#Format external hard drive time machine mac os

Mac OS Extended (Case-sensitive, Journaled) makes case-sensitive folders and Mac format.

#Format external hard drive time machine password

Mac OS Extended (Journaled, Encrypted) adds a password and partition encryption to the Mac format. Mac OS Extended (Journaled) uses Mac formatting to protect data integrity A Format pop-up window will give you the opportunity to choose one of the following:.

Click 'Erase' from the Disk Utility options.Find your external hard drive in the list of drives.

Open Applications > Utilities > Disk Utility.

Since most external hard drives are formatted for PCs, before the backup of your Mac begins you need to format the hard drive for macOS.

MS-DOS (FAT) is an ancient file system, and generally, you shouldn’t use it.Copying the files from your Mac to an external drive allows you to save data on your own terms.

#Format external hard drive time machine windows

exFAT works with both Windows and Mac but does not support Time Machine backup.

macOS Extended Journaled (a.k.a HFS+) works with all Mac OS versions and will not work with Windows.

The catch is if you forget the password, you’ll lose the data.

Encrypted means data stored on the drive can be encrypted, use this if you intend to store sensitive data on the drive.

Case sensitive means files of the same name but different letter cases (i.e., MyFile.txt vs.

APFS only works with Sierra (10.12) or later.

(For this example, I named the new partition Time Machine, used Mac OS Extended (Journaled) as the format and 300GB as its size.) Then click on Apply.īy the way, if you’re curious as to what file format to use.

#Format external hard drive time machine plus

Click on the Plus (+) to add another partition to the drive, then pick the Name, Format, and Size for the new partition. Select Name, Format, and Size for the new Partition.Ģ. Note: Doing this will erase all drive content, so make sure you’re OK with that. For that, you turn a single hardware drive into two different volumes (or logical disks) and use one for Time Machine. The idea here is to create a separate partition on the external drive and use that partition exclusively for Time Machine backup. Limit Time Machine backup size of an external drive Instead, you’ll need to limit the storage space at the destination side, be it the external drive you plug directly into your Mac or a Time Machine-supported NAS server.īy the way, since you make changes to the backup destination, this method will work on all macOS versions. If you run the latest macOS (10.13 Mojave or newer), the command above won’t take effect. Sudo defaults delete /Library/Preferences/ MaxSize Limit Time Machine backup size in all versions of macOS If you want to revert to the default value (no limit), run this command: And that’s it! From now on, Time Machine on that Mac will automatically delete old backups to make sure it uses no more than 300GB. You’ll be likely prompted to enter your account’s password, so do that and press Enter again. Sudo defaults write /Library/Preferences/ MaxSize 307200

Run Terminal (you can search for it using Spotlight at the top right corner).

So if you’re going to use 300GB, then the number you have is 307200 since 1GB = 1,024MB.

Convert the storage limited you want into megabytes.

Note that you need to log in with an administrator account. This trick is easy to implement and for sure works on macOS 10.12 (Sierra) and older versions. Limit Time Machine backup size in macOS 10.12 and earlier The more storage space, the more versions of backups you’ll get, which means the further you can go back in time. So, for example, if your MacBook has 128GB of internal storage, 300GB of backup space is generous. Generally, you want to use 150% or more of your Mac’s internal drive capacity.

#Format external hard drive time machine how to

(If you don’t know how, check out this post, which also gives you some other handy Mac skills, including how to run Terminal, which you’ll need to use in this post.)Īfter that, find out the amount of storage you need for the backups. Determine the OS version and suitable backup limitīefore you can fix Time Machine’s storage, you first need to determine what version of macOS you’re running. Creating a separate partition on your backup drive is the best way to control the amount of storage Time Machine will use.