It such a pleasure to know that I’m covered all day long with no more Byzantine schemes to execute for backing up and archiving. What a time saver.

I do recommend two backups with one off-site if possible. You can lose your hard drive and a backup drive at the same time. I know because I’ve done it.

Initially, out of the box I had trouble getting Time Machine (TM) and my new MBP working. I had however migrated over EVERY program and binary from my Power PC laptop to my shiny new intel laptop using migration assistant because I was pressed for time. This is a bit of a no-no but I thought I would try the shortcut first. Anyway, after I reformatted my MBP, updated the TC firmware and started clean every thing worked just fine out of the box.

Setting up the network (extended my current one, with a separate 5GHz Band) was very very straight forward. The step by step guided approach was great. I have a good idea how to do it but I don’t really care.

The initial backup (30GB) took an evening, but after that its been pretty seamless, when I just leave it alone to do its thing. If I use it like the average user who don’t care too much about backups.

As a geek the black box approach of TC and TM at first frustrated me. Why are taking so long to “prepare?” What are you doing when you “Finishing?” Some times it looks like it is hanging… Why? Why? Why? What the hell are you doing Apple? I want to know, NOW, NOW, NOW!

Then I decided to relaxed, ignored what it was doing, focused on my *real* work and left it to do its thing without intervention.

And guess what? It works quite well.

Then I started to notice the subtleties of how well it worked. When I was busy transferring files across the network, it would wait patiently, “preparing,” until I finished my transfers then commenced the backup. I also think it was postponing backups when the CPU was taxed (although I need more observations to confirm this). It would also wait until my laptop was plugged back into the power before initiating an automatic backup.

Note, if I am on the battery, I can manually initiate by clicking in the menu bar and selecting “Backup Now” - I personally approve of this behavior.

Finally, retrieving files has been a dream. For example, I accidental saved a bunch of changes in a program file I was developing, before I submitted the previous state to my SVN server (a way to log changes during software development). So I figured I would give TM a try.

I was wireless wandering around in my living room when first entered TM then navigated to a previous version of the file, selected the file and hit restore (to see what would happen). I enjoyed the graphic of seeing the file seemingly levitate and get transfered to my current time frame (even my mom would understand what was happening).

Then TM informed me this file already existed and did I want to overwrite or keep both versions. I opted to keep both versions and it appended an “(original)” to the file name. Perfect.

I changed some file names, submitted the previous version of my file to my SVN sever with a log entry, then deleted the old version.

The fact TM was automatically doing its thing was great. I probably would have lost that development change otherwise. It just fits quietly into my workflow and doesn’t ask too much of me.

Personally, I think that is exactly how a personal backup program should work.

Well, I have to point out the obvious here and say that this person has a lot of negative things to say about this product without actually owning it! He never liked the “idea” of Time Machine! How about actually using it and then giving an opinion! I suppose he won’t update to Leopard because he has an “idea” that it won’t work the way he would like it to! Here’s a line for you: Try before you lie!

It is true that almost no home user backs up their data, and most professional users who don’t work in a business that forces them to take serious back ups in special network storage do not back up their data too often. Time Machine is innovative in that it integrates the process of keeping back ups so you have to do absolutely nothing at all. And if you ever delete a file or a folder accidentally, you can restore it in seconds.

Not only that, but Time Machine can save you hours (if not days) of precious time in the case of a computer hard disk failure. Imagine what a nightmare it would be to have to re-install the OS, all your apps, migrate all your data (from an out-dated back-up, if any), download updates and the list goes on. With Time Machine, all you have to do is boot from the Leopard DVD and then restore your computer to the latest image of your hard disk. Saves lots of time, effort and frustration!

> if you can afford an Apple computer, you can afford a $500 network hub to back up all your bad photos and amateur Buffy novelization drafts

People don’t take photos to claim they’re great photographers, but because it’s a way to keep memories alive. A user could indeed have 10,000 photos and maybe they’re all bad, but still priceless, including snapshots from the most important days of her life. If an automated back-up mechanism can preserve all this priceless information for the user, then it’s their salvation.

As for the comment on the price, I don’t think there are many wireless 802.11n routers with gigabit ethernet ports, USB printer and hard drive sharing *and* an integrated 1TB hard disk costing less than $500.

I would explain more - but you have already done it well to point out the ignorance.

That is some good logic there. All because you are mad at Apple. You show them. I bet if they knew this they would immediately serve your needs.

The beauty of Time Machine is that you don’t have to spend productive time deciding what’s important. If you lose a hard drive in the middle of a project day, at most you lose an hour’s worth of work. Plus, versions of work are always available. That’s invaluable insurance.

It works for casual users, too. They don’t need to develop backup strategies or worry about when to execute them. Most casual users and a surprising number of power users have Never Backed Up. Many back up once or twice a month, quarter, or year.

> and I know where it all is and how it works.

Is that a criticism of Time Machine?

> Time Machine strikes me as a black box that utilizes my CPU and hard drive in a mysterious

It is a bit mysterious if you’ve never worked with Sparse Images or incremental backups.

> and inefficient way.

You can save backup storage space, and waste man hours doing manual backups, and then waste more man hours retrieving the data. Every tried retrieving data from a DAT drive? The Time Machine interface is the best possible navigation tool to make the entire backup accessible instantaneously.

> Furthermore, laptops are basically left out of the party.

Not true. Switching drives is simple if you have one Time Machine backup disk at home, one at work, and a pocketdrive for off-site work. It would be nice to have mirrored Time Machine backups everywhere, but having off-site backups is good insurance.

> Not to mention those who are simply responsible and prescient enough to back up their important things regularly and as such find Time Machine superfluous and wasteful.

Small club.

Point one: Time Machine is so easy and automatic that there is no excuse for not having a backup. Keep doing those regular, manual backups, but let Time Machine handle the day to day stuff.

Point two: there is no such thing as a superflous backup unless you can no longer access the data. Redundant backups are the backbone of good backup strategies.

Point three: For those who have mission-critical data, Time Machine should not be their only backup, but it’s better than not having any backup or only having out of date backups, true for too many of us.

> As for the price, well you know the line: if you can afford an Apple computer, you can afford a $500 network hub

Actually, $499 for a server-class 1TB NAS with built-in 802.11n 4 port wireless router is a bargain. It’s a price point that will “serve” many. (forgive the pun).

If you use your system for generating income, you balance cost vs. benefit and give Apple your credit card, or not.

> to back up all your bad photos and amateur Buffy novelization drafts.

Do you doubt the value of family photos and recreational writing? Tsk.

Now we can’t do what we were told we could with our already 1K investment in hardware. Thanks Apple.

By the way, I gave my iPhone to my wife. Sick of hauling it around. Blackberry and Nano for me.