external hard drive time machine backup without erasing

#EXTERNAL HARD DRIVE TIME MACHINE BACKUP WITHOUT ERASING MANUAL#

Click Finder > Preferences and examine the Hard Disks in Show these items on the desktop. Just plug in the external hard drive to your Mac to get started and back up your data.

#EXTERNAL HARD DRIVE TIME MACHINE BACKUP WITHOUT ERASING MANUAL#

Thank you for whatever help you can provide. Method 1: Manual Backup You can manually back up Mac data to an external hard drive without Time Machine. For single-drive computers, you’ll need a device to connect the old drive to your computer after your new drive is installed.

In short, how can I get both storage space and Time Machine space on my external hard drive without erasing the material already stored on that hard drive? To transfer your data, you’ll need both your original drive and your new drive, connected at the same time. So, are there any ways to partition that external hard drive without erasing the data that is on it? Or is there any way to trim files from Time Machine to shrink the backup size to keep storage space open? I've heard something about some software that partitions drives without the erasure of data. And although I could solve this problem by getting another external hard drive and backing up files to that, I am treating that option as a last resort.

When looking at the preferences for Time Machine, they state that Time Machine will continue to keep weekly backups until the drive is full obviously this poses a bit of a problem, as I want to keep using this drive for both functions, and as the drive is currently not partitioned into seperate parts for both time machine and the extra storage.ĭisk Utility warns that it cannot partition a hard drive without erasing its contents, and I already have too much stored on my external hard drive to move the files back onto my computer's regular hard drive. As I got the drive a while before I got Leopard, I used the provided backup software, along with simply moving what items I wanted stored on the external hard drive to it. I've got a 500GB external hard drive that I want to use as both a backup drive, and as extra storage space.

External hard drive time machine backup without erasing