How to back up computer properly in order to restore to factory settings

Hi! I have a late 2008 MacBook Pro that I think was originally running on Leopard. I had my friend upgrade it to Lion about a year ago (it says it's running on 10.7.5), and it's been running horribly. I want to restore it back to Leopard, so I backed up my computer to a WD Elements portable hard drive. However, I read on one of the forums that a back up won't transfer over to Leopard properly because everything is in Lion format. It also mentioend something about a carbon copy, but I wasn't sure if that was an actual step or just a description.
What steps do I need to take to properly back up my computer properly so that when I restore it to Leopard, everything can be easily added back to the computer? And how do I restore the computer? Would it be better to ask someone at the Apple store to do it or can I do it on my own? I don't think I have any discs that came with the computer (if any did).
Thanks so much for anyone's help! I was getting really confused by all the different discussions regarding this issue.

I think you need to establish what Operating System the machine was originally supplied with, whether, for example, it was shipped with Leopard or Snow Leopard.
In either case there would have been disks supplied ... but you can buy Snow Leopard from Apple today if you tell them the serial number; Leopard can only be bought privately or on eBay or Amazon nowadays.
Not having Lion, I don't know all the implications but I suspect data on Lion will not transfer in its entirety. There are examples of people with similar problems in 'More like this' opposite your post >>>>>>>
This link (Kappy post) may help .. Anyone know how to uninstall Lion and...: Apple Support Communities

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How can I turn off "find my ipad" to restore to factory settings if screen is not working?

How can I turn off "Find My iPad" to restore to factory settings if screen is not working? I can't get access to the apps on my mini pad. I can see the device when I'm in iTunes.

Try resetting the iPad by holding the home and power keys down until the Apple logo appears.
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Hi there,
To restore to factory state I used the F11 function at boot time and was able to acces the menu shown in the picture here below. My problem started when an electricity bump caused the machine to restart, the recovery wasnt complete and now I have no OS to boot and the F11 function is not avaiable anymore. My Lenovo_Recovery partition is still there intact by the way but unfortunatelly I never created a recovery CD.
So how can I start the recovery process again from my recovery partition?
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Link to picture
Moderator note; picture(s) converted to link(s) About Posting Pictures In The Forums

Try using a bootable Windows disk, going into repair, and invoking Startup Repair. It should scan for valid entries, one of which should be the recovery environment, and add them to the boot list.
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I need to erase the contents of my phone and restore to factory settings. Does anybody know how to save your texts so you don't lose them? Can I back those up to iCloud? My phone was very likely hacked (Apple's advice was to call the police!)

"I need to erase the contents of my phone and restore to factory settings. Does anybody know how to save your texts so you don't lose them? Can I back those up to iCloud? My phone was very likely hacked (Apple's advice was to call the police!)"
That was all I could put in the initial "box." Then it brought me to this page with instructions on how to write a good sentence.
Proceeding ...
After going back and forth between Apple, AT&T and the police (all telling me to go to the other two) I took AT&Ts suggestion and got a new number. One tech warned against doing a backup, especially on my Mac, saying if my phone had been hacked then whatever bug was there would then invade my computer. But nobody knows how to determine if the phone has been hacked or a virus was planted there. Unfortunately I know who would have reason to do such a thing and all I can say is that he is at the top technologically and could easily do it. Almost impossible to prove, however.
So I need to preserve my text messages and my emails as well. I backed up my photos to that Microsoft product (One-Drive) and it froze (Surprise, Surprise) with four short videos to go, and no way of stopping that (when I tried it crashed repeatedly) so I'm in crisis mode here.
Help ...
Running 8.0 on 5S
Thanks!

Betty I don't know if you fixed your hacking problem but I feel your pain. I've seen some strange things going on between my iMac and my iPhone and Apple has told me the same thing, call the police which I have done. The hackers have stole 500.00 out of my checking account have access to every internet account I use and no matter how often I change the password their right back on the account. I closed my FB account 3 times only to have someone reopen it. Right now I've got a link in my reading list (Safari) that if I click on it, it allows me to log onto my FB account anonymously.
I've seen a green folder come out of no where while I was trying to delete my passwords out of keychain when that green folder was put into the key chain I was immediately locked out. I than went into system preferences to try to make changes to my security settings, when I clicked on the icon it wouldn't open. I've seen log files of automator receiving commands and sending out my personal information thats on my computer.
I have a legitamate program called iExplorer that allows you to look at the contents of your iPhone back ups and saw a transaction someone made at the Apple store for some full length movies, some albums, ibooks and other apps but when I called the iTunes store and they said none of those items were showing up on my account. If their not on my account how can they be on my iPhone 6? One day someone was using my gmail account and unknowingly used google maps to search for an Italian restaurant, than a Mexican restaurant than a coffee shop and their search showed up on my iPhone but I didn't have my gmail account installed on my iPhone 6. Using my computer I logged onto my gmail account and looked at the maps history and sure enough there were the searches when I'd hover my curser over the link it gave me the longitude and latitude of the where the hacker was when he was using google maps. I know whoever reads this thinks Im crazy but I've documented everything and can prove the things that I have mentioned in this post actually happened.
One day I had my laptop (pc) and my iMac next to each other as I was using both. when I clicked on airport it showed that my laptop and my iMac had made a connection and were actually communicating with each other. I know I didn't do it I don't know how. The iMac was logged into my iCloud account while my laptop wasn't. I have formatted my iPhone at least a dozen times, Apple and an Apple retailer have formatted my hard drive not to mention the numerous times I have formatted it but the hackers keep getting on my devices. Im formatting my lap top at this very second because during the course of the night I left the ethernet cable plugged into it and they locked me out of my c: drive, and configured the system so I can't download any updates from Microsoft, overtime I type in www.microsoft.com it changes to ww38.microsoft.com which takes me to a blank page. I right clicked on the page I was redirected to and read the java script and couldn't believe that someone had actually configured Internet Explorer to redirect me to a blank page when I tried to go to Microsoft. Apples answer to all this is there was nothing wrong with my iPhone or my iMac and if I thought there was a problem to call the police which I have done.
Theres no doubt the hackers are reading this while I type it or will read it and I simply don't care anymore. I no longer email anyone, don't use my iCloud account and have taken precautions to protect my credit but if I ever find out who has invaded my privacy to this extreme the police are going to want to talk to me because Im going to hurt them like they've never been hurt before

I followed the steps to restore to factory settings now I can't get back my info from a prior backup. My pads screen was frozen on the connect to iTunes I needed to restore. I had to setup my pad as if it was new. How do I acess my prior backup

I followed the steps to restore to factory settings now I can't get back my info from a prior backup. My pads screen was frozen on the connect to iTunes I needed to restore. I had to setup my pad as if it was new. How do I acess my prior backup

Once again, KP is correct, but I just want to add that if you don't see the backup in the drop down menu on the summary page of iTunes when you choose the restore from backup option, then the backup is unfortunately gone. If you backup your computer, the iPad backup should probably be in that computer backup. I use Time Machine with my MacBook Pro and can access backups from months ago.
On a side note, I also archive backups from time to time. If you right click on a backup name in iTunes>Edit>Preferences>Devices (Windows) or iTunes>Preferences>Devices (Mac) you can save that backup or archive it. It will be date and time stamped. I have no idea why I do this to the degree that I do it, but I probably have 12-14 iPad backups archived in iTunes.

HT201269 My computer crashed and had to be restored to factory settings. My ipad has my ituned library. how do i get the music collection from the ipad to the computer?

my computer crashed and had to be restored to factory settings losing ituness collection of music. My ipad has my itunes library. how do i get the music collection from the ipad to the computer?

You should be able to copy iTunes purchases over to your computer's iTunes via File > Devices > Transfer Purchases. For music from other sources (e.g. copied from CDs) you will need a third-party program to copy them back from your iPad - there are some listed half-way down this page which should work : https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-3991

How do I restore my itunes library? My computer was restored to factory settings and I couldn't find a restore date that allowed my to get access to all of my files. Now my itunes library is empty minus the songs we've recently purchsed!

MY computer was restored to factory settings. Is there a way to get my previous itunes library back? I don't have an Ipod or other device that I saved my itunes library to.

Restore the media from the backup of the computer.
If it was simply restored via the Windows restore point, no data on the computer should have been affected.
If the computer was formated and Windows re-installed, no data remained on the computer and will have to be added back by the user.

Ipod touch is not recognised by the computer or in i tunes and is unrepsonsive. All we get is the apple logo. How can it be restored to factory settings?

My ipod touch is not recognised by the computer or by itunes. All we get on the ipod is the apple logo and it won't do anything else. How do we restore the factory settings?

Have you tried everything here?
iOS: Not responding or does not turn on
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My computer has crashed and I have had to restore the factory settings, without backing up my purchases is there anyway which I can recover purchased downloads?

My computer has crashed and I have had to restore the factory settings, without backing up my purchases is there anyway which I can recover purchased downloads?

check out Dave Sawyer's post in this thread.

Can you recover videos from i phone 4s if it was restored to factory settings and It doesn't have any back ups on computer, Can you recover videos from i phone 4s if it was restored to factory settings and It doesn't have any back ups on computer

Hi Guys,
Does anybody know hoe to recover photos and videos from I phone 4S if it had been restored to factory settings without having been backed up from I tunes.
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No, It is impossible, sorry!

My iPod restored to factory settings and erased all my stuff. When I tried to put everything back it came up with an error. How do I get all my stuff back?

My iPod restored to factory settings. Every time I try to connect to iTunes a error comes up not letting me back my iPod up what should I do? Help ASAP please

And what did the error message say?

HT1212 my computer is telling me it does not recognise my ipdad mini and is asking me to restore to factory settings what happens if i do that will i lose all my photos, music etc?

my computer is telling me it does not recognise my ipdad mini and is asking me to restore to factory settings what happens if i do that will i lose all my photos, music etc? how do i get my computer to recognise my ipad mini?
Thanks

have you backed up in the past with iTunes or iCloud? If so, it is possible that you will not lose this information, but I cannot guarantee anything.
Check for backups in iTunes by going to Preferences > Devices > Device backups
If you do not see any, and your iPad is still in working order, check for iCloud backups in Settings > iCloud > Storage & Backup
Also, if your iPad is still in working order, you can backup with itunes before restoring : http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1766

All the apps that I have downloaded are "waiting" and whenever I try to sync apps on my computer with my phone, the apps section is greyed out and won't allow me to do anything. I have tried restoring to factory settings but it didn't work.

How can I access my apps? They are all greyed out in itunes. I have tried restoring my iphone to factory settings but that didn't work. I have a feeling it may have something to with the restrictions settings on my phone restrictions are on) but it won't allow me to change the restrictions without putting in a passcode. I don't remember ever having a passcode and after several attempts have not been able to get the right code.
Also. on my phone, in settings, personal hotspot, iCloud and Twitter are greyed out. And, the App Store icon is missing from my screen as well.
Can anybody help me with this?
Thanks

yep, unfortunately can't reset without the passcode either.
With regards to doing a restore, do you mean:
open itunes on my computer
click on my device on the left
go to the device summary
click restore
it then asks if i want to back up before i restore (to which i say no)
then it asks me if i'm sure I want to restore to factory settings and that all of me media and data will be erased and replaced with the newest version ( to which I say yes)
then it takes about 90 mins to do this but when I look at my phone, everything is exactly the same.
Am I missing something? Obviously I'm technologically challenged, but I HAVE to get to the bottom of this!

HT4972 I have had an iphone 3g and recently had to restore my factory settings, when I have tried to add facebook on again it says that the relevant update of 4.3 is not available, however the 4.3 update is not available for the iphone 3g. how can i solve

I have had an iphone 3g and recently had to restore my factory settings, when I have tried to add facebook on again it says that the relevant update of 4.3 is not available, however the 4.3 update is not available for the iphone 3g. how can i solve this and get facebook back on my phone

You cannot.
Unless you have done as you should and have the old facebook app on your computer.

My Iphone 5 screen is cracked and I need to restore to factory settings and wipe all content. How do I do that?

My Iphone 5 has a screen that is cracked and cannot be read. I need to restore the factory settings to send it back to the warranty company. Please tell me how to do that through Itunes

Restore your iOS device
Connect your iOS device to your computer using the cable that came with it.
Select your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch when it appears in iTunes. In the Summary pane, click the Restore button for your device.
Click Restore again to confirm that you want to restore your device to factory settings and delete all data and content. iTunes will download the iOS software file and restore your iOS device.
After your iOS device is restored to factory settings, it will restart, and you’ll see the "Slide to set up” welcome screen. Follow the steps in the iOS Setup Assistant. You can set up your device as new or using a previous backup. If your iOS device has cellular service, it will activate after you restore. your welcome

How to back up computer properly in order to restore to factory settings

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