zipping files recommended??

Yes, it's fine to zip anything you want. Be aware that some files such as documents or text files will compress to a greater degree than files like photos or videos.

You shouldn't see much difference in speed when using an external drive, unless you're dealing with very large files or a large volume of files, in which case your connection method may play a role. In other words, for example, a Firewire 800 connection to an external drive can transfer files 2-3 times faster than a USB 2.0 connection.

As long as you follow CCC's instructions properly, you shouldn't have any problems with a WD drive.

I highly recommend CCC for backing up any type of files, or your entire hard drive.

 

In Finder, either select all the photos, or select the entire folder where they reside, then right-click and select "Compress x Items" or "Compress foldername". You can then put the zip file created anywhere you want it.

That depends on if you use the Mac OS X built-in compression tool or if you use a 3rd party app, such as StuffIt Expander or UnRarX or The Unarchiver or iZip or many others. With the built-in tool, you would have to expand the original zip, then re-zip with the new files included. Some of the other tools may allow you to simply drag and drop new files on an existing zip file to add them.

 

Hello Knew2Mac,

Welcome.

It sounds like you're asking about 2 different features: compressing, and backing up.

The two are not directly related, but go well together.

Typically, you computer has 1 hard drive. It's basically a big bucket that holds files.

They suffer from 2 fundamental problems:
1) They can't get any bigger. You can buy a bigger bucket, but you can't make the bucket you have bigger.
2) They go bad. After enough time, they fail. They having moving parts and they have circuits that move electrons. It's just a matter of time until it goes bad.

Compressing (or zipping) files helps solve the first problem.
Backing up files helps solve the second problem.

Compressing the files makes them smaller. The smaller the files, the more can fit in your bucket.

Backing up your files into a 2nd bucket means that when the first bucket fails, you still have a copy of the files in another bucket.

A match made in heaven?
Most people's hard drives are mostly empty space. So even if you copy every single file to two hard drives, the backup drive is mostly empty space. Let's say you make a backup every day of every single file. That means your backup drive will get full faster than your original drive. The original drive has 1 copy of every file, then other drive has several copies of every file. That's why people make a backup and then compress it.

Does that help clarify things?