One of the most important things to stay on top of is a regular system backup. If you’re new to Mac usage—or just never bothered to backup before—you’ll want to get familiar with a built-in Mac program called Time Machine. Time Machine works with your Mac and an external drive to regularly save important documents, photos, and even important system files. Apart from keeping spares of every file, Time Machine also keeps a record of how your system looked on any given day, making it easy for a full system restore if something goes wrong.

Before you get started, make sure your external drive is Mac compatible. This is done by formatting it using the Mac file format. Time Machine is found on Mac OS 10.5 (Leopard) and above. When selecting the proper hard drive to use, you’ll want one with plenty of space for repeated backups.

This how-to is done using an external hard drive dedicated to Time Machine, and a Mac that has not been set up for Time Machine backups.

Step 1: Connect your external drive
First, hook your drive up to your Mac via the proper port: Thunderbolt, USB, or FireWire, depending on your drive and your machine. Your Mac should recognize the added hardware, and a pop-up window will prompt you to your next step. The window asks if you want to use the drive to back up with Time Machine; click Use as Backup Disk. A full system backup will start immediately.

Time Machine will prompt your first backup when you first plug in your hard drive.
Your first full system backup will take a little while (a few hours), but regular backups will only take a fraction of this time since the drive just needs to update what’s already there and save new files. If your drive stays connected to your Mac most of the time, the scheduled hourly backups take seconds.

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