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Move Time Machine Backup to new drive

TM doesn't require it's own partition though...

I don't see why a block level copy will be any different or avoid the problems I ran into before
 
You don't NEED a clean partition for TM, but Apple recommends it.

The block-level copy will work better for the reasons I outlined earlier. If they're too confusing, don't worry, its pretty nerdy stuff. But the beauty of CCC is that it makes it painless.

I really think it will work, and I would test it myself but I don't have a second external drive big enough for my TM. 🙁

Is there any specific part of my "argument" that I can clarify for you? I'll try to simplify it overall...


Imagine you're copying a piece of paper. You can either use a photocopier or type it into a computer.

If you use the photocopier, it doesn't care whats on the page. It could be pictures, words, many different languages, etc... it just copies the whole thing.
If you use the computer, you have to be able to read whats on the page and re-type it, not to mention you can't copy a photo, different language, etc...

Think of the block-level copy like the photocopier. It doesn't care whats actually there, it just copies it, unlike file-level, which actually reads each file and then copies it.
 
Ahh, got it, nice metaphor. The only problem now is that I am trying to move my TM files onto a hard drive of the same size and carbon copy says its not big enough for a block level clone...
 
The drive does need to be bigger... don't know why, it just does.

But why would you be trying to move TM if the drive is the same size?
 
I see...Long story, had two 300gbs, got a new 500gb that I'm not going to be using for time machine and I'm giving away the other ...doesn't matter.

I think we've figured out some good stuff (assuming a block level clone would work) and I think I'm just going to do a new time machine backup.
 
I'm moving to a different backup drive as well so this thread interested me. I was wondering if we could use the built in disk utility's restore function to duplicate the drive. Seems logical that Apple's own disk software should handle the hard links. Does anyone know if it uses block copy for restoring partitions? I'm assuming you would have to boot from the leopard disk to do this.
 
Solution

Go in to 'System Preferences' and turn Time Machine off
Plug both disks into your USB ports
Start 'Disk Utilities'
Click on 'Restore'
Set the source to your old disk
Set the destination to your new disk
and start the process

My 80Gb disk was copied in a 250Gb disk in 50 mins for a copy and 33 mins for the verify.
 
datamgmt said:
Go in to 'System Preferences' and turn Time Machine off
Plug both disks into your USB ports
Start 'Disk Utilities'
Click on 'Restore'
Set the source to your old disk
Set the destination to your new disk
and start the process

My 80Gb disk was copied in a 250Gb disk in 50 mins for a copy and 33 mins for the verify.
Click to expand...

And I'm assuming TM picked up right where it left off from? And you were able to access all your old backups?

-Kevin
 
Can you rely on Time Machine for crtical files?

If I understand how Time Machine works, I have to wonder if it secure for long term storage of critical backups. My 80 gig Powerbook filled up a 500 g G drive in 8 days and Time Machine started its delete and compression process.

While it takes continuous snapshots of your total system, it basically assumes that you will never delete any files off your hard drive. This is a key assumption as Time Machine will fill up whatever back up space you allot to it. After that it deletes the very first back-up replacing with the very latest. It will also start converting hour backups to day to week backups to save space.

Therefore, kiddies, think about the implications of filling up your hard drive over time and deleting files on your primary HD relying on Time Machine to preserve that precious archive – like – no – sooner or later Time Machine will kill that precious back-up. It may take a long time, but it will do that.

Therefore, if you are like me, and your poor 80 gig HD is already cramped full of iLife projects that you would like to move to a save space and preserve for all future generations, Time Machine is not for you.

Unfortunately, while you can switch off Time Machine, there appears to be an invisible link between Leopard performance and using Time Machine which, by itself has no options to set. I had no end of "kernal panics" after converting from Tiger until I got Time Machine running. After Time Machine took over, I was back to Tiger reliability.

Am I missing something?
 
ctworek said:
If I understand how Time Machine works, I have to wonder if it secure for long term storage of critical backups. My 80 gig Powerbook filled up a 500 g G drive in 8 days and Time Machine started its delete and compression process.

Am I missing something?
Click to expand...

It filled up a 500G drive in 8 days when all the drives you backup are only 80 G?

Something is wrong there.

I have 3 internal drives which have a total of about 200GB used. I'm backing up to a 500G drive, and I installed TM the day leopard came out....10/26/07. So far it has used up 220G on the 500G drive.

So something is not right in your install of TM.

As far as I can see:

- TM takes hourly snapshots for the last 24 hours
- The first hourly of the day is saved as a DAILY backup. Daily backups are kept for 31 days.
- Based on what day you started TM (my case it was a Friday), TM will take that day each week and save that backup, removing the rest....making what is a weekly backup.
- It saves these weekly backup until the drive is full.
- So basically each month listed in TM should have 4-5 backups (1 from each week)

So, basically, if you want to make sure something is truly backed up, you need to make sure it is included in the daily backup that becomes the weekly.

Confused yet? Yeah, seems Apple doesn't want to release the Tech details on this.

It really is a set it and forget it backup solution (not brought to you by Ronco 😉).

-Kevin
 
datamgmt said:
Go in to 'System Preferences' and turn Time Machine off
Plug both disks into your USB ports
Start 'Disk Utilities'
Click on 'Restore'
Set the source to your old disk
Set the destination to your new disk
and start the process

My 80Gb disk was copied in a 250Gb disk in 50 mins for a copy and 33 mins for the verify.
Click to expand...

I followed these instructions to copy a 250Gb to a 500Gb drive. It couldn't be easier. It takes all of about two drag and drops and a click of the mouse. The copy took my MacPro (harpertown) 44 min. Sure beats doing a whole new backup.
 
Drive names

Interesting topic. I wonder if, after doing the CC block copy, you'll need to give new drive the same name as the old one, in order to make it work seamlessly. This would possibly allow TM to continue using the new drive as if the old one simply magically expanded in capacity.

T
 
solution

What's new in this version:
Full Leopard support
Can store a bootable backup side-by-side with a Time Machine backup on a single volume
Can copy Time Machine backup volumes to other drive when you need more space (or want to back up your archived data)
"Run Now" button for scheduled copies
Automatic preservation of any custom icon on the destination volume
Improved Spotlight handling

Performance and other improvements
Of course, the new SuperDuper 2.5 still improves on the acclaimed original in many ways, including:
The ability to easily schedule backups
Additional imaging options
More control over shutdown
Better AppleScript support
Hundreds of UI improvements
Growl support
And a completely rewritten, task-based User's Guide.
 
Are there any options for moving a TimeMachine folder from a larger partition to a smaller partition?

I've painted myself into a corner. I've got a 500GB drive, partitioned into 80 GB and a 420 GB drives. The 80GB is first, and was used for a SuperDuper! backup before upgrading from 10.4 to 10.5. The 420GB is the Time Machine drive. Now that 1.5 is working well on this system, and SuperDuper! is updated to play nice with Time Machine, I want to remove the 80 GB partition and give TimeMachine the full 500 GB. (And possibly buy the new SuperDuper!)

But I can't resize the TimeMachine partition with DiskUtility -- it's the second partition, so it can't be safely changed in size.

The Restore process described earlier doesn't work -- it won't "restore" the 420 GB drive to the 80 GB drive. If did, I could then set that as the TimeMachine drive and resize that partition -- it's the first partition so Disk Utility will resize it safely.

I'm trying to manually copy the Time Machine folder (about 60 GB) to the 80 GB Partition, but earlier comments say this doesn't work.

So, short of tossing the TimeMachine folder, reformatting the drive, and starting from scratch, are there any options for moving changing my drive configuration?
 
DaveF said:
Are there any options for moving a TimeMachine folder from a larger partition to a smaller partition?

I've painted myself into a corner. I've got a 500GB drive, partitioned into 80 GB and a 420 GB drives. The 80GB is first, and was used for a SuperDuper! backup before upgrading from 10.4 to 10.5. The 420GB is the Time Machine drive. Now that 1.5 is working well on this system, and SuperDuper! is updated to play nice with Time Machine, I want to remove the 80 GB partition and give TimeMachine the full 500 GB. (And possibly buy the new SuperDuper!)

But I can't resize the TimeMachine partition with DiskUtility -- it's the second partition, so it can't be safely changed in size.

The Restore process described earlier doesn't work -- it won't "restore" the 420 GB drive to the 80 GB drive. If did, I could then set that as the TimeMachine drive and resize that partition -- it's the first partition so Disk Utility will resize it safely.

I'm trying to manually copy the Time Machine folder (about 60 GB) to the 80 GB Partition, but earlier comments say this doesn't work.

So, short of tossing the TimeMachine folder, reformatting the drive, and starting from scratch, are there any options for moving changing my drive configuration?
Click to expand...

Could you borrow someone's 500GB drive....do the clone to the borrowed drive, then format yours, and clone it back?

-Kevin
 
micsaund said:
It's just a wad of directories on the disk. Have you tried copying the Backups.backupdb to the new drive and changing TM to use that drive? It might be that simple (I don't know for sure - just guessing).
Click to expand...

Just copying Backups.backupdb using the Finder will not work. Say you have a 200 GB hard drive and backups from 50 different dates. The Finder would think that you have 50 times 200 GB stored on the backup drive and it would try to copy 10000 GB.

If you plug in old backup drive and new backup drive and do a volume copy using Disk Utility, that might work.
 
i kinda have a different question-can i use my time machine drive as an external storage as well; like can I put a bunch of movies and shows on the time machine drive at the same time using the drive as the backup drive for time machine?
 
I have a question that has not been addressed. My current time machine backup is a 250 GB internal hard drive (mac pro). I want to convert that backup to a 750 GB Network drive i just installed in my server. I can't do a disk restore because network time machine backups are stored on disk images. I don't want to start fresh though, my 250 gig drive isn't even full yet, and I want to keep backups as far as I can for as long as I can.
 
datamgmt said:
Go in to 'System Preferences' and turn Time Machine off
Plug both disks into your USB ports
Start 'Disk Utilities'
Click on 'Restore'
Set the source to your old disk
Set the destination to your new disk
and start the process

My 80Gb disk was copied in a 250Gb disk in 50 mins for a copy and 33 mins for the verify.
Click to expand...

this solution was GENIUS. thank you.
 
datamgmt said:
Go in to 'System Preferences' and turn Time Machine off
Plug both disks into your USB ports
Start 'Disk Utilities'
Click on 'Restore'
Set the source to your old disk
Set the destination to your new disk
and start the process

My 80Gb disk was copied in a 250Gb disk in 50 mins for a copy and 33 mins for the verify.
Click to expand...

This seems to be the solution for wired backups. Will this work for networked backups?
 
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