Snow Leopard and Time Machine

[billwill]

I use an external hard drive to back up my MacBook using Time Machine. Before I upgraded to Snow Leopard, it would take a few minutes when I did a backup every 10 days or so. Now with Snow Leopard, it seems to take about 30 seconds!

Before Snow Leopard, the Time Machine icon would just come up and stay on the desktop until it finished, then I'd drag it to the Trash Bin.

Now with Snow Leopard, the Time Machine icon comes up yellow, then after 30 seconds or so, turns green, and the status light on the hard drive barely blinks.

Is my data REALLY being backed up or do I need to change some settings or something? TIA.

 

[bobtomay]

After the first backup, it only backs up those things that have changed. If nothing or very little data has changed, then it's just not going to take long.

Have you gone into TM to verify your data is there? Always, with any backup method, verify the backup.

 

[billwill]

Thanks, Bobtomay

How would I go about checking the data in Time Machine? I'm a Mac newbie. Thanks again for your help.

 

[bobtomay]

Open Time Machine.

Spend a few minutes once in awhile just browsing through the Finder window it opens. Take a gander at the documents folder, music folder, etc.

You won't be able to verify, file by file, that indeed the whole drive has been backed up. But at least go in and check it out on occasion to verify it's readable and accessible.

There's nothing worse related to your data than to think you have it backed up only to discover the backup is no good after your primary drive fails.

This is just good practice whether backing up to an external drive, CD, etc.

 

[chippypoo]

I figured i'd post here since its about Time Machine and Snow Leopard.

My laptop got stolen recently and luckily they didn't take my external harddrive, stupid thieves. Anyway, I wanted to know if there are issues since my harddrive was still Leopard, and since I'd be buying a new laptop, what would be my issues in restoring the new laptop that has snow leopard on it?? Or I guess I should ask, what I should do in this case???

 

[McBie]

You can safely restore a TM backup ( taken from Leopard ) onto Snow Leopard .... done it myself several times already when I deleted something by accident.

Cheers ... McBie

 

[chippypoo]

awesome, thanks a bunch!

 

[chscag]

I'll verify what McBie stated. When I installed Snow Leopard clean I used my Time Machine backup from Leopard to restore. Worked great.

Regards.

 

[ggrizzy]

before i upgrade to snow leopard, i had a320G external HD connected to my TM and it was working fine - i could access it (for storage, not for backups), and my PC's could access it too. after upgrading my mac pro, i've lost access to it thru the TM, and can only access it when it's directly plugged in via USB. is there any way to get it to be visible again thru the TM?