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store other data on external drive with photos

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rmargolis

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Jun 8, 2011
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Intermediate
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Lightroom Classic v. 9.2
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  1. macOS 10.14 Mojave
I have an external 6 TB drive that I store my photos on. Since my Time Capsule is full, I need more storage for a complete back up of my computer using Time Machine. Is it a bad idea to use the same hard drive as the one where my photos are stored? My instinct tells me not to use it but my intuition is perhaps steering me to the wrong answer. If that drive fails, then I lose both my LR catalog and my Time Machine back-up. Of course my other option is to another hard drive. Thank you.
 
Personally I'd buy another drive. Too easy to lose everything if you're not careful!
 
Thank you. That confirms my instincts. How do I choose a reliable drive? There are so many options. Does brand name mean anything now? I don't stay up-to-date. I know with appliances, its a guess as to who is actually creating specifications and who is manufacturing. Thanks.
 
Backblaze often publishes hard drive reliability based on their own (massive) experience, but that applies less to external drives. You may see indications there of brand reliability though. Here's 2019, but if you search for combinations of their name you'll find a lot of info. They are useful as they are objective, just a consumer (albeit a massive one).

Backblaze Hard Drive Stats Q2 2019

I got lost in your question -- are you backing up the photos you have on the external drive also? You should.
 
Thanks. I use Backblaze for my off-site back-up.

Yes I am backing up my photos on an external hard drive and also on Backblaze.
 
TimeMachine won’t let you backup data and use the partition as a regular data disk. You can split the disk into 2 partitions but when the disk fails you’ve lost primary data and back up data.
I would suggest adding an external hard drive to the time capsule and creating extended back up on the additional volume attached to the time capsule. This is what I have done. Ithink Apple only sells 3 TB time capsules Which is not adequate for backing up several disk or several computers.
 
Thank you. That confirms my instincts. How do I choose a reliable drive? There are so many options. Does brand name mean anything now? I don't stay up-to-date. I know with appliances, its a guess as to who is actually creating specifications and who is manufacturing. Thanks.
Are you going to buy a "raw" drive, or a drive in a case with USB (or Thunderbolt) interface? As a general rule, avoid Seagate. If you are buying an external drive, get a drive made by a vendor that will identify the raw drive they use. If you are in the US, consider this product line, which is sold only by Best Buy: https://www.bestbuy.com/site/search...bal&st=easystore&type=page&usc=All Categories

Phil Burton
 
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