How to set up an external hard drive for roon backups?

Roon Core Machine

Late '13 iMac. 3.1 GHz Quad-Core Intel Core i7. 8 GB RAM running Catalina 10.15.7

Networking Gear & Setup Details

2 Airport Extreme Routers (last models that Apple released) iMac is connected to the first router via ethernet.

Connected Audio Devices

I’m using a Bluesound Node 2i connected to my 2nd Airport Extreme via ethernet.

Number of Tracks in Library

I just stream TIDAL through roon.

Description of Issue

I have an external hard drive that is set up for Time Machine. I also have dropbox set up for roon backups.

I’d like to know how to also use my external hard drive for both Time Machine and roon backups.

Partition your drive. Use on partition for each task.

I don’t know how to do that. Would you please tell me?

Hi Brett,

If you have another USB port, I’d spend a couple of dollars and get a cheap 1 tb usb hard drive, plug that in, and use that for Roon Backups. I think it would be the easiest way.

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ok, thanks.

This should work:

So, I have the drive partitioned. But now when I try to do a manual backup it tells me “error loading folder unauthorized”. What do I do now?

Hey @Brett_Lancaster,

Ben here from the support team, thanks for taking the time to write in! An important thing to note, we strongly recommend against using Time Machine for backing up and restoring Roon as it will result in database corruption.

Here is a fantastic article on backing up Roon that breaks down this information in more depth for you.

Please let me know if you have any questions at all, @Rugby is steering you in the right direction here in regards to the easiest way to start making backups on your account :pray:

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I’m not trying to use Time Machine for backing up roon. It’s just on the same disc which is now partitioned and set up to use Time Machine on half of it. And roon on the other half of it. I’d really rather not use a 1tb thumb drive which I don’t currently have. Plus I only have 1 usb slot left on my iMac that I use for connecting my devices. And I don’t have a usb hub either. I also have drop box set up for roon backups. Honestly, I don’t know what purpose roon backups is for?

It may be a permissions problem. If that is the case, Roon needs permission to write to the backup partition. One of the ways you can grant that like this:

You can also right click on the partition/volume in Finder or the sidebar, then choose
Get Info,
then click the lock,
enter your admin password,
then click “ignore permissions on this volume “
and close the Info window.

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Wow. Thanks! That worked!

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