Preserving Time Machine Backup

[krravi]

I need to preserve certain early sets of time machine backups. Since Time Machine does the FIFO basis when it runs out of disk space, I would rather preserve the first backup always. That way instead of re-installing the OS from the media, I can always restore from the first backup.

I am sorry if this has been asked before and if it has please point me to that thread.

Thanks.

 

[Weaselboy]

I need to preserve certain early sets of time machine backups. Since Time Machine does the FIFO basis when it runs out of disk space, I would rather preserve the first backup always. That way instead of re-installing the OS from the media, I can always restore from the first backup.

I am sorry if this has been asked before and if it has please point me to that thread.

Thanks.

There is no way to do this natively within Time Machine. As a work around what you could to is use Time Machine to make the first virgin system backup, then turn off Time Machine and move that completed backup to another drive or a folder in the same external drive. Then restart Time Machine again and make another backup that would be ongoing as normal.

This would give you that virgin copy you are referring to.

 

[krravi]

Thanks !

But isnt there a command line utility called "timeutil" or something that will let us do some advanced tricks?

 

[Weaselboy]

Thanks !

But isnt there a command line utility called "timeutil" or something that will let us do some advanced tricks?

Yes there is, but it won't do anything like what you described.

 

[krravi]

Yes there is, but it won't do anything like what you described.

Got it and thanks for that link. Now my backup has grown to like 250 GB....

So maybe I can go earlier in time and do a restore so i get the early stage then trash the backup and start a fresh one and then preserve that....

I wish Apple would let us preserve certain time slots...

 

[Weaselboy]

Got it and thanks for that link. Now my backup has grown to like 250 GB....

So maybe I can go earlier in time and do a restore so i get the early stage then trash the backup and start a fresh one and then preserve that....

I wish Apple would let us preserve certain time slots...

I don't know of a way to do that with a complete restore. If you boot to recovery and click restore from Time Machine it will just restore what you have now. There is no way to go back in time and restore an old version of the entire OS.

 

[krravi]

I don't know of a way to do that with a complete restore. If you boot to recovery and click restore from Time Machine it will just restore what you have now. There is no way to go back in time and restore an old version of the entire OS.

Why not? When I do restore I can pick the earliest backup isnt it?

 

[Mal]

I don't know of a way to do that with a complete restore. If you boot to recovery and click restore from Time Machine it will just restore what you have now. There is no way to go back in time and restore an old version of the entire OS.

I was pretty sure I remembered seeing a drop-down to choose the date of the restore when doing a complete restore via Time Machine, though I admittedly haven't done that in a very long time.

jW

 

[Weaselboy]

Why not? When I do restore I can pick the earliest backup isnt it?

I don't remember there being any choice when you do that. As I recall when you tell it to restore from a Time Machine backup it just asks where the backup is. Mal (below) says he does recall being able to choose a date.

Give it a try and please come back and confirm the outcome for us.

I was pretty sure I remembered seeing a drop-down to choose the date of the restore when doing a complete restore via Time Machine, though I admittedly haven't done that in a very long time.

jW

 

[krravi]

I don't remember there being any choice when you do that. As I recall when you tell it to restore from a Time Machine backup it just asks where the backup is. Mal (below) says he does recall being able to choose a date.

Give it a try and please come back and confirm the outcome for us.

I just did it a few days ago and it shows a drop down list box where it lists all your backups by date in descending order... I picked the one in the middle as thats where I had installed all the software I needed.

 

[ZBoater]

Sorry to resurrect such an old thread, but this is very relevant to my question. I have OS X 10.8.5 and will be upgrading to Mavericks. I want to preserve the current backup on my TimeMachine. I am using 400GB of 2TB, so there is plenty of space to copy the current backup to another directory to preserve it.

My question is, who can I access that "preserved" backup if I ever wanted to restore part or all of it?