APFS changes affect Time Machine in macOS Big Sur

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APFS changes affect Time Machine in macOS Big Sur, encrypted drives in iOS 14

“Apple is increasing its support for APFS on its computing platforms, bringing the ability to use Time Machine with an APFS-formatted disk to macOS Big Sur, while enabling the ability to view external drives using encrypted APFS in iOS and iPadOS 14.”

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Nathan Parker

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I’ve never heard of ‘AFPS’ until reading Alex’s original comment here; from reading the article to which Alex has provided a link, I gather it is a form of encryption. I have a Mac laptop, currently running macOS 14, a.k.a ‘Mojave.’

When, and if I move on from ‘Mojave’ to ‘Big Sur’, would this new feature interfere with my ability to keep retrieving already backed up files with ‘Time Machine’ that are either not encrypted, or not encrypted with this (to me) novel type of encryption? If it does interfere, would there be a workaround?

I think that any new development that has to do with the means used for backing up one’s data files and documents is an issue of legitimate concern that needs to be fully understood, thus my question here.

Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).

MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV

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Apple moved to the AFPS file system in Catalina. I haven’t used my old Time Machine in a couple of yesra, but I don’t think it is compatible with APFS.

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Nathan Parker, OscarCP

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PK, This is a worry, then: would an incompatibility to save APFS encrypted files cripple one’s ability to keep using Time Machine, not only back up new files, but even to retrieve old ones already backed, encrypted or not?

Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).

MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV

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APFS = APple File System. (Equivalent in Win is NTFS). You need a Time Machine with APFS formatted drive.
Whether you encrypt it or not is not a part of the need for the APFS formatted drive.

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Nathan Parker, OscarCP

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Well, now I am left with the impression that this is going to be a real problem for many, unless something analogous to the “Rosetta” software is made available by Apple to let users continue to be able to use their Time Machine external drives after installing “Big Sur”, instead of losing access to files and documents they have stored in there, or else having to do something complicated and perhaps expensive to get around the problem. I imagine that this could seriously an unnecessarily affect a lot of people.

Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).

MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV

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I don’t think comparing it to “rosetta” is appropriate. It is more like how MS Word can open/save/modify either a doc or docx format file. The newer format is more efficient and has more capabilities.

In this case, when a Mac BS machine pics a APFS volume as a storage destination, it will use the APFS features of that volume to create a new backup format. When you pick an HFS+ volume it will use the HFS+ backup features. When you pick a NAS volume, it will create an HFS+ sparsebundle file to hold the backups.

It seems completely implausible that they wouldn’t allow you to browse or restore from the older TM backup archives.
It seems unlikely that they would limit new backup creation to AFPS destinations (with the new backup format) if only because

• having people reformat existing external drives usually destroys previous data and is easy to mess up.
• even if non-destructive reformat happens, it could not easily/efficiently/safely translate an existing backup archive into this new archive format (therefore they still need to read the original format no matter what).
• limits compatibility of that drive for other purposes with older macs you may still have
• buying new drives to start over would be significantly burdensome.

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You won’t lose your files. What will happen is Apple will convert your existing Time Machine backup from being formatted from HFS+ (Apple’s old file system) to APFS (Apple’s new file system). You can choose whether to encrypt it or not in Time Machine preferences (I have mine encrypted for security reasons).

Overall this is a good move since I’ve had some issues with Time Machine being a little funky backing up an APFS Mac to Time Machine since it still used HFS+. Longterm, this is a good move to ensure Time Machine and the Mac use the same underlying file system.

In Catalina, Apple already moved the backup database from a .sparsebundle to a .backupbundle and performed the upgrade without any major issues.

The only possible issue the Time Machine issue would cause is you couldn’t restore your Time Machine backup to an older, non-Catalina Mac, but you likely wouldn’t do that anyway.

Nathan Parker

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Nathan: “What will happen is Apple will convert your existing Time Machine backup from being formatted from HFS+ (Apple’s old file system) to APFS (Apple’s new file system).”

So, when I move to “Big Sur” (from Mojave, where I moved from “Sierra”, the OS my Mac came on with when I bought it, back in June of 2017), I will have to do something so then the Mac will reformat my TM external hard disk, maybe first moving all that is in it into its own internal SSD and then writing everything back to the reformatted TM external disk in APFS-compatible formats? I imagine that will take some time.

Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).

MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV

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It won’t be a full reformat. It can “convert” to the new file system without a full reformat.

Nathan Parker

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OscarCP

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OscarCP wrote:

I gather it is a form of encryption

No. APFS is Apple “new” file system since macOS High Sierra (10.13) and iOS 10.3, replacing HFS+.
Your Mac iPhone iPad are probably using APFS file system since 2017.

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Nathan Parker

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