Mac – Methods for copying Time Machine backups offsite

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I presently use an external USB drive to back up my Mac Mini with Time Machine which is a little about 1.5 TB total, however, I would really like to be able to trickle those backups onto some other cloud provider or even another location on a desktop located at a different office so I am protected from a massive catastrophe. I realize that upstream bandwidth is a major factor in successfully doing this. (I only have 10 megabit upstream.) I have tried to use ARQ which uses S3 backup, and while it works very well, the costs associated could end up being astronomical which I consider backup up my music, movies, etc…, not to mention the the loads of incidental file changes that I I don't need to capture every time. Also, there is simply no way it could ever catch up with with the amount of TM data that gets churned.

What I am looking for is a solution geared specifically for copying Time Machine backups to a cloud location, and does some things to reduce the amount of data that has to be pushed over the pipe. I would be accept having the Time Machine backups that are pushed offsite be far less frequent and I would accept some lag in getting these backups shipped, but I want to have SOMETHING in case I have a catastrophic incident, like a fire or water is spilled on my computer and Time Machine drive simultaneously.

Solutions like Mozy and Carbonite are simply not well geared for MacOS with its heavy reliance on datastores vs files. Attempting to rebuild an iTunes library from files would be a nightmare.

I am having trouble finding anything out there geared for this, but if you have some suggestions, I am all ears.

Best Answer

If I understand your question correctly (and I may not) you would prefer a cloud solution but would be willing to consider another non-cloud offsite solution.

My preference is not to use the cloud for this type of backup. The cloud is fine for low volume data storage and file services (e.g. Dropbox, iCloud, Google Drive, MS OneDrive, etc), but for this type of backup it's not (at least not yet).

Instead, my recommendation is to do something similar to what I am doing. By way of example, I'll explain how I do this for my iMac (but I follow a similar process for all my machines!)

  • This iMac has a 500GB HDD
  • I have purchased two portable USB 2TB external hard drives
  • I have labelled these hard drives as iMac TM Backup HD 1 and iMac TM Backup HD 2
  • I set both of these external drives to be TM backup drives
  • As both drives are set up with TM they are alternated whenever both drives are available
  • Once the initial backups are done, I physically remove one of the external drives and take it 'offsite'
  • On the same day each week, I then swap them over
  • The net result is that both hard drives will have backups in the order of one week on, one week off (but between them I have a full set of backups).

Now, in terms of keeping one of them offsite, you have a number of options. Over the years I have used as my offsite location any of the following:

  • My workplace
  • A shed in the back yard
  • My car (but this may depend on your climate and where you 'garage' your car)
  • A family member's/friend's place (assuming you trust them!)

Basically, the idea is that your offsite drive is somewhere that protects your data in the event your house burns down or you get robbed. My strong suggestion would be in a locked drawer at your workplace (unless you work at home). Most people's workplaces are air-conditioned, secure, and convenient.

IMPORTANT NOTES ABOUT STORAGE

Regardless of the 'offsite' location you choose to keep your hard drive, there are some key factors to keep in mind:

  • Always keep the drive safe from large magnetic fields!
  • Ensure the location has a temperature range between 10 degrees celsius (50 degrees fahrenheit) and 43 degrees celsius (110 degrees fahrenheit). So, keeping it in a car would usually not be a good idea.
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