Maybe you only want to back up your Mac with specific files — a more fitting solution if you are interested in saving a particular type of media, or backing up only data related to your job, etc. You should always routinely back up everything on your MacBook. You don’t need a lecture about backing up your drive. Imagine what it feels like to lose everything — names, numbers, letters, reports, presentations, saved games, photographs, and music. Then ask yourself, “Self, isn’t all that irreplaceable stuff worth just a couple of.
Like most people, I’m lazy about backing up my data. If it’s remotely inconvenient, I won’t do it. Fortunately, there are now several things you can do to back up your data in 2021, all without having to lift a finger. Smart Wi-Fi 6 access points and cloud computing services have changed the backup playing field. I’m going to share with you a foolproof plan for automatically backing up your data so you can rest easy.
Best automated backups for macOS
When Apple released Time Machine, they introduced a dead-simple way to backup your Mac. Just plug in an external hard drive, and let it do the rest. While it’s a great solution, I still have to remember to get my hard drive out on a regular basis, hook it up, and let it do its thing. I’m too lazy for that, or at least too lazy to do it frequently enough.
My solution was to get a Synology DiskStation. It’s a network-attached storage (NAS) device that supports Bonjour and Time Machine backups. When used at home, it will backup your MacBook Pro and any other Mac computer, including the new Apple Silicon (M1 chip) Macs, on your local network without having to do a thing. Time Machine automatically detects when you’re on your home network and then determines when it’s time to backup your computer. All of it is done in the background. It’s beautiful!
Synology also supports dual disk redundancy. I use the Synology DS1520+ with five WD Red NAS SSDs. It operates silently, and if two hard drives fail, I won’t lose any data.
Best automated cloud computing backups
Unfortunately, relying on one backup is not the best backup plan. Especially if you lose your computer in a house fire, which happens to be the same location as your Synology DiskStation. For that reason (and others), I use a couple of cloud computing services for backups.
Latest apple software. Just like Synology DiskStation with Time Machine, these services can be set up to run automatically in the background. The two cloud computing services I use are Backblaze and Dropbox.
Backblaze
I’ve tried several cloud computing backup services on macOS, including Mozy (now Carbonite), but Backblaze was the service that worked the best and was also the most unobtrusive. Like Time Machine, Backblaze automates the backup of your hard drive, or the folders you specify, and saves them securely in the cloud.
The price is incredibly cheap. It only cost $6/mo for unlimited storage. One of the things I like the most about Backblaze is that it allows me to specify the backup speed. I can either choose better network performance (slower backup speeds) or faster backups (full throttle backup speeds).
Dropbox
Another cloud computing service I use is Dropbox. While Dropbox’s conventional use is storing documents in the cloud, it can also be used as an excellent automated backup system. The way I use Dropbox on my MacBook Air and iMac Pro is that I save all of my documents in my Dropbox folders.
House building software for mac. I decided to mimic the default folders that appear in the Home folder on macOS, including Music, Photos, and Documents. I then made shortcuts to those folders, and I make sure I save everything in them. Dropbox then automatically syncs those documents in the cloud.
My documents are not only synced (backed up) in the cloud automatically, they’re also accessible via their iOS app. That means I can easily access all of my documents on my iPhone or iPad using Dropbox’s free iOS app. Just like Backblaze, their service is incredibly affordable. They have a free account that comes with 2GB, a $9.99/mo account that comes with 1TB (1,000 GB), and a $15/user/mo business account that comes with 1TB (1,000 GB).
Manually backup and restore a User Home Folder | 16 comments | Create New Account
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Provided the user account isn't the only admin account you can just use the System Preferences option to delete the user account. It prompts to archive the account to a disk image or a folder.
Deleting the account does not preserve ownership and permissions, as this method does. When deleting/archiving an account you're removing the user and all associated information, so the system changes the permissions to be accessible by other (admin) users.
Why would you want to preserve ACL's & ownership? The OS will restore the correct ownership after the new user is created on the new system. Don't ACL's use the UUID of the account & not the user ID? So when you make the new account the UUID's no longer match? Right click the account in System Prefs & select Advanced options… Anyway, if it works for you, great.
Huh. The right-click-user-to-see-Advanced-Options bit should be a hint unto itself -- never knew about that! :)
Neat! Neither did I! Now I'm going to have to try right clicking in all such lists!
Best Way To Back Up Macbook Pro
> and then will verify the home folder as having the correct ownership.. Does it actually check the ownership of *all* files in the folder, including sub-folders?
There's Time Machine and also the Migration Assistant. Most of the time, if there is storage available, I would want to back up the entire disk, probably as a disk image, using Super Duper, CCC, Disk Utility or ddrescue if things are really bad. Then you can install a new system, run Migration Assistant and select as many user accounts as you want to move from the backup to the new system.
Definitely true that Time Machine or other utilities will give you a more complete backup of the entire system. This process was designed as a quick and easy solution for moving user accounts between machines without migrating all data. It's easy to demonstrate and doesn't require much technical skill.
I usually do the backing up via System Preferences. Simply delete the account. You will get asked if you want to archive it in a disk image.
Again, using System Preferences to delete/archive the account does not preserve ACLs, permissions, ownership, etc.
Maybe I'm a dinosaur, but I rsync my $HOME to a small NAS daily, via a root cron job. Given how few actual changes there are (other than data in Dropbox which is excluded from the rsync anyway) after the initial heavy run, daily rsyncs take mere seconds. It's as maybe not quite as good as time machine or whatever it's called, but this method has worked for the past few years. I have had H/D's crash on me once or twice - oh yes, but never lost userdata, thanks to this method. I suppose this is a pretty decent illustration of 'whatever works for $you' :D
Using rsync will also make it a recursive backup which is both faster and more practical than using Disk Utility. The downside is that it force you to the CLI.
Aaaah, but the CLI is a haven of refuge in troubled and unstable gooey times. It is predictable, it is always your friend. The CLI doesn't care if you see other shells, or even have a beer after severely misusing it. *cough*
ssh keys exist on both ends, I should add, thus eliminating any need for a manual login
Best Way To Backup Macbook Pro
HTH!
Backup Macbook Pro Hard Drive
This is a good hint. But.. There are things to consider before you go there.. There is no point doing this unless you are sure that it is a system level problem. First establish whether it is a system or a user level problem by reproducing the problem with a fresh user account. If you restore the user account, it may just bring back all that bad stuff. Hope this helps :)