How to Back Up Files to an External Hard Drive using Time Machine

To prevent loss of your valuable files in the event of an unexpected crash or other mishap, you should make a regular backup routine an essential part of your workflow. Time Machine is an application bundled as part of the Mac OSX Leopard and Snow Leopard operating systems that allows you to automatically back up your hard drive periodically.

Things You'll Need

• Mac computer with Time Machine
• External hard drive
• USB cable

Instructions

1. Connect your external hard drive to your computer with a USB cable. Time Machine will automatically detect the external drive and ask you if you wish to use this drive to back up your machine.

2. Click “Use as Back Up Disk”.

3. Select how often you would like Time Machine to perform a backup: hourly, daily or weekly. Click the lock to prevent further changes and Time Machine is ready to go.

Tips & Warnings

• To change these settings, you can return to the Time Machine preferences box at any time by navigating to "Apple", "System Preferences" and "Time Machine".

• Your Mac must be awake and your external hard drive must be connected to your computer at the time the backup is performed.

• The first backup may take a long time, depending on how much data you have to copy. It may be more practical to set Time Machine to perform the first backup overnight.

• Not all external hard drives automatically coexist with Time Machine. If you used your external hard drive previously on a Windows machine, or the external drive was preformatted when you bought it, you will receive a prompt from Time Machine to reformat your drive. The reformatting process effectively erases all data on the drive and changes the format to be compatible with your machine.

References

• Mac 101: Time Machine