticipate filling the time capsule anytime soon. All my content is barely over 60GB. I just dont want to start deleting unless I know its going to be ok. Help? And thank you SO MUCH in advance.

 

[fluffyx]

When you delete content on your MacBook, it will still be stored on your Time Capsule... for the moment. When your Time Capsule gets full, it will delete old backups. Do not use Time Machine as a repository for files you intend to keep!

It's definitely possible to store files on your Time Capsule outside of your normal backup file, but it's probably not a good idea. You're backing up your files because you want to protect against data loss. Every hard drive (the one in your MacBook, even the one in your Time Capsule) will eventually fail. Sometimes hard drives last 15 years, sometimes they last a week.

It sure wouldn't be nice if you saved important files to your Time Capsule and had your Time Capsule fail, would it? Have you considered other options, like upgrading your MacBook's internal hard drive? It's not hideously expensive.