No Time Machine? Alternative backup tools for your Mac
Wednesday, October 31st, 2007 at 2:05 pm by Cyril Roger
One of the most lauded features of Apple’s new operating system, Leopard, is probably Time Machine, the automatic backup that makes up to date copies of every single thing on your Mac, without you having to worry about a thing. The design of Time Machine and its simplicity, as startling as it may sound, make backing up an exciting task. Yet, for you unlucky people who still haven’t gotten their hands on a copy of Leopard, saving and storing files is far from being the most thrilling thing you want to be doing on your Mac. I’ve gathered a few programs that will do the job effectively and will at least make backing up a bit more easier for you. Let’s check them out:
- Personal Backup - A quick solution to save copies of your files, can even save to any external drive and synchronize two Macs together.
- Mozy Remote Backup - 2Gb of free online storage to backup your files any time, anywhere so long as you’re connected.
- SuperDuper! - The king of backups, this program has a built in -scheduler that could almost make backups as easy as in Time Machine.
- Deja Vu - Clone your OS X system disk, mirror the content of folders, and have backups ready in a click.
- BackityMac - Backing up is as easy as checking a file in a list. Great to store files from Mac specific apps like Apple Mail, iCal or iPhoto.
- GrabBack - Best for making backups on USB flash drives, this application makes sure you’re never left without a copy of your most important files.
Posted at 12:43 pm on Apr 18th
Time Machine is a piece of crap. I repeat DO NOT USE TIME MACHINE FOR BACKUPS YOU WILL LOSE ALL YOUR DATA.
Apple have so many unresolved issues with Time Machine that their engineers listen to feedback full time!
Posted at 12:33 am on Oct 14th
Nothing but problems with Time Machine. Not very stable or dependable!!! I use SuperDuper. It always works!
Posted at 11:28 pm on Jan 18th
Actually, Time Machine works as it should for me and for my clients. No lost data from any of them. One client (office manager of a church) lost her computer in a burglary but she took the TM drive home every night. WHen she got the new (replacement) computer, it asked the usual “transfer from another computer/volume/Time Machine BackUp” and, in short order, she was back up and running exactly from where she left off with the old computer. I’ve restored corrupted address books and iCals with TM and currently have about 1.2TB of Time Machine data.
Posted at 10:36 pm on Apr 27th
I would have to agree that time machine is a piece of crap. What’s worse if you go to Apple’s support discussions don’t make the mistake of criticizing Apple or you’ll get booted off the forum. The old hear no evil mentality prevails over there.
I have tried using Time Machine on 2 different computers using 2 different external hard drives. Same results works good for a while than starts to fail. Hell, Time Machine is so bad they’ve come out with a widget to capture the failure messages for posting on the forum.
Stay away from this product unless or until Apple can fix it. Which, based on the bunker mentality at Apple over this, may be awhile.
Posted at 11:59 am on Jun 23rd
Check out Genie Timeline
http://www.genietimeline.com
Seems like a promising equivalent solution to Time Machine for Windows