Here's something no one likes to think about: backing up your Mac. It's an arduous task, but backing up your system periodically is important to ensure you don't lose data to hardware malfunction, human error, or software corruption. With multiple backups both onsite and offsite, you can keep yourself from becoming just another victim to data loss.
It is estimated that more than 140,000 hard drives fail each week in the U.S., and more than 2,000 laptops are lost or stolen each day. Don’t become a statistic. Read our guide and protect yourself from losing all of that precious information.
>> External hard drive (we like these)
>> Carbon Copy Cloner
>> Backblaze
You should always have multiple backups of your computer, because one backup simply isn’t enough. At a minimum, you should have one onsite backup that you backup to daily; an offsite backup (stored off your premises) that is backed up weekly; and (optionally) an online backup solution that is kept up-to-date as much as possible. We’ll show you how to get started backing up with Time Machine, Carbon Copy Cloner, and Backblaze.
If you have Mac OS X Leopard (10.5) or higher, then you already have Time Machine. This is a “set it and forget it” type of back up solution that lets you plug in a hard drive and not worry about your backups until you need them.
To get started with Time Machine, plug in an external hard drive that’s at least the same size of your internal drive, and then navigate to System Preferences > Time Machine. Flip the switch from OFF to ON, and then click “Select Disk.” Select the external drive you plugged in and go ahead and check the box labeled “Show Time Machine status in menu bar.”
Time Machine will spring into action, creating hourly backups of your Mac for 24 hours. It will keep daily backups of your Mac for the past month, and weekly backups for as many months as will fit on your external drive. The oldest backups will be removed as your external drive becomes full.
You can easily restore from Time Machine by opening a new Finder window and clicking the Time Machine menu bar icon > Enter Time Machine.
In the Time Machine interface, you can click on any item in the Finder, and then click on the “Restore” button in the lower, right-hand corner of the screen.
Carbon Copy Cloner is an application that can create a complete mirror image of your hard drive that can be booted from if you encounter a Mac emergency rendering your internal drive unusable. If you wish to have a bootable clone of your Mac, check out our previously published guide on using Carbon Copy Cloner to create a clone.
It is important to maintain an offsite backup in case of an emergency that renders your onsite backups useless. Backblaze is one of the cheapest backup solutions at only $3.96 per computer, per month, with unlimited storage. You can download a free trial at their website.
After creating an account and installing the Backblaze backup tool, you will be ready to begin the backup process. Navigate to System Preferences > Backblaze to start or pause a backup.
Backblaze works by uploading your data continuously until all of the data is backed up. Depending on the size of your hard drive, this process may take a while. For our 250GB drive, it would take 18 days on a standard DSL connection (~300kbps uplink).
Once your data is uploaded to Backblaze, you have three restore options. By signing into your account online, you can download a zip file of the files you need, or pay a fee to get your data on a USB flash drive ($99 for up to 28GBs of data) or USB hard drive ($189 for up-to 1TB of data). We like having these additional restore features as a “just in case” emergency option.
Cory Bohon is a freelance technology writer, indie Mac and iOS developer, and amateur photographer. Follow this article's author, Cory Bohon on Twitter.
clasqm
April 04, 2012 at 6:38am
This system is based on the absurd idea that all data is equally valuable.
How much of your data really is lose-your-house stuff? Be honest, now, don't count your Pr0n collection. Your last five years' tax info would qualify. Identify the few GB of truly vital information and Dropbox it. If you are truly paranoid, keep a second copy on Sugarsync or box.net.
Next, what is of sentimental value? Your kid's baby photos? Back it up to Flickr or Picasa. Your music? There's a copy of that on your iPod already. Movies? You can always re-rip your DVD's or re-download your iTunes purchases, but you'll probably want to back up home movies.
Everything else is just a mild irritation to lose. Time Machine can handle it.
There is absolutely no reason to back up system files. You can always reinstall an OS. Another case of "mild irritation".
AKChris93
April 03, 2012 at 11:10pm
I have a Time Capsule 2tb that handles all my back-ups & a seagate 650GB that handles my itunes an Other various Media. I have never in my ENTIRE computing life ever had my HD crash on me..ALTHOUGH..i have had issues with back-ups b4 and ended up losing most of my Data when i had a PC..but Again i've never had an issue with backing up..not to mention..i can always use DropBox..or....buy another External and & connect them together.
driverajr
April 03, 2012 at 5:08pm
This is actually a no brain-er. Using the correct USB cord type, I use an old 500GB hard drive partitioned to Mac format and viola!, the rest is handled by Time Machine...point blank. Anything of a 'critical' nature (like creative docs) I dump onto a class 6 SD memory card...so I will have doubles of those major critical files. If you are a professional service...I only hope that you are creating dual back ups as even a back up needs a back up.
MaclifeUK
April 02, 2012 at 6:09pm
In addition to all of the above, I also email, in 20mb chunks, data to my various web email accounts, for access away from my "burnt out home" if needs be.
20mb chunks are password protected .dmg disc image folders
Just copy empty 20mb and then fill empty ones before emailing.
All sensitive data is also password protected matter of course.
Be aware, if you change computer, you cannot access previous different computer Time Machine data, unless you do a full restore, especially if you upgrade from say 10.6.8 to 10.7.3
To this end, I also backup directly to an external 1tb external HDD.
Godzdude
April 02, 2012 at 4:57pm
What about Crash Plan? I've tried both Backblaze and Crashplan, and I believe crashplan is better. For one, it is available with an iPhone app, so you can access your info.
brandonwalkermedia
April 02, 2012 at 1:25pm
I personally use my old 2006 iPod 80GB to back up my MBA2011 64GB with Time Machine, as i look at the iPod classic as a Apple certified HD!
