So far Time Machine is a Big disappointment.

I am not one of these folks just looking to trash apple at every chance, so it pains me to write this.
This is not a question, rather my comments on Feature Time Machine.
I rushed to pre-order it and when it finally came, I find the main thing (Time Machine) I was really interested in only worked with a connected hard-drive (via Firewire, USB) nothing else. This makes this feature absolutely useless a lot of portable(notebook) users. None of us want to hook up a bulky USB or Firewire dive, thats why we choose a notebook in the first place. It would have been nice to been able to use this with my NAS dive. We want options not Limitations thats why I bought an Apple instead of a PC. Lets hope they will consider a fix for this soon.

it probably won't help with your NAS drive, but it is possible to us an external drive hooked in to a network machine, provided it is formatted with HFS. I have my MacBook backing up its Time Machine over the network to an external drive attached to my iMac upstairs

I also have a OSX server on my network with another terabyte share and still nothing. interesting that you got it to work with a drive shared on you other mac...I understand it works with Leopard server well.

Ouch! Time Machine was one of the Leopard features I actually thought was kind of cool. I have a Mac Pro and I like to keep my drives internal. I have one empty hard drive bay remaining which I plan to use for backups of the OS drive and nothing else. I had assumed that Time Machine would naturally work with it. I am very surprised that it doesn't! I imagine this will be one of the things they change in 10.5.x, or at least I hope.

Time Machine will only work with external drives that are connected to Macs with Leopard on them. So if your Mac Server is running 10.4, that would explain why Time Machine won't use it. If you upgrade to 10.5 Server, I'm sure that will take care of your problem.

And Joe, if you add in an internal hard drive, you should be able to use Time Machine with it. I don't think you're limited solely to external or networked hard drives.

Internal Drive

I have a Mac Pro and I used an internal drive with time machine. I had a 100 gig's to backup the first time, it took over an hour to do it. It's a great feature that I know I will use down the road.

In Time Machine preferences it showed that all my mounted drives (20GB Windows partition, 500GB FW drive & 250GB USB drive) where available to be used, and just grayed out the ones that where too small. I don't think it matters how the drive is connected, as long as it's mounted.

I am using an external drive on my MacBook and I was wondering if I could unplug it for travel etc. Would that mess everything up or would it just stop working until I plug it back in?

It notes the changes, and updates the drive when you plug it back in.

All my drive NAS and HFS network shares (wirelessly.....I also tried to connect wired ethernet) and Nothing appears in my TM preferences. I did however try a old firewire drive connect directly to my notebook and that did show up but thats not going to work for me. I just don't want a wired HD that I have to plug in to sitting on y coffee table. Also I understand it might work wirelessly with the server upgrade ($499) but I just cant see spending that kind of money for this. Don't get me wrong ...I never said it was disappointment for everyone, I,m just disappointed in the flexibility.

BTW I sure it will also work with any HFS formatted internal HD as long as it not the system drive.( for those that may be concerned.)

Well seeing as it was available in the developer previews, I'm guessing Apple might restore this feature with 10.5.1 or later.

It is disappointing that it isn't available in the shipping version of Leopard, but Backup software is one thing that needs to be rock solid. I'd rather they get it just right than corrupt my backups...

SunsetRoadzter said:

I have a Mac Pro and I used an internal drive with time machine. I had a 100 gig's to backup the first time, it took over an hour to do it. It's a great feature that I know I will use down the road.

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OK, cool. I thought that it was a little odd allowing only for USB and Firewire drives.

Joe Redifer said:

OK, cool. I thought that it was a little odd allowing only for USB and Firewire drives.

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Ya, that would be. I know on my quad, all of my internal and all of my external drives show up as eligible for TM.

I have a MB and a Mini, both running 10.5. Am I correct in believing that a shared FW drive from the Mini would be usable as a TM drive for the MB over the wireless? Also, can the same drive be used as a TM drive for both ie: external 320GB FW drive on the Mini as the TM drive for both the Mini and MB? Does it need to be partitioned into 2 volumes?
Thanks!

i havent even tryed TM yet. the only external HDD i have is my ipod, and it wont even show as a choice grayed out.

baggss said:

Ya, that would be. I know on my quad, all of my internal and all of my external drives show up as eligible for TM.

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even the boot drive?

Fallooza said:

even the boot drive?

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Good point. I think he meant all the drives except the boot drive figuring people would take it that way.