Take Control of Mac OS X Backups, Fourth Edition

Set Up Your Time Machine Hardware

Time Machine always stores its backups on a hard drive. The only question is where that drive should be:

• Locally attached: You'll get the fastest performance, by far, with a drive directly connected to your Mac via FireWire, USB, or eSATA. This is the best option for anyone with a single Mac or who relies on a slow wireless network. (By the way, you can use more than one local disk on a given Mac with Time Machine; for details, see Use Multiple Backup Disks with a Single Mac.)

• Shared from another Mac: If you're backing up two or more Macs and you have either a wired Ethernet connection for all of them or a fast (802.11n) AirPort connection, sharing a drive on your network may be a good option. Be sure the Mac that's ...