I have a LaCie external hard drive that is my Time Machine backup destination. It's plenty big enough (4TB) to hold the contents of my 3TB iMac, since I only have about 750GB of files so far on the iMac.
The problem is that when I go into the Time Machine to see if a file is there, it often isn't. Even though the file is still on my iMac's internal hard drive, it doesn't show up in a Time Machine backup in some cases until I go way, way back. And I never know how far back I need to go to find it.
My first question: Is this normal? Shouldn't every backup done by the LaCie include everything until it's full? (Currently 2.6TB of storage is still available on the LaCie.)
My second question: If this is normal operation, then how do I know how far back I need to go in Time Machine to find a particular file? It could be on any day's backup between now and when I got the LaCie last July.
The internal hard drive on my iMac hasn't failed--but I want the security of knowing I'll be able to find a file if it ever does.
Thanks.
The problem is that when I go into the Time Machine to see if a file is there, it often isn't. Even though the file is still on my iMac's internal hard drive, it doesn't show up in a Time Machine backup in some cases until I go way, way back. And I never know how far back I need to go to find it.
My first question: Is this normal? Shouldn't every backup done by the LaCie include everything until it's full? (Currently 2.6TB of storage is still available on the LaCie.)
My second question: If this is normal operation, then how do I know how far back I need to go in Time Machine to find a particular file? It could be on any day's backup between now and when I got the LaCie last July.
The internal hard drive on my iMac hasn't failed--but I want the security of knowing I'll be able to find a file if it ever does.
Thanks.