If you have any number of iOS devices, you likely back your stuff up onto your computer. Perhaps iCloud, but after a certain point, you may have so much stuff to back up that it’s best to just put it all on your computer than it is to pay for the additional iCloud storage. That’s especially the case if you have multiple iOS devices. You can save a lot of space on your drive if you have lots of iOS apps, etc. For instance, we were able to free up 100GB, no joke.
OS X
1) Make sure that iTunes is closed.
2) You will now move your folder called ~/Library/Application Support/MobileSync/Backup/ to the drive you want to back up to. For instance, an external drive or secondary drive within your computer. Whichever works for you.
3) Launch Terminal Applications/Utilities/Terminal and type in the following command line:
ln -s /Volumes/DriveName/Backup/ ~/Library/Application\ Support/MobileSync/Backup
In the above example, ‘DriveName’ would be the name of the new backup location.
(Credit: Link)
Windows XP
1) Ensure that iTunes in closed.
2) Download Junction (link) ( Or you can use MKlink for Windows here’s a rundown on that, which will make things a little different in the command prompt)
3) Unzip Junction.exe to your username folder, which is usually found in C:\Documents and Settings\
4) You will now create a folder for the your backups where you want them to save. From there, you will move your current backup folder to that new location.
a) The default location of that backup folder is here: C:\Documents and Setting\username\Application Data\Apple Computer\MobileSync
b) You will now put it in the new location you want your backups to save to, such as an external drive.
5) Now run the Command Prompt and type the following:
junction "C:\Documents and Setting\<username>\Application Data\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup" "H:\Backups\iPhone Backup"
In the above example, “H:\Backups\iPhone Backup” should be your own file path leading to the backup location you want to use.
6) Close the Command Prompt and open iTunes and backup.
(credit: Link)
Windows Vista and Windows 7
1) Ensure that iTunes is closed.
2) Move the C:\Users\(username)\AppData\Roaming\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup\ to the drive you want to back up to. Let’s say Drive H:\ again
3) Open a command prompt and create an NTFS junction point something like what’s shown below:
mklink /J “C:\Users\(username)\AppData\Roaming\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup” “h:\Backup”
(Credit: Link)
There you go!
Now you can save a ton of space on your main hard drive by backing up your iOS devices onto an external drive. We freed up 100GB on our MacBook Pro.
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does not work for me
Does not work on Mountain Lion.
Any suggestions?
I have this setup on mountain lion. Make sure to run commands in terminal as super user, that is the only way to make proper symbolic link
wow, great post…. Thank alot.
Have done this but during backup it stops and says “Error (-1303) if you continue with backup will lose all information on this iPhone. Any idea what that may be? I am trying to upgrade to iOS 6.0 so phone is backing up first as part of this process”
They have typed it backwards.. do this:
mklink /J “h:\Backup” “C:\Users\(username)\AppData\Roaming\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup”
“r” above is quite wrong. The syntax is certainly confusing. What actually worked was
mklink /j “C:\Users\(user)\AppData\Roaming\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup” “e:\iTunes backup\”
No, you have typed it backwards.
Liam, did you even TEST what I wrote before disagreeing or are you one of those people that just likes to disagree?
I needed to do this on another PC, googled this page, copied the exact text in my comment and it worked perfectly.
The syntax is mklink [/j] Link Target, so it’s quite obvious that c:\… comes first and e:\ comes second.
Anyway, everyone else, just ignore him. It works 100%. but make sure you using hard not soft quotation marks as that will screw it up, as others here have noted.
Don’t forget to replace the “ with normal ” as I found out after trying for 5 minutes to copy and paste the mklink code in the original post.
nothing is working
not working please help me
after I did what ” r ” said, it worked, but!!
now it saves the backed up files to C:\ AND D:\ !!
Now I got double backup -.- takes x2 space..
plus if I delete from 1 directory it gets deleted from the other too..
junction “C:\Documents and Setting\\Application Data\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup” “H:\Backups\iPhone Backup”
It’s “Settings” not “Setting”
junction “C:\Documents and Settings\\Application Data\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup” “H:\Backups\iPhone Backup”
Don’t copy-paste the command, type it.
That being said, the original posting is correct!
Not working for me. Using this code:
ln -s /Volumes/Macintosh HD/Backup/ ~/Library/Application\ Support/MobileSync/Backup
I finally got mine to work.
When you drag and drop the “Backup” folder to your new hard drive location, make sure it’s not COPYING itself to the new location. In order to do this, when dragging and dropping, hold down the COMMAND key and the “+” sign designating copying will disappear.
The BACKUP folder needs to be MOVED and not simply COPIED for the code to work.
I hope this helps and that your problem was the same as mine.
In windows7 it’s “Apple Computer” there is a space between apple and computer. Original post is perfect. Just not obvious that there is a space there until you really look at it. Just worked for me, thanks
Here’s my syntax, not sure what’s wrong with this..
C:\>mklink /J “C:\Users\Tony_Win7\AppData\Roaming\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Back
up” “F:\Apple Stuff\iTunes\Backup”
The syntax of the command is incorrect.