HELP! if i back up everything on time machine, can it ALL be restored?

i need to reformat my external hard drive because it can only read files. if i use time machine to back everything up, erase all the files on my external and reformat it, can i restore everything that was on it from time machine?

That's not likely to help; you'll save the permissions, and bring them back when you restore.
How is the drive formatted? If it's NTFS (like from a PC), OSX can't write to it natively.
If it's formatted for a Mac, try Repairing the drive, per #A5 in [Time Machine - Troubleshooting|http://web.me.com/pondini/Time_Machine/Troubleshooting.html] (or use the link in *User Tips* at the top of this forum).

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I have the new 2011 macbook pro, with lion preinstalled. I want to change the harddrive. I have backed up everything on time machine. when i put my new blank hard drive in will the lion screen startup.How do i get the lion dmg when i am already using lion

I have the new 2011 macbook pro, with lion preinstalled. I want to change the harddrive. I have backed up everything on time machine. when i put my new blank hard drive in will the lion screen startup.How do i get the lion dmg when i am already using lion

NicholasLiban -
When you use the Lion restore as described, it does a fresh install on the hard drive that you can select at the beginning of the process. This provides a complete install of the very latest version of Lion, including the recovery partition. The drive that you choose for the installation destination winds up like what you would have on a brand new computer from Apple.
- Randy

HT201250 It's amazing how little help "Help" is in the Mac on using Time machine to do a full "restore" .. Oh sure.. It says you can do it .. but offers no way of doing it by explanation .. Then we have this article that suggests to re-start with the "Com

.. but what do ya do when the "Command-R" keys do nothing at restart .. sigh!

Thanks Matt, for you quick help on this .. Unfortunately, the link is no help at all. Well.. It seems to offer help, and it sorta gets you started with some cautions .. but, actually provides no instruction on how to fully restore using Time Machine. It quickly launches into "Migration Assistant" which is not Time Machine software.
My problem is with Time Machine .. and the instructions on how to use it for a full restore .. Those instructions simply don't exist, or are hidden, and left as an exercise for the student to find.
Ironicly, there was nothing wrong with my computer, until Apple issued a recall to replace the 1TB drive in iMacs. After 3 years of my iMac working perfectly ...I made the fatal choice to let Apple replace my drive, at the California, Escondido, North County Apple store.   A work order was generated that would replace the drive, and a full restore would be done by the store, as I (like most everyone else) had no idea how to use Time machine for a full restore.
When I got the computer home (after 6 days in the store) .. I was shocked and horrified to find all data was gone.. it was essentially a new computer out of the box. They didn't "restore" anything.
I had backed up everything just before taking the iMac in. Unfortunately, all of my attempts at using Time Machine failed to produce any meaningful results .. And now .. a worse problem has developed.. When launching Time Machine.. the drive ( which does mount on the screen) is no longer listed as a "Time Machine Backup Disk) And apparently, cannot even be accessed by Time machine.
I called the Apple store .. They are sorry for the screw-up, and are saving my old drive, and will put it back in.. or use it, somehow, to restore my computer. Naturally, I do not trust them to be successful.
.. then there's the problem with the backup drive .. apparently caused by Time Machine.... sigh!

After installing Mavericks my Business Mail folder disappeared and Time Machine can't seem to restore it with everything in it. How can I fix this?

Time Machine doesn't restore my Business Folder in Mail, which is empty after I installed Mavericks. It will restore just the folder but nothing in it. What am I doing wrong? Also, Time Machine doesn't go back more than about a year. I thought it would do better than that.

Michael - Thanks! I used my wife's iBook, and it did indeed allow me to restore it there.
Unfortunately, now when I plug my nano into my Cube, it is still telling me that some of the tunes don't copy onto my iPod (in fact, none of them do) because I don't have the current software, and to install the latest by going to apple.com, blah, blah, blah.
I DO indeed have the latest software and both iTunes and my Cube recognize the nano. I just can't get it to copy them onto it.
Does anyone have an idea as to what I can do to actually get MUSIC to play ut of this thing! I've had it for a week and a half, and something as simple as getting tunes to load onto it is proving to be the hardest process ever! Arggghhhh!
The only thing I could think of - and this was late last night, was tha looking at the specs of iTunes 5.0.1, is that it requires a 500MHz processor - and my Cube only has a 450 MHz PowerPC G4 processor - Can anyone tell me if this is the problem?

NEW back up drive for Time machine, can I move old back up to new drive?

I have been backing TM up to a GRAID external. I just bought a new 'toaster' with mirror back up for TM to use. Is there anyway to move the old back up files from the GRAID to the new toaster?

Clone the old backup drive to the new one:
Clone using Restore Option of Disk Utility
1. Open Disk Utility from the Utilities folder.
2. Select the destination volume from the left side list.
3. Click on the Restore tab in the DU main window.
4.Check the box labeled Erase destination.
5. Select the destination volume from the left side list and drag it to the Destination entry field.
6. Select the source volume from the left side list and drag it to the Source entry field.
7. Double-check you got it right, then click on the Restore button.
Destination means the new backup drive.
Source means the old backup drive.
Use the above procedure only. Do not attempt to copy by Drag and Drop or use a third-party backup utility unless it states that it qualifies for cloning TM backups.

I recently did a full reinstall from my time machine and now my MacBook pro won't back up to the time machine. It starts a full backup ignoring the original back up, can anyone help?

I recently did a full reinstall from my time machine and now my MacBook pro won't back up to the time machine. It starts a full backup ignoring the original back up, can anyone help?

Did you follow the instructions on the page linked below?
OS X Yosemite: Recover your entire system

HT1553 i am upgrading my 2008 macbook to an ssd drive and want to save my settings. how do i save then? I have my files backed up with time machine ,but dont want to restore all files ,as there might be some junk backed up too. Help will be appretiated

i am upgrading my 2008 macbook to an ssd drive and want to save my settings. how do i save then? I have my files backed up with time machine ,but dont want to restore all files ,as there might be some junk backed up too. Help will be appretiated

When you restore from a Time Machine back up you can pick and chose what is restored. It is not an all or nothing process. Nor do you have to do the partial restores all at the same time. If days after the first partial restore you find something else you want you can restore just that.

I just replaced my hard drive and restored everything from Time machine. However, my itunes is empty. No music, movies etc are there. Please help thanks

I just replaced my hard drive and restored everything from Time machine. However, my itunes is empty. No music, movies etc are there. Please help thanks

Empty/corrupt library after upgrade/crash
Hopefully it's not been too long since you last upgraded iTunes, in fact if you get an empty/incomplete library immediately after upgrading then with the following steps you shouldn't lose a thing or need to do any further housekeeping. In the Previous iTunes Libraries folder should be a number of dated iTunes Library files. Take the most recent of these and copy it into the iTunes folder. Rename iTunes Library.itl as iTunes Library (Corrupt).itl and then rename the restored file as iTunes Library.itl. Start iTunes. Should all be good, bar any recent additions to or deletions from your library.
Windows images, but you get the point. Depending on the age of your library the library file might not include the .itl extention. Make it match the file you are replacing.
See MusicFolder Files Not Added and Super Remove Dead Tracks for tools to catch up with any changes since the backup file was created.
tt2

According to the Genius Bar, my HD is dying. I need help with such things as making a boot disk, making sure back up is complete, etc. I have a White early 2008 MacBook running 10.7.3. It is backed up regularly with Time Machine to an external drive.

I am not a real tech type person. MAcBook white early 2008 running 10.7.3. I know I will need a boot disk to restart the computer after I have installed the new drive. I have purchased a Hitachi 500 G, 7200 RPM to install. The computer is backed up regularly using Time Machine to an external hard drive. I nned to know all the steps I need to do before physically changing the hardware.

Do you have your original drive backed up? Is it still working? If so I'd buy an external enclosure and boot from that. Then format your new drive and use Carbon Copy Cloner to clone your old drive to the new one.
If you don't have a backup, I'd buy an external drive, use carbon copy cloner to do a backup, then install the new drive and clone back to it.

Just updated to Lion but has too many conflicts and drop outs for some of my apps. I want to deinstall and go back to SL. I back up to a time machine so have everything backed up - how do I do this? Thanks

I've just updated to lion on my iMac (following a successful install on my MacBook air) - a number of my apps on the iMac now don't work properly and I've checked some user forums and these are known issues I hadn't picked up before. I was quite happy with snow leopard so I just want to deinstall Lion and go back to Snow Leopard. I back up to a time machine and so can restore from that but how do I remove lion and reinstall SL? Thanks

Boot from Snow Leopard DVD
After selecting language, use Disk Utility to erase disk
Install Snow Leopard
Restore from backup
Allan

I just replaced my hard drive and restored everything from Time machine. However, I am unable to open iphoto and the following message appears Your photo library was not found. Do you want to find your iPhoto Library?

I just replaced my hard drive and restored everything from Time machine. However, I am unable to open iphoto and the following message appears Your photo library was not found. Do you want to find your iPhoto Library?
Where do I find this library?
thanks
Shak

Twas quite a hassle if I am honest which was eventually resolved but I don't feel qualified to help anyone through the process as it required a trip to my local apple store and a genius bar appointment.
Personally, I would do anything like moving pictures out of folders etc. Certainly not creating a new users. i don't think that is an elegant solution
Try the following which MAY just about rescue the situation for you but if they don't work you may have to do something more drastic.
(1) Holding down Cmd & Alt at the same time, start iPhoto by clicking on the iPhoto icon. From the resulting menu choose Rebuild photo library by selecting all available options given to you and then pressing REBUILD!
If that doesn't work
(2) Fire up Utilities. Go to migration assistant. Chose 'From another Time machine back-up'. Open the 'Users' option that comes up next and from there select Pictures, then uncheck everything else like Applications etc (you don't want to do a full migration of everything) and click go.
If that doesn't work, take a deep breath and this step is rather complicated but it worked for me. First of all close iPhoto! Then go to new Finder window.
From the Finder window choose Pictures, then iPhoto library, press CMD and the letter i. It brings up a new window. Go to Sharing & permissions. From there select the padlock to unlock settings. and then select User account, then press the 'cog' icon next to +/- abd choose Apply to enclosed items.
This may take a while. Once completed, re-open iPhoto.
And that should (I stress should) cure it.
Good luck.

Keep getting this message when trying to back up iMac to time Machine: Unable to complete backup. An error occurred while copying files to the backup volume.

Keep getting this message when trying to back up iMac to time Machine: Unable to complete backup. An error occurred while copying files to the backup volume. tried everything.

Pondini's Time Machine FAQ for help with TM problems. Also you can select Mac Help from the Finder's Help menu and search for "time machine" to locate articles on how to use TM. See also Mac 101- Time Machine.
Time Machine- Troubleshooting backup issues

My external hard drive is 'seen' by my iMac and I can go into the Finder and open files and folders. I am using the hard drive for Time Machine back up. However Time Machine says it can't find the drive. Same thing has happened with Final Cut Express.

My new LaCie external hard drive is 'seen' by my iMac and I can go into the Finder and open files and folders. I am using the hard drive for Time Machine back up. However Time Machine says it can't find the drive.
The same thing happened recently between Final Cut Express and my other LaCie external hard drive used as the Scratch disk. It fixed itself.
I've run out of ideas. Help would be very much appreciated. Thanks.

have you done some searches on FCPx and time machine? Is there a known issue with using a TM drive with FCPx? dunno but ...wait...I'll take 60 sec for you cause I'm just that kind of guy.... google...." fcpx time machine problem" Frist page link
http://www.premiumbeat.com/blog/fcpx-bug-best-practices-for-using-external-hard- drives-and-final-cut-pro-x/
You cannot have time machine backups on your hard drive if you intend to use it in FCPX.
booya!

I have an IMAC and I'm running OSX 10.9.2. I'd like to store my Aperture /IMovie Libraries to an external hard drive. In addition, I'd like to partition the external hard drive so that Time Machine can use it to both back up my IMac and the externa

I have an IMAC and I'm running OSX 10.9.2. I'd like to store my Aperture /IMovie Libraries on an external hard drive. In addition, I'd like to partition the external hard drive so that Time Machine can use it to both back up my IMac and the external library drives. Is this possible? Can I set up a RAID 5 format for redundancy?

I'd like to store my Aperture /IMovie Libraries on an external hard drive.
That is fine and recommended.. use the fastest disk you can afford.. ie Thunderbolt>USB3>FW800>USB2.
In addition, I'd like to partition the external hard drive so that Time Machine can use it to both back up my IMac and the external library drives.
Let me be clear.. you want to partition the one disk.. use it for TM and move your files to the external disk.. and then backup to the same disk.. You can do it.. but that is not a backup.. that is an experiment in how long you can get away with running files and backups on the same disk before you lose everything.. like Russian Roulette.. pull the trigger enough times and laws of probability will do you in.
You must have backups on a different disk .. otherwise it is pointless.
Can I set up a RAID 5 format for redundancy?
No.. you can buy special USB and Thunderbolt external drives that support RAID..
BUT that is still not a backup.. let me show why.. you make a silly move and corrupt your file in aperture.. it is not that rare.
Raid will corrupt all copies of the files.. it is replicated across all disks.
Delete a photo it is deleted across all disks.. you have no recovery.
Alway, always consider RAID system one disk.. backup onto another disk.. and if the photos or movies are at all important to you.. ie your family .. make another copy and store in a relatives house.. There is no such thing as too much redundancy.

HT3275 EMERGENCY!!!!!!!! NEED TO RETREIVE AN ACCIDENTALLY DELETED BACKUP! BACK UP FROM MY TIME MACHINE DRIVE???? In other words, I emptied out a folder on my main MAC to make space and the next subsequent backup backed up the EMPTY FOLDER and then delet

EMERGENCY!!!!!!!!
IS THERE ANY WAY TO RETREIVE AN ACCIDENTALLY DELETED BACK UP FROM MY TIME MACHINE DRIVE????
In other words, I emptied out a folder on my main MAC to make space and the next subsequent backup backed up the EMPTY FOLDER and then deleted the "old backup" that actually contained the contents of the very important folder.
Now only the emptied folder exists on my MAC and in the two backups on my Time machine backup drive.
This was clearly a big mistake on my part not realizing that the "old backup" being deleted by Time Machine would include backed up files that I had no intention of getting rid of....
What can I do now?
Is DATA RETREIVAL even an option?
I am sure that the Folder of files that I need are on the most recently deleted "OLD BACKUP" but how do I get to this, if even possible?????
Super desperate situation here...
M

inna-help-me wrote:
Is DATA RETREIVAL even an option?
It may be possible to recover some of the data, if it hasn't been overwritten, but it won't be cheap or easy.
You've posted in the Time Capsule forum, but you mention a "backup drive." If your backups are on a Time Capsule's internal HD, instead of an external HD, it's even worse.
See Data Recovery.
Good luck.

HELP! if i back up everything on time machine, can it ALL be restored?

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