Setting a hard drive from time machine backups on multiple Macs

Question

Setting a hard drive from time machine backups on multiple Macs

With AirPort support going away, I'm trying to use a hard drive attached to one computer, share it on the network, and use time machine to backup multiple Macs to the shared hard drive. After I have shared the hard drive, and after setting up the hard drive for Time Machine backups for the host Mac, I'm not able to see the backup drive in Time Machine from my other Macs. I don't know what I'm doing wrong. I'm not sure how to set up a login from the other machines to use the backup drive. I can see the drive in Finder on the other machines, but I can't see it when setting Time Machine options on the other machines. What am I missing? Pete

Mac Studio (2022)

Posted on Aug 20, 2025 02:24 PM

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Answer 1

Aug 20, 2025 03:11 PM in response to wepetepeterson

Make sure the drive is using APFS or Mac OS Extended formatting.

Use the GUID partition scheme rather than MBR (Master Boot Record)

Also, if using across a network, consider using SMB sharing rather than AFP.

This is Apple's guidance: Types of disks you can use with Time Machine on Mac - Apple Support

Also see:

Set up file sharing on Mac - Apple Support

Connect your Mac to shared computers and servers - Apple Support

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Answer 2

Aug 20, 2025 03:31 PM in response to wepetepeterson

Two recent threads on this topic, with NAS background, and some hardware alternatives to AirPort Time Capsule.

Time Machine will no longer support Time … - Apple Community

back up on Airport time capsule - Apple Community

As you are aware, Mac can also serve the storage via SMB well, if you want to go that way. Here is how:

Back up to a shared folder with Time Machine on Mac - Apple Support

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Answer 3

Barney-15E

Level 10

121,250 points

Aug 20, 2025 04:07 PM in response to wepetepeterson

Once a drive is set up to back up directly via time machine it is read only.

In order to share that you need to add a second APFS volume to the drive and then set up one of the volumes for the dedicated backup of that Mac and use the other one for your network Mac

The network volume can host multiple network backups. However, the direct connected volume will be read only and cannot be modified.

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