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Time Machine + Macbook + Mybook External HD

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I would presume that it backs upto your internal hd as standard with an option to back up to an external as not everybody will have external hd.

I am not sure the technicalities of how time machine works but I cant imagine it working like it backs up your whole system and then says eats a % of your hd as after a few weeks/months of hourly backups you would have no hd space.

http://www.apple.com/uk/macosx/leopard/features/timemachine.html

If there is an option to back up to external hd then I would hope that there will be some form of function to the frequency of which it backs up.
 
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I was thinking about this. I would much rather it backed up to my external HD. But if i had to retrieve the data, i would have to have the cable in? hmmmm? I've never had osX not be able to do something i wanted. We shall see.

Oh, does anybody know if i can partition a FreeAgent pro, and if so, use both partitions at the same time? (Firewire)

Cheers.
 
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Won't Time Machine just work like the current Backup software? It schedules backups and if your external HD is not connected it just skips the backup for the time being. I figured Time Machine was Backup without having to pay for a .Mac membership.
 

bobtomay

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Oh, does anybody know if i can partition a FreeAgent pro, and if so, use both partitions at the same time? (Firewire)

Cheers.

Any drive can be partitioned - just realize that the partitioning process will erase everything on the drive.

Once you have it partitioned and when connected to the drive, each partition will show up as a drive in finder and will also be listed on the desktop if you have this preference set.
 
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Cheers for the reply. But do you know if i can read/write from the 2 partitions at the same time. Eg. Save file to partition A while watching movie on partition B of the same Firewire drive.

Ta.
 
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^^ Of course. Unless it is a really high bitrate movie, the HD can multitask pretty well.

As for time machine, you can just as well pause the backing up process and resume it when you plug the HD back in. And it does not backup while it is in sleep mode, that is, you can unplug the drive, put the mac to sleep and then five hours later, when you plug it back in, it will continue it's usual process....
 

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Yep, as goobi stated you can.
Just tried it: watching a movie from my external and transferring a file to it simultaneously, no issue although the transfer was rather small.

I may be just a tad paranoid, I keep a bootable backup on one partition of the external (via SuperDuper!) and all my movies and itumes on the 2nd partition. Others may, but I am not personally willing to take a chance on my back up by trying to run a back up and simultaneously play a movie from the external. Am sure it works just fine, it's just me, would rather schedule the backup for a time when the system is not working on a bunch of other stuff. And this may just be my hold over from prior to C2D processors.
 
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How about you let Time Machine take care of the backups (after leopard is out), and whatever else you want to store, just dump it on the external. There's no need for making two partitions.
 

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Well, we're yet to know for sure all the ins and outs of exactly how Time Machine works. Does it provide for a bootable back up in case you internal dies or does it just back up your data?

In the case of SuperDuper, if you want a bootable backup and storage space for stuff that is not kept on your internal drive - 2 partitions is necessary. I enjoy having this set up as I know if my internal drive dies, not a big deal, I just re-boot from the external and keep going till I have the chance to replace it. It all depends on your needs and what you're looking to accomplish with an external drive.
 
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Time machine does not back up apps, system files and such. But I'm assuming, that if something goes wrong, while installation, it will automatically copy all your documents and such to make it just as it was minus the apps.
 

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