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Time Machine & external drive size
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Forum Regular
Join Date: Jun 2000
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Hello all,
Wondering how people are planning to utilize Time Machine - specfically, what ratio of internal to external drive size are you considering?
As a typical home user, most of my large files are non-compressible multimedia (photo and video), which take up 1:1 space on the backup drive but won't change much from snapshot to snapshot (and therefore not requiring multiple writes). However, non-destructive backups do tend to eat up a lot of space over time.
My current 120GB external drive isn't going to cut it with my new 320GB iMac, so I'm planning to swap it out for a larger IDE. My guess is that it makes sense to go with 500GB external, but open to other views. Your thoughts?
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Posting Junkie
Join Date: Oct 2005
Location: Houston, TX
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There are a lot of things you wouldn't back up with TM (System, Libraries, Applications, etc), so it's OK to have your external be a tad smaller than your internal. Also most people don't run their internal hard drives 100% full. On the other hand, the bigger the external is the more versions you'll be able to store.
500GB is the best bang/buck for externals (and internals) right now at about 33 cents/gig including the enclosure. I don't see much value in going to a larger drive today unless you're doing a lot of file revision and/or you need a long history.
On a somewhat related topic, does Time Machine support binary diffs? Or even diffs at all? Or does it re-copy an entire file if one bit changes?
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Grizzled Veteran
Join Date: May 2005
Location: Toronto, ON
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I was wondering the same.
I saw a 1 TB Firewire/USB2 Western Digital hard drive at Costco for under $350. I'm planning on picking one of them up in preparation.
My MBP has the 120 GB HD, so it should be plenty and be able to handle a few versions (if it works the way I think it does that is)
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MacBook Pro | 2.16 ghz core2duo | 2gb ram | superdrive | airport extreme
iBook G4 | 1.2ghz | 768mb ram | combodrive | airport extreme
iPhone 3GS | 32 GB | Jailbreak, or no Jailbreak
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Dedicated MacNNer
Join Date: Jan 2001
Location: Pittsboro, NC
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I'm using the current build of Time Machine and have it mapped to a network drive at work (just AFPing to the drive over ethernet). This seems to work best for me and will probably continue with this - the two external drives I've owned were very failure prone.
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Mac Elite
Join Date: May 2001
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Since there is no more detailed information anything about necessary hd sizes is speculation.
A full backup would need that space of the (compressed) original data. But Apple’s Time Machine is not advertised as a backup application. So it might only keep record of the changes to the current actual data. That would imply that the /System, /Library, /Application (and any other) folders are not occupying any space as long as there are no files added or removed to them.
Each incremental backup to record the changes will occupy the space of the difference to the previous backup. The Apple movie suggests there will be (by default) daily backups for the past month, half as much for the previous month and then perhaps less for the months before.
It could be, that Time Machine will automatically adapt the granularity of the backup points to the size of the backup volume.
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Moderator  Join Date: May 2001
Location: Hilbert space
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I'd try to get a drive which is roughly twice as large, so basically a 500 GB and a 750 GB drive fits the bill. I think you'll be fine with 500 GB for now -- which have the best bang for the buck these days anyway.
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I don't suffer from insanity, I enjoy every minute of it.
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Addicted to MacNN
Join Date: Oct 2002
Location: England | San Francisco
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If you think about it, stuff that you change all the time are usually text files and stuff, so it wouldn't take up that much more room.
I personally go for backup drives that are 2x the size too. (I have a current and a stable backup)
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we don't have time to stop for gas
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Grizzled Veteran
Join Date: May 2005
Location: Toronto, ON
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Originally Posted by Moonray 
But Apple’s Time Machine is not advertised as a backup application. So it might only keep record of the changes to the current actual data. -
The OSX Leopard website states:
"More than a mere backup, Time Machine makes an up-to-date copy of everything on your Mac — digital photos, music, movies, TV shows, and documents — so you can go back in time to recover anything."
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MacBook Pro | 2.16 ghz core2duo | 2gb ram | superdrive | airport extreme
iBook G4 | 1.2ghz | 768mb ram | combodrive | airport extreme
iPhone 3GS | 32 GB | Jailbreak, or no Jailbreak
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Mac Elite
Join Date: May 2001
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Mh ok, the fineprint. (However it does not explicitly state that it does not count the current copies on the original drives in.)
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Posting Junkie
Join Date: Feb 2000
Location: Washington, DC
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Originally Posted by Moonray
Mh ok, the fineprint. (However it does not explicitly state that it does not count the current copies on the original drives in.)
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"And what if the unthinkable happens and your drive crashes, losing all your data? Install a new hard drive, point Time Machine at your backup volume, and your Mac will reassemble your drive from the data on the backup volume using a file-transfer process similar to Apple’s Migration Assistant." - MacWorld
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