iTunes Back-Ups

T

the jackal

Registered
Hi!

I'm wondering if you can make back ups from iTunes.

In my case, I've got the the Library in my external HD, as the internal is only 120gb, but I'd like to do some back ups to my second external HD from time to time. Is that possible? I can't find any options in iTunes to do that...

Thanks!

The Jackal


P.S. I'm running Leopard 10.5.8 in a MacBook Pro, and my version for iTunes is 9.0.3 (15)
 
Time Machine will back up iTunes, and the rest of your system as well.

You can manually drag and drop your iTunes library on a different hard drive for a manual backup.

There is configurable software available that will back up/sync user-specified data and folders from one place to another. I use Chronosync -- works like a charm, and it includes a scheduling component as well.
 
Thanks Diablo!

The thing about doing the drag and drop is that is tedious, as (correct me if I'm wrong) you say don't replace older items, it won't copy anything(?!). Not really sure about this. (This may happen in windows actually...). And when you have to copy around 100GB instead of 40GB is a bit of pain down there.

I was checking out the Chronosync software and looks bloody great! and it's only $40, even better, and you may imagine that a program like that may cost hundreds.

But, is it really worth compared to TM? I mean, I'm not gonna do anything special, and time machine may just do the job... I don't know. How is your experience with Chronosync?

BTW, does anybody know if when backing up music TM also sees the changes in the IDtags of the files?! That would be something absolutely fantastic!

Thanks dude!
 
Spotlight is meant as a total boot disk backup solution. It backs up everything, and is difficult to configure to work differently.

Chronosync allows me to, say, mirror two external drives -- something that Spotlight won't do. It allows me to work with data in a customized way on drives that are not my boot drives.

I still have Time Machine for keeping an up-to-date backup of my boot disk, but Chronosync is where the real work gets done.

Yes, Time Machine would detect changes in the ID3 tags of the files -- some tags are stored in the files, other tags are stored in an XML library that iTunes keeps separate from the actual audio files themselves. Either way, Time Machine would certainly back up any files (be them actual audio files or the XML index files) that had even the littlest change done to it.
 
Wow, looks like Chronosync is exactly what I'm looking for. A flexible and configurable back up sofware.

Does it work with HDs with any kind of file system? Cause I've got one external HD in HFS+ and the other one is FAT32 to be able to plug it into PC and MACs...


Thanks Mr Diablo!
 
I believe it does, however, it would be prudent to contact the developer and confirm.

You can always keep the FAT32 drive connected to the Windows machine and synchronize across the network -- Chronosync works well this way, too.

Other users seem to be fond of this piece of software (just because I'm biased toward Chronosync):

http://www.qdea.com/pages/pages-syncx/syncx1.html
 
ElDiabloConCaca said:
Spotlight is meant as a total boot disk backup solution. It backs up everything, and is difficult to configure to work differently.
Click to expand...

I tend to be a backup junkie, so I would not want to be missing anything here.
Can you elaborate on what you mean in regards to SPOTLIGHT being a total BACKUP solution?
 
Spotlight will make an entire backup of every, single piece of data (sans some cache files) on your BOOT drive. It will keep these backups until your Time Machine disk is almost full (it always leaves a little space free, as a completely full drive is a drive that would soon exhibit problems), and then it will keep weekly and monthly backups.

http://www.apple.com/macosx/what-is-macosx/time-machine.html

Time Machine does not back up drives that are NOT your Mac OS X boot drive that you're currently booted from, as far as I know. For backing up those types of drives, I prefer Chronosync.

Most new Mac users simply have a single drive with a single partition -- exactly the way the Mac shipped to them. Power users sometimes have external drives, multiple partitions, and a variety of storage media. For these types of users, an additional backup solution (such as Chronosync or Synchronize! X) is necessary/preferred in addition to Time Machine.
 
Your use of the term Spotlight as a backup application is confusing me, I hate to think what it could do some of the real Apple newcomers.
That is why I asked for some more clarification, I'm not trying to be a smart a$$ here, just that I've always considered Time Machine the backup app, and Spotlight a search application.
I know spotlight can be used to search your time machine backups, but I'm not aware of its function as a backup application per-sa.
 
ElDiabloConCaca said:
Time Machine does not back up drives that are NOT your Mac OS X boot drive that you're currently booted from, as far as I know. For backing up those types of drives, I prefer Chronosync.
Click to expand...
I think you'll find that Time Machine will backup any mounted drive it finds, unless they are added to the excluded list under TM Preferences -> Options.
 
jbarley said:
I think you'll find that Time Machine will backup any mounted drive it finds, unless they are added to the excluded list under TM Preferences -> Options.
Click to expand...

Hmmm... not my Time Machine... got 5 external drives, and none of them get backed up. None are in my "exclude" list, either. I'll have to verify when I get home -- perhaps you're right and I added them to the "exclude" list in a daze one foggy night! ;)

Your use of the term Spotlight as a backup application is confusing me, I hate to think what it could do some of the real Apple newcomers.
Click to expand...
I've thoroughly confused myself! Heh... it's the end of the day here, my brain is fried from looking through code all day, and I do apologize -- search and replace "Spotlight" with "Time Machine" in all my prior posts and they'll make more sense. Simple end-of-day confusion on my part.
 
I still use the free version of Carbon Copy Cloner.
It will do full and incremental back-up, and also will
let you backup specific folders, like iTunes.
 
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