Time Machine question

I have a external 1TB hard drive connected to my Time Machine. I run also Parellels 5 with Windows 7 installed.

Is there a way I can automatically back up data which is held on the Windows partition using Time Machine?

Thanks

It is done automatically since the Windows VM is just a file on your hard drive.

If you have not excluded the parallels vm file (the virtual hard drive) it is already backing it up. That being said, it is backing it up as a total snapshot (hard drive image) rather than in individual files. The only way to backup the files to the TC would be to connect to it via windows and use a Windows backup tool to save to the networked drive.

Thanks folks. I have checked and it has backed up the Parellels partition. I use Microsoft Frontpage for my web design which I do see in the listings, but I do not see any of the files which were saved.

If I do need to restore Microsoft Frontpage will it automatically install the saved files too?

Think of it this way. The VM hard drive is nothing more than a large file. In that file is your windows installation and anytime that you open it, it and make changes to it you will prompt time machine to back it up. This is much like any document that you open on your machine.

You can't restore a single file to parallels from time machine. You can only restore the entire hard drive. So, if you trash your files for some odd reason, you can restore the last snap shot of your entire hard drive.

Day 1 Time Machine backs up VM.
Day 2 Install Front Page and then Time Machine backs up VM.
Day 3 Crash....

If you restore Day 1 you will get the VM without Front Page.

If you restore Day 2 you will get it all.

Thank you my friend, you explained it clearly.

Your Windows VM needs to be excluded from Time Machine ASAP. As was stated, the VM is stored on your Mac's HD as one giant file. Say you've set aside 30gb of your HD for Parallels/Windows. There is a single 30gb file in the Documents folder on your HD containing the VM. Every time you boot Parallels/Windows, minute changes are made to the VM files triggering a Time Machine backup of the file in your Documents. That means Time Machine is writing an addditional 30gb of data to your external everytime you boot Windows. At that rate, how long will it be before your external drive is full?

Tip: Using Time Machine and Parallels | BabyGotMac

EDIT: I should also mention that Entourage and Aperture should be excluded for similar reasons. If your using either, you should exclude the Microsoft User Data file in Documents and your Aperture Library. Microsoft has said they will address this incompatibility in their next release of Office for Mac. Not sure how Apple overlooked the incompatibility with Aperture...

It just works. hehe

Hi. Roughly on the same topic ... I am still in transition between PC and Mac. Have installed windows with bootcamp but without parallels or fusion (don't see the need to run both pc and mac at once!?!). Have not yet loaded my files as I need to find out:

a) which side to load my files on (ie pc or mac - I unfortunately will still need to use windows and therefore need to be able to access files from both sides) ... I understand that mac will read files on the windows side but not vice versa

b) the best way to use Time Machine to back up all files ... I understand that Time Machine won't back up files on the pc side without parallels or equivalent

c) Has anyone had experience with NTFS for Mac? - PARAGON Software Group - NTFS for Mac, communication channel between Mac OS X and Windows It apparently allows files to be read from both pc and mac sides and therefore I could place them all on the mac side and have Time Machine do its thing. On the surface of it this seems to be the option for me to go with.

I'm impressed thus far with the Mac but will be a far happier man when these decisions are out the way and I can finally use the mac full time.

These forums are excellent!
Rich

Hi, if you exclude parallels from time machine back up, then what happens if you have to restore from it, you would not get your work back?

I do use parallels and i have read about this elsewhere, my VM drive is 20 gb, as i am frightened to exclude this from TM i don't, but what i do do is to work on my files in ms money and in quick books and then just stick in a usb stick and copy the files to it just to be on the safe side, i must exclude the VM from TM
and i think that i would be safe if i did lose vm and have to do a restore as i could just reinstall viand the windows programs and then copy my files back from the usb memory stick? Right/Wrong?