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Copying Time Machine

HI

I decided to upgrade the external drive that I use for a Time Machine and have a question about copying the files across.  The Apple help article Time Machine: How to transfer backups from a current backup drive to a new backup drive - Apple Support says to drag the folder across but I had started mine copying using control-c and the control-v before I read the article, does this matter, is there really any difference?

The reason I ask is that for over 24 hours by iMac has been 'Preparing to Copy' it is now reached 3.5 million files and I've just used Info in Disk Utilities to find out that my current Time Machine drive has 19 million files.

Is the 'Preparing to Copy' count really going to count to 19 million and based on this math can I reasonably expect it to take about 6 days?

Is there a better way?

Any help or thoughts appreciated.

Regards

Drag and Drop or CTRL-C and CTRL-V are essentially the same. However, it is surely not the best way. Either you wait or stop the copy and do it some other way. The better way is to clone the old Time Machine drive to the new Time Machine drive:

Clone using Restore Option of Disk Utility

1. Open Disk Utility in the Utilities' folder.
2. Select the destination volume from the left side list.
3. Click on the Restore tab in the Disk Utility main window.
4. Select the destination volume from the left side list and drag it to the Destination entry field.
5. Select the source volume from the left side list and drag it to the Source entry field.
6. Double-check you got it right, then click on the Restore button.

Destination means new Time Machine drive. Source means the old Time Machine drive.

Be sure the new Time Machine drive has been properly partitioned and formatted before using:

Drive Partition and Format

1. Open Disk Utility in the Utilities' folder.
2. After Disk Utility loads select the drive (out-dented entry with the mfgr.'s ID and size) from the side list.
3. Click on the Erase tab in the Disk Utility toolbar. A panel should drop down.
4. In the drop down panel set the partition scheme to GUID. Set the Format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.)
5. Click on the Apply button and click on the Done button when it is activated.
6. Quit Disk Utility.

For syncing, backup, data transfers, etc. you should use a good disk utility. I suggest and recommend using Carbon Copy Cloner.

Hi, thank you, I have CCC, in fact I've just upgraded to v5, I use CCC to take at least a weekly clone of my iMac Fusion drive which I keep in a fire proof safe - you cannot have to many backups can you?

Just found this article Cloning one external hard drive to another external hard drive | Carbon Copy Cloner | Bombich Software so off to give it a try now.

I'm so frustrated with myself as I never even thought of using CCC, so glad I posted, thank you for you support.

regards

I think you'll find CCC is a lot faster than drag and drop copies of large amounts of data.

CCC refused the task :-( so I'm trying the Disk Utility, it is unmounted both drives and says Restoring so I will keep my fingers-crossed.

I'm surprised about this. Did not think there was anything CCC couldn't copy but looks like it cannot deal with the hard links and sparse-bundle structure of the backup. Must also explain why you cannot erase a Time Machine backup by dumping it in the Trash.

iwaddo wrote:

 

Is there a better way?

Yes: Disk Utility for Mac: Restore a disk

See my original posts, John. That has already been covered. Now the OP has stated he is using Disk Utility to make the copy.

最后更新：2017-08-28 09:16:11

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