Time Machine with my Western Digital

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I am in the process of backing up my Macbook with the Western Digital external hard drive for the second time ever. The first backup I did was about 6 months ago and it took many hours (usb connection). I am now on my second backup. Should it take another 6 hours or backup much faster? I don't have the hard drive connected to the computer often, so it really doesn't do frequent backups. Naturally, I would think that the second backup would take significantly shorter because it's only looking for new files. Isn't my assumption correct?
 
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Yes basically, you got it in one.
You did your complete system back-up 1st time and it would have take a lil while, but this should be a short one depends on what you have been doing over the last 6mths and what you have dl. It will look for the newer file since the last one and back them up only.

As a suggestion, to do bootable backup with SuperDuper or CarbonCopyCloner.
These two make a clone and bootable copy of your HD just if for reasons unknown your HD fails.
TM isnt bootable ..... Just a suggestion :)

Cheers
 

Slydude

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You're second backup may also take a while.Time Machine is going to have to examine all of those files again and determine which files have changed before backing up the changed files. Time Machine was designed from the ground up with incremental backups in mind. When performed hourly, the backups are usually almost unnoticeable in the background even with a USB connection. This might give you some ideas for improving its performance. ATPM 15.03 - How To: Time Travel: Introduction to Time Machine
 
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27" i7 iMac 2.8 Ghz, 1TB, 8GB RAM | 13" MBP 2.53Ghz 320GB HD, 4G RAM | iPad 2 64GB+3G *WHITE*
I am looking to get a 1.5TB WD HD to back up my stuff And make it wireless if i got a airport extreme or a airport express could I connect the HD to that and then have my comps back up automaticly? I know time capsule has both but I have been reading reviews that ppl say the HD went out and they can't replace so I am looking for an alternative. And is there any benefit to getting and apple router?
 

Slydude

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You can do what you want with the Airport Extreme. Time Machine should work with a hard drive attached to the USB port. The specs for the Express suggest that the USB port on the Express works for shared printing but makes no mention of hard drive use. The other difference between the Extreme and Express is that the Extreme is dual band. Slower 802.11b or g clients won't slow down the 802.11n clients on your network.

I currently use an external hard drive attached to my Time Capsule. That drive functions as my Time Machine backup so the process should work fine. The first time you run the backup I suggest connecting by Ethernet wirelessly. The initial Time Machine backup can be quite slow wirelessly.
 
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what do you think about this...Western Digital - My Book World Edition 1TB Remote Access Storage System.. it has a ethernet cable and can be connected to a router so i wont have to purchase a new one.
 

Slydude

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I haven't used that product but have seen a few ads that specifically mention that it can be used with Time Machine. Since it can be formatted HFS+ Time Machine should be OK with it.
 
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awesome i think i may get that... and i thought you could copy everything onto a new HD if it failed with Time Machine? what is the point of it then?
 

Slydude

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I'm pretty sure you can restore an entire drive with Time Machine although Super Duper or Carbon Copy Cloner might be better for that task.

Time machine really is designed to make sure the backup is current by updating every hour. It really shines when you have to revert to the a previous version of a file.
 

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