Time machine drive used for time machine before..can it back up a new drive without erasing? My MacBook Pro drive died a few months ago. Thankfully it was fully backed up to an external with Time Machine. I seem to grab something from the backup every week from various libraries, but I now need to back up my new drive. I am cheap and do not want to buy yet another external especially as the older backup is a TB and nowhere near full. Does anyone know if I can use the old external with the old HD back-up as a back-up for the new drive without having to erase and reformat (i.e., keep the old HD back-up in tact)?
Thanks in advance for a response.
Yes, you should have no problem doing that.  Simply tell Time Machine to backup to that drive, and Time Machine with create a new folder in the backups.db folder on your external drive.  As far as Time Machine is concerned, your new backup will be as if it is from a different computer, even if you're using the same MacBook Pro with a new hard drive.  Time Machine can handle backups from multiple computers to the same drive.