Time Machine backups to network drives

[agfkfhahddhdn]

What kind of magic do consumer NAS devices (e.g. WD MyCloud) use to create a network share that Time Machine automatically detects? The only "official" Apple route is to buy a Time Capsule. I know there is a command line trick you can do to allow backing up to any network share, but the WD NAS doesn't require this. It's also easier if you have a second Mac on the network, but WD is surely not running embedded OS X. Ideally I'd like to just set up a partition on my Windows 10 "file server."

 

[dave_the_nerd]

What kind of magic do consumer NAS devices (e.g. WD MyCloud) use to create a network share that Time Machine automatically detects? The only "official" Apple route is to buy a Time Capsule. I know there is a command line trick you can do to allow backing up to any network share, but the WD NAS doesn't require this. It's also easier if you have a second Mac on the network, but WD is surely not running embedded OS X. Ideally I'd like to just set up a partition on my Windows 10 "file server."

The WD NAS (and other NAS devices) are using FOSS implementations of appletalk/appleshare, which can be configured to, basically, lie and pretend it's a supported time machine device.

My server tells my Macbook that it's a Time Capsule, although my housemate's latptop seems to think it's an XServe for some reason. Either way, it works!

There are lots of tutorials online explaining how to do this in detail. The home-NAS sellers like WD just wrap it in a pretty bow and add a toggle-switch to the UI. (Which is actually harder than I'm probably making it sound, with all due respect. Getting a product to market and all that. But let's be honest - 90% of the effort is already done.)

 

[agfkfhahddhdn]

The WD NAS (and other NAS devices) are using FOSS implementations of appletalk/appleshare, which can be configured to, basically, lie and pretend it's a supported time machine device.

My server tells my Macbook that it's a Time Capsule, although my housemate's latptop seems to think it's an XServe for some reason. Either way, it works!

There are lots of tutorials online explaining how to do this in detail. The home-NAS sellers like WD just wrap it in a pretty bow and add a toggle-switch to the UI. (Which is actually harder than I'm probably making it sound, with all due respect. Getting a product to market and all that. But let's be honest - 90% of the effort is already done.)

Thanks! Still kind of unsure what solution I'm going to go with here. External USB HDDs basically don't exist for under $50 for 1TB, which is a good deal...except my MacBook has a 120GB HDD, I'd like to have one disk purely for backups, and 1TB seems excessive. I also have a 500GB 2.5" drive, but third-party drive enclosures seem to be reeeeally poorly made, don't want to waste my money there. I've been looking for a reason to do some kind of Raspberry Pi project, maybe I'll go that route.

Can I ask what you use your server for? My "server" is basically old PC parts cobbled together to host Plex, store media, stream things, and occasionally used for couch gaming. It used to be Linux but I find that Windows makes those tasks far easier. I assume there's nothing like Netatalk in the Windows world?

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Thanks! Still kind of unsure what solution I'm going to go with here. External USB HDDs basically don't exist for under $50 for 1TB, which is a good deal...except my MacBook has a 120GB HDD, I'd like to have one disk purely for backups, and 1TB seems excessive. I also have a 500GB 2.5" drive, but third-party drive enclosures seem to be reeeeally poorly made, don't want to waste my money there. I've been looking for a reason to do some kind of Raspberry Pi project, maybe I'll go that route.

A bigger external drive just means storing more history/changes. Having "too much" space is kind of a first world problem anyway. I'm surprised you're not tempted to upgrade your Macbook's storage too, though. (Unless you have one of the newer machines where you can't.)

Third party HDD enclosures run the gamut - you can find some nice ones too. They don't have to be made all _that_ well, usually - it's just a box you put a hard drive in. I usually prefer metal to plastic, but otherwise? As long as it has a working USB/SATA bridge, it's good to go.

A Pi and an external HDD would be a perfect fake-Time-Capsule. Although it's not much of a "project" from a RasPi-hacking or building-cool-stuff standpoint.

Can I ask what you use your server for? My "server" is basically old PC parts cobbled together to host Plex, store media, stream things, and occasionally used for couch gaming. It used to be Linux but I find that Windows makes those tasks far easier.

Basically the same as you, and as a time machine backup, and also as a VM host for a few household utility VMs. (A DNS server that does adblocking, a web server that serves up a little household cleaning checklist I made, a minecraft server, a crashplan backup box, and a couple linux boxes for playing around with networking/IT stuff.) It's in a closet so I can't game with it, per se.

Would Windows be easier? Maybe, depending on how you define "easy." But I'm also just used to FreeBSD/Linux now. *shrug*

I assume there's nothing like Netatalk in the Windows world?

There are a couple Appletalk/Appleshare emulators/implementations that run on Windows. At an old job, where we had a mixed bag of Windows/Mac clients, but our file servers were Windows boxes, we used this one:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ExtremeZ-IP

It's money though.

There are also some tricks you can do on the Macbook itself to use a CIFS (Windows/Samba) share as a Time Machine target.

http://rajiv.sg/blog/2012/11/19/con...ion-time-machine-to-work-with-cifs-smb-share/

But I'm not 100% in favor of doing that, since I've 1) never tried it, and 2) am not convinced that restoring a backup to a new machine (assuming I dropped my laptop in a lake or something) would be as easy as it would be from a Fake-Time-Capsule NAS device. (Or an external HDD for that matter.) I might be wrong, but I've never tried it / can't endorse it.

 

[agfkfhahddhdn]

A bigger external drive just means storing more history/changes. Having "too much" space is kind of a first world problem anyway. I'm surprised you're not tempted to upgrade your Macbook's storage too, though. (Unless you have one of the newer machines where you can't.)

The answer to both of these points is that I store very very little on my MacBook. The idea of using Time Machine is just so I can easily reimage it if something were to happen. It's more to save time than to store files. I mostly just can't justify buying a 1TB external drive when I know the one task it's going to be used for doesn't require 1TB.

Although it's not much of a "project" from a RasPi-hacking or building-cool-stuff standpoint.

Project was a bad word. Basically just looking for a reason to buy one.

Would Windows be easier? Maybe, depending on how you define "easy." But I'm also just used to FreeBSD/Linux now. *shrug*

It's a lot easier on many fronts. Plex is the biggest reason the thing exists, and my old Ubuntu-based Plex server broke constantly. I've had zero problems in that arena since I went to Windows. I also frequently use it for streaming (AceStream, SopCast, Live Extra when the Apple TV app breaks, Fox Sports since they don't have an app for any streaming device), which has always been easier and more stable on Windows, in my experience. I also OCCASIONALLY game on it, and of course Steam just has more Windows games available.

But I'm not 100% in favor of doing that, since I've 1) never tried it, and 2) am not convinced that restoring a backup to a new machine (assuming I dropped my laptop in a lake or something) would be as easy as it would be from a Fake-Time-Capsule NAS device. (Or an external HDD for that matter.) I might be wrong, but I've never tried it / can't endorse it.

Yeah, I've seen that, we're in agreement here. Sounds risky and defeats the point of a backup.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

It's a lot easier on many fronts. Plex is the biggest reason the thing exists, and my old Ubuntu-based Plex server broke constantly. I've had zero problems in that arena since I went to Windows.

Really? Huh. That's too bad.

I'm not anti-Windows at all, but I haven't had much in the way of hiccoughs from my Plex Server / Ubuntu VM. (And most of my issues tend to be network-related, not the plex server application itself.)

I also OCCASIONALLY game on it, and of course Steam just has more Windows games available.

Well there you go then.

 

[agfkfhahddhdn]

Really? Huh. That's too bad.

I'm not anti-Windows at all, but I haven't had much in the way of hiccoughs from my Plex Server / Ubuntu VM. (And most of my issues tend to be network-related, not the plex server application itself.)

Well I don't know if it was an Ubuntu problem, a Plex problem, a driver problem, or an "I screwed up the configuration" problem, but regardless, my Roku would just constantly lose connection to Plex when my server was running Ubuntu. Haven't had any of those problems on Windows. I'd like to run some flavor of Linux, mostly just to have representation from all the major OSes, but I'd also like to do as little work as possible.

E: I was doing some googling for Windows Netatalk alternatives and apparently some people just run a Linux VM to get the job done. Maybe I'll do that.