Backup HD

[tape]

I currently have 2 WD USB 3 HD [one is 1TB and other is 2 TB] for backups to my iMac and wife's MacBook. I use Carbon Copy Cloner. I have begun to notice, however, that since the past few OS updates, these drives are not mounting. With the MacBook, it just seems to take a LONG time. For my iMac, I often have to go through Disk Utility to mount. When I have difficulty, I run the first aid stuff and I have even reformatted. Mounting may work well for a few backups, but then the mounting difficulty resurfaces. I'm waiting for my new iMac to arrive and want to move over data, etc without a problem. Thinking perhaps that I just need to move on from WD. So my question: do you have suggestions for drives that WORK? Thanks

 

[Raz0rEdge]

How old are the drives? How often do you use it for backups? What does the SMART status indicate for these drives? Failure to mount is usually the first indication that the drive is on its way out.

If you're reformatting it and things are still unstable, it's time to grab a newer set of drives.

 

[tape]

How old are the drives? How often do you use it for backups? What does the SMART status indicate for these drives? Failure to mount is usually the first indication that the drive is on its way out.

If you're reformatting it and things are still unstable, it's time to grab a newer set of drives.

Raz0rEdge,
My 1 TB is a good number of years, while the 2 TB is much fewer. These are drives I keep off site after backup, so I do so less often-each month. However, since the mounting difficulties, I backup with these every week. Any brand recommendations for me?

 

[Raz0rEdge]

There aren't that many manufacturers out there other than WD, Samsung and maybe Hitachi if they're still in this business. A lot of them also only make SSDs now.

However, I'm weary of recommending an SSD fo pure backup purposes since you'll exhaust the erase cycle very quickly and end up with a SSD that won't hold the data, so for frequent erasures, spinning disks are the best.

I'm running 4 WB Red NAS drives in my NAS and they replaced a set of WD drives before that were smaller and developed SMART failures after a few years of usage. My current set is from 2018 and still performing well. I'd expect to have to begin doing replacements in an other year or two.

 

[MacInWin]

However, I'm weary of recommending an SSD fo pure backup purposes since you'll exhaust the erase cycle very quickly and end up with a SSD that won't hold the data, so for frequent erasures, spinning disks are the best.

Not necessarily. I only backup twice a day, so the read/write cycles on my backup drive accumulate very slowly. The real advantage of spinners for backup is price. So every individual has to assess the cost/benefit to THEM of the backup device. Need hourly backups like Time Machine and speed is not really an issue? Spinner will probably do. Make less frequent backups but want them done fast? SSD. I have both in service.

 

[chscag]

Need hourly backups like Time Machine and speed is not really an issue? Spinner will probably do. Make less frequent backups but want them done fast? SSD. I have both in service.

Same here. I use two Samsung T5 SSDs to do my CCC backups. I alternate them every other day. However, for my Time Machine backups, I continue to use a Seagate Spinner.

 

[Randy B. Singer]

Some thoughts:

The three manufacturers of raw rotating disk hard drive mechanisms are: Western Digital, Seagate, and Toshiba. Toshiba tends to make good drives across the board. WD and Seagate both make some of the very best RDHD's, and some of the most putrid drives.

If you are purchasing an external RDHD, much more important is the company that put the drive together, not the maker of the internal raw mechanism. For instance, Glyph makes amazingly reliable external hard drives in their Studio series, despite using Seagate mechanisms. That's because they spec them very highly and then test every one before they put them into one of their cases.

Glyph Studio Professional External Drive

The Original External Hard Drive for Content Creators Glyph Studio is a production-grade external hard drive packed with best-in-class technology and backed by the industry's best warranty. With USB 3.0, FireWire 800, and eSATA ports you can connect with your interface of choice...

www.glyphtech.com

If you format your RDHD as APFS instead of HFS+, it will run like a dog. APFS is optimized for SSD's, and not for RDHD's.

If you want to check the health of your hard drives, and diagnose their problems, you can use the free demo of this product:

DRIVEDX
DriveDx - the most advanced drive health diagnostics and monitoring utility

The concept of "wearing out your SSD" is terribly overblown. Recent SSD's used in anything other than a server will likely last many times longer than a RDHD. This one is an excellent choice:

Oyen Digital Helix 1TB USB-C (USB 3.2 Gen2) NVMe Portable SSD, Up to 950 MB/S - Newegg.com

Buy Oyen Digital Helix 1TB USB-C (USB 3.2 Gen2) NVMe Portable SSD, Up to 950 MB/S with fast shipping and top-rated customer service. Once you know, you Newegg!

www.newegg.com

 

[MacInWin]

The concept of "wearing out your SSD" is terribly overblown. Recent SSD's used in anything other than a server will likely last many times longer than a RDHD.

Thanks for saying that, Randy. Needed to be said.

 

[RadDave]

Some thoughts:
........................
If you want to check the health of your hard drives, and diagnose their problems, you can use the free demo of this product:

DRIVEDX
DriveDx - the most advanced drive health diagnostics and monitoring utility

The concept of "wearing out your SSD" is terribly overblown. Recent SSD's used in anything other than a server will likely last many times longer than a RDHD. This one is an excellent choice:.....................

Hi Randy - on my 3 Mac computers (1 iMac + 1 Laptops all on Catalina), I'm using 5 external drives for each (duplicate CCC & TM BUs) which are a mixture of EHDs & SSDs - just checked a half dozen and have some EHDs formatted w/ APFS and some SSDs on HFS+ - for the latter, maybe was for TM using only HFS+ in the past?

Thus my question(s): 1) Should all SSDs be on APFS since TM now supports that format; and 2) Should all EHD spinners be on HFS+ relative to your statement 'running like a dog' if using APFS? Thanks - Dave

 

[chscag]

Hi Dave:

My experience with using the Big Sur Disk Utility app is that it will insist on formatting an external hard drive to APFS Case Sensitive regardless of whether it's a spinner or SSD.

At first I thought I did something wrong when I formatted a Seagate 1TB spinner drive that I wanted to use for Time Machine backups and found out that even though I selected HFS+, it still formatted it to APFS Case Sensitive.

I erased it and tried again. Same result.

I concluded that the Big Sur Disk Utility app was doing that by default. It certainly did not do that when I was using Catalina or Mojave.

 

[RadDave]

Thanks Charlie for your comments above - all of these externals seem to work so the decision as to use APFS vs. HFS+ remains confusing to me, and this article from just a year ago does not seem to clarify matters much still stating not to use APFS on TM backup drives - hasn't this changed? Dave

 

[chscag]

The article you referred to is still valid. However, it seems that Apple is moving ahead with making APFS its default file system even on external hard drives that are of the spinner type. But you can still use HFS+ on spinner type hard drives provided you format them with a version of Disk Utility prior to Big Sur.

 

[Randy B. Singer]

Thus my question(s): 1) Should all SSDs be on APFS since TM now supports that format; and 2) Should all EHD spinners be on HFS+ relative to your statement 'running like a dog' if using APFS?

It would be optimal to do so. Of course you can't use TM, pre-Big Sur, on an APFS disk. And you can't boot Big Sur from an HFS+ disk. So those are exceptions.

 

[Rod]

My experience with using the Big Sur Disk Utility app is that it will insist on formatting an external hard drive to APFS Case Sensitive regardless of whether it's a spinner or SSD.

Yes, I noticed the same thing myself, glad it's not just me. I initially thought it was my error but after repeating the exercise got the same result again: APFS Case Sensitive for my StoreJet Transcend 1Tb spinner.

 

[Rod]

Keeping the whole thing simple, my wife and I now have:

1 X HDD Transcend (spinner) 1Tb for each of our devices running Time Machine Daily.
1 X SSD Samsung T5 1TB for *Data only Carbon Copy Cloner backup (with safety net on) once a week.
1 X Bootable Big Sur USB installer on Thumb Drive created with Instal Disk Creator from macdaddy.io

*Due to bootable clone issues with Big Sur I have elected to perform Macintosh HD-Data only backups for now on my Intel based devices.

 

[jpdemers]

Bombich (the creators of Carbon Copy Cloner) now says that Apple has relented (a bit) and is allowing them to make bootable clones. The latest release of CCC supposedly can pull off the feat - but not all external drives are actually compatible with the scheme. (None of mine, for example. )

 

[chscag]

Carbon Copy Cloner version 6.0 was released last night. Upgrade from version 5.0 is $20.00.

 

[Lifeisabeach]

Bombich (the creators of Carbon Copy Cloner) now says that Apple has relented (a bit) and is allowing them to make bootable clones. The latest release of CCC supposedly can pull off the feat - but not all external drives are actually compatible with the scheme. (None of mine, for example. )

I can confirm that. I made a bootable clone using CCC 5.1.27.

The demise of Bootable macOS Clones?

A couple of things struck me when reading the AppleInsider article: 1. It states: While this article is more about making it possible to have an M1-based Mac that has more primary storage, the same principle can be used to create a bootable drive for emergencies. If the main macOS installation...

www.mac-forums.com

 

[Lifeisabeach]

The article you referred to is still valid. However, it seems that Apple is moving ahead with making APFS its default file system even on external hard drives that are of the spinner type. But you can still use HFS+ on spinner type hard drives provided you format them with a version of Disk Utility prior to Big Sur.

Mmmmm... I can still format my external HDD in HFS+ on Big Sur. Now I do believe that as a bootable volume, it would be converted to APFS if Big Sur is installed to it. But as a data-only volume, nope. HFS+ is still very much allowed.

 

[chscag]

Mmmmm... I can still format my external HDD in HFS+ on Big Sur. Now I do believe that as a bootable volume, it would be converted to APFS if Big Sur is installed to it. But as a data-only volume, nope. HFS+ is still very much allowed.

Some of us have tried several times using the version of Disk Utility provided with Big Sur 11.3.1 and it absolutely defaults to APFS Case Sensitive. And thats with Spinner hard drives not just SSDs.