Copying a Time Machine Volume

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Copying a Time Machine Volume

I recently discovered via DriveDX that my Seagate Ultra Touch which I use for Time Machine backups had command timeout errors that could be due to an oxidized data cable. This sounded worrying so I managed to persuade Seagate to replace the drive, but I have to send them the old drive first.

So I wanted to copy the backups I already have to another external drive (WD) I have of the same size. Various searches indicatated this is a very lengthy process and the best way was to use SuperDuper!. So I downloaded the free version and repeatedly tried to copy from one drive to the other but the process completes after a certain amount of time (up to hours) without copying all the files. After a lot of googling it seemed that the problem is that my source drive, the Seagate, is formatted as APFS while the new drive is formatted by SuperDuper! as Mac OS Extended (Journaled). SuperDuper! confirmed this is the case, that it's not possible to copy the files from an APFS formatted drive using SuperDuper!.

So many threads seem to indicate there is no easy way to do this and probably to just give up. Be great to hear if anyone has a magic wand.

I am using a MacBook Pro 16 inch, 2019, with an 8-Core Intel Core i9 processor and Monterey OS.

MacBook Pro 16″, macOS 12.3

Posted on Apr 21, 2022 2:06 PM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

Grant Bennet-Alder

Level 10

133,291 points

Apr 22, 2022 6:26 AM in response to sandjensen11

If you are running Big Sur or later, a New Time machine backup drive will be formatted APFS -- but you don't need to worry about that. Just offer the drive to Time machine as a backup destination, and if the format is not to its liking, it will invoke disk Utility and "fix" that.

"Trusted Backup" is an ethereal concept. What it boils down to is: "Do you trust all your files to the backup you have on hand?

Once you make one full backup, you are almost there. if you have added several additional incremental backups to the same set without incident, that is probably as good as it gets.

You may want to invoke Time machine.app (not to be confused with Time machine preferences) and look at the lists of files in your new backup, to improve your level of trust.

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Answer 2

Apr 21, 2022 6:34 PM in response to sandjensen11

DON'T copy Backups.

Copying backups, especially if it may be a troubled drive, is a Bad Idea™. Any problems in the backup set might be made worse by copying. Your backups are your safety net, and you want it to be as strong as possible, even if it does not extend as far back in time as would be ideal..

If you have another drive, ADD it as an additional Time Machine backup destination, and let it run until it has a trusted backup on it. Time Machine will create a new stand-alone backup on the new drive, then alternate destinations -- every other backup goes to every other drive, until one is removed.

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Answer 3

sandjensen11 Author

Level 1

16 points

Apr 22, 2022 3:18 AM in response to Grant Bennet-Alder

Grant, thanks so much for replying.

I've actually now been told by the SuperDuper! (Shirt Pocket) team that it is simply not possible to copy APFS Time Machine backups.

In your opinion would it be best to format the new drive as APFS or Mac OS Extended (Journaled)?

And I'm not sure how I would know if the new drive has a trusted backup - if you can give me some pointers here I'd be very grateful. Again thanks so much.

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Answer 4

sandjensen11 Author

Level 1

16 points

Apr 22, 2022 9:07 AM in response to Grant Bennet-Alder

That's super helpful, thanks so much Grant. I 'tested' what you said as I didn't quite believe it but yes, Time Machine automatically formats as APFS. And if it is not possible to copy Time Machine back ups from an APFS disk, then no doubt this is why there are so many threads here and there about the difficulties in doing this :-)

Now waiting while my first new back up happens to the new (old, actually) external hard drive.

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Copying a Time Machine Volume

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