Time To Say Goodbye… To Time Machine
Let’s send Time Machine sailing into the sunset
Elections may come and go, but tech issues are eternal! One of the most important — and least implemented — tech concerns is ensuring all your precious data is backed up in case something terrible happens. There’s an old saying in the tech world: “They who laughed last backed up first!”
Good Times
When Steve Jobs was alive, he knew that most people never thought about backups, much less did them, and he wanted Apple to change that. As only Steve could, he demanded that his software engineers devise an insanely easy way for anyone, regardless of their tech abilities, to create a workable backup system with just two clicks of the mouse. One that would back up an entire drive once an hour without the user even noticing.
The team delivered: In 2007, Time Machine was born in concert with the new Apple Time Capsule routers.
Those products combined an unbeatable combination of ease and simplicity. The Capsule contained an internal drive, and all Macs connected to it via Wi-Fi or ethernet could back up to that drive using the Mac’s built-in Time Machine software. Setup was as easy as it gets: two clicks and done… genius!
Bad Times
However, time has not been kind to this initiative. Although Time Machine is still part of the Mac’s operating system, it has not been fundamentally upgraded or changed much since 2007, except for a tweak in 2017 that allowed it to understand drives using Apple’s new APFS drive format, which was introduced that year and has been used ever since.
To add insult to injury, Apple’s Time Capsule routers had also not received much love from the company. They were officially abandoned in 2018 as Apple felt there were too many other routers to choose from that were as good if not better… and they were right. Some even supported network drives or had their own internal drives like the Time Capsule did.
Here in 2024, Time Machine is, in my view, old and tired and it’s time to let go of it. Why? Another tech adage states that backups are not as important as the ability to restore items from that backup. Time Machine uses a proprietary format to create backups and restore files and folders from them. As such, restoring is often an excruciatingly slow process. Trying to “go back in time” using my Synology network drive can take almost ten minutes before the file list appears in what is colloquially called the “time tunnel.”
The Mac is unresponsive during that time, and I can only wait. Once the “time tunnel” is active, choosing an older version of a file can take another five minutes before the “restore” button appears.
I once had to use Time Machine to restore a client’s Mac whose drive had died and then been replaced. Restoring the entire drive — not just a file or a folder — from a reasonably fast external drive took almost 24 hours! Considering how unbelievably fast Apple Silicon-based Macs are now, Time Machine feels more like an anachronism than ever.
Time For A New Way
For many years, I have used and recommended Mike Bombich’s Carbon Copy Cloner (CCC) as the best way to make a “clone” backup—a mirror image of your internal drive’s contents—onto another drive. I even briefly mentioned CCC in a previous post.
I appreciate and use many of the features CCC has up its software sleeve, such as working with disk images, various scheduling options, and the ability to back up folders to other folders. However, I’m pretty sure that most people use it primarily for fast and easy clone backups.
For six versions the software has been intuitive to use and solid as a rock. Now, in a massive upgrade to version 7, Mike has thrown down the gauntlet at Time Machine’s wobbly feet by incorporating the same strategy: hourly (if desired) backups with the ability to “go back in time” if need be to restore a previously deleted file… or merely one you screwed up by mistake.
The initial setup is even easier than Time Machine, as CCC will walk you through correctly formatting an external drive and then using it as a backup. During the guided setup, it does this by asking if the destination volume will only be used for a backup or if other files are already on the drive. If so, CCC will try to create a backup alongside those files. CCC can also create an archive drive, which is not a backup but rather a repository of files you don’t use anymore so that you can free up some disk space.
Speaking of which, I always recommend backing up to a drive dedicated solely to that purpose and, if you have a separate archive drive, backing up that as well. Remember Tech Daddy’s Law of Backups: “Any file you cannot afford to lose must have a backup somewhere!”
CCC will even offer to format the drive if necessary. This is a valuable feature, as most external drives come pre-formatted for Windows machines and should be re-formatted to work natively on a Mac before use. Again, most people aren’t aware of this… but CCC is.
Once CCC is set up to work like Time Machine, the fun really begins! When using Time Machine with my Synology NAS (network-attached storage), I would see the backup drive appear on my desktop and then stay there for around 10 minutes before disappearing. And while those backups were happening, the Mac itself would be sluggish. Now? When using a 2TB Toshiba T7 SSD; CCC will make it appear on the desktop, and then about 20 seconds later, it disappears. That’s right: CCC does hourly backups in only 20 seconds!
But wait, don’t order yet… there’s more!
Replicating Time Machine’s ease of use is just the start. As I said, restoring is a crucial element of any backup strategy, and this is where CCC beats the pants off of Time Machine. Instead of bringing up some glitzy — and unnecessary — graphics layer to get to older versions of your files, you can call up CCC’s Snapshot Navigator to quickly find the file — and the particular version of it — you’re looking for.
CCC can do this because it fully leverages the power of snapshots that are part of the aforementioned APFS format that all modern Macs use.
Snapshots are just that: a way of freezing a Mac’s contents at a certain point in time. Incredibly, snapshots don’t take a lot of disk space, as they primarily log anything that has been changed or deleted since the last one. CCC Snapshots allow CCC to go back in time… for days, weeks or even months, depending on the size of your backup volume.
Unlike Time Machine, CCC also gives you a lot of granular control of your backups — what’s included, how often the backup occurs, and much more — for those who want it. CCC can handle files stored using cloud-based services such as iCloud Drive and Dropbox. And, in a historic first for any backup app, CCC lets you back up iOS and iPadOS devices using its new “Diplomat” feature. It really is a one-stop backup shop.
Another hallmark of CCC is the voluminous number of helpful web pages that can answer any question you have. Trust me: if these pages can answer all my questions, you’ll have no trouble! ;-) They have the perfect balance of information, education and entertainment without talking down to anyone or going over people’s heads. There is even a series of incredibly helpful YouTube videos that often accompany the text. I wish more software had manuals and guides this good!
OK, now you can order
CCC 7 requires macOS 13 “Ventura” or later. Click here to purchase it for $49.99.
That’s not $49.99 a year; it’s a one-time payment, and that’s it. At that price, CCC is the bargain of the century! And if you have a previous version, it’s only $24.99!
That’s A Wrap
CCC has truly done the impossible: making something as arcane as dealing with backups enjoyable and empowering. I have often said that Mike Bombich has forgotten more about how backups work than most people remember, but now he has taken backups to a whole new level. And for that, I am eternally grateful, as you will be, once you finally ditch Time Machine for good.
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