Time Machine rejects Samba Share

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I am new to Macs and I have a brand new Mac Mini now. We use many Windows machines to connect to a Linux server's samba share. The new Mac 'sees' the Samba share all right. But refuses to use this share for Time machine backup. It also doesn't like a common external harddrive for backup which it wants to format.

My Linux server - I agree is getting long in the tooth - it runs Fedora Core 11 and another Linux server runs Centos 5.5. All the help available on the Net point to installing netatalk service in the Linux which I did. But no joy.

I would be grateful for any insight.
 
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If you're drive doesn't support Time Machine (which it won't in this circumstance), you can't set it up without formatting . . . . unless . . . . you change the flag to allow unsupported drives and manually create the sparsebundle

Further info here

That said, as you want a backup to be easy, reliable and accessible a directly connected, dedicated HD might be a better solution
 
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Thanks mrplow. I tried all tricks as mentioned but still it doesn't budge. I even shrunk my external hard drive to allocate space for Mac's Disk Utility to format. Even this is refused by Mac as it cribs that it is a MBR partition. At the end of the day, I am resigned to buying another external hard drive. I am not making any comparisons here - but I have had Windows and Linux computers co-existing together for years and one Mac refuses to accept other entities.
 
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I used similar info to get Time Machine working to an ext3 formatted, networked drive. Sorry it didn't work for you. But that one tool is giving you issues isn't really representative of an entire platform. I have OSX, Windows and Linux (x86 and ARM) boxes all playing nice with one another.

Perhaps consider a different tool like Carbon Copy Cloner or Super Duper, both very popular choices on here
 

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Uh, MBR partition is not compatible with Time Machine. It has to be a GUID and Apples Mac OSX Extended Journalized! In Disk Utility you hit the partition tab after selecting the drive. There is an Options there. Click that and change it to GUID then Apply.
 
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I used similar info to get Time Machine working to an ext3 formatted, networked drive. Sorry it didn't work for you. But that one tool is giving you issues isn't really representative of an entire platform. I have OSX, Windows and Linux (x86 and ARM) boxes all playing nice with one another.

Perhaps consider a different tool like Carbon Copy Cloner or Super Duper, both very popular choices on here

Thanks again. I know eventually they can be made to work with each other. But I am worried about the time it would take. I already spent one full day trying.

Uh, MBR partition is not compatible with Time Machine. It has to be a GUID and Apples Mac OSX Extended Journalized! In Disk Utility you hit the partition tab after selecting the drive. There is an Options there. Click that and change it to GUID then Apply.

Thanks. Would this method force me to lose the data in the NTFS partition ?

Mac mini doesn't have a eSATA port unlike my Dell Server. If it had that , I would have rigged up a hard drive I have in stock.
 

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