HT4413 What if migration assistant isn't recognizing my external hard drive with my time machine backup on it.

Tech department updated my computer to Lion and wiped it clean. I'm trying to restore my documents/photos/etc from a Snow Leopard time machine backup. When trying to use Migration Manager, when it asks for me to "Select my system," my hard drive with the time machine backup doesn't appear.

See Pondini's TM FAQs for starters.

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Migration Assistant can't see my external hard drive.

Migration Assistant can't see my external hard drive with my back-up info on it. I need to migrate my user data from an older back-up ( OS X 10.4.11) to a recently installed OS X 10.5.8 system on a Mac Pro. The external drive is not bootable. Any ideas?

Great news, thanks!
On iTunes see this...
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4527
Expand the External drive section & it's 6 steps.
More info, especially the Wrong Way part...
http://www.ilounge.com/index.php/articles/comments/moving-your-itunes-library-to -a-new-hard-drive/

External hard drive used for Time machine is full and having a hard time backing up. what should I do?

External hard drive used for Time Machine is full and having a hrad time backing up. What is my best option moving forward? NAS?

For All things Time Machine see Pondini's Excellent Infirmation here...
http://pondini.org/OSX/Home.html
Start with FAQs and Troubleshooting.

HT201250 if my drive with my time machine backup becomes corrupt, what is a good tool to recover it?

if my drive with my time machine backup becomes corrupt, what is a good tool to recover it?

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Migration Assistant can't find my external hard drive

I'm trying to set up my Mac Mini and it isn't working. Three steps into the process and already I'm locked up. I'm trying to migrate data from an external FireWire 400 drive. I have to use an adapter because the Mini only has a Firewire 800 port. That's not a problem because I've used the adapter several times and it works fine. The external drive is connected directly to the Mini and turned on. It's been turned on before I went into this mode. Now the Migration Assistant is hung up on Select The Source with a spinning circle and the Continue button is greyed out. I don't want to bypass this step and do everything manually because that's a nightmare and with my schedule it will likely drag out for months.
Can anyone help?

Personally I have always used the manual method for moving my files over to a new iMac and never use Migration Assistant.
Go to the Apple drop down menu and select Force Quit.. and if Migration Assistant has failed, force quit it and try re-launching it again from your Applications Utility folder.

Need to reformat hard drive and restore Time Machine backup. What's the safest way to proceed?

I have a Mac desktop, purchased in 2007. We upgraded last year to Snow Leopard. It has been slow for a few days, and yesterday wouldn't go past the gray screen. Tried booting in recovery with no success, same for safe mode. Even tried fsck -fy. Eventually went to the Snow Leopard install disk and tried to repair disk, but got an "Disk Utility can't repair this disk. Back up as many of your files as possible, reformat the disk, and restore your backed-up files" message. I've got Time Machine back ups on an external hard drive, but I want to make sure I do this right and don't make things worse. What steps do I need to take?

In most of the cases, that Disk Utility message means that the hard drive is damaged.
However, you can try to erase the disk and restore the Time Machine backup to see if it works. Follow these steps:
1. Insert the Snow Leopard DVD and press the C key while your Mac is starting.
2. Go to Utilities menu > Disk Utility, select Macintosh HD on the sidebar, go to Erase tab and erase the disk. If there's an error during this step, take the Mac to an Apple Store to get a new hard drive.
3. Close Disk Utility, go to Utilities menu, choose the option to restore a Time Machine backup and follow the steps.
If the computer is slow after doing this, take the Mac to an Apple Store as soon as you can

What size external hard drive needed for Time Machine?

Can someone offer advice? What size external hard drive do I need to back up my system with Time machine? Hard drive is 232 GB but I'm only using 40 GB of the 232.
Thanks.

beach bum51,
Hard drive space is cheap, so I'm going to recommend that you get something with at least 500 GBs capacity. 500 GBs would be twice the capacity of your internal, which is apparently the "recommended" size, so I have no hesitation recommending it. The larger the drive, the lower the cost per GB.
What's not so cheap is speed. You'll be happiest with a drive capable of using the fastest bus provided by your computer. If your iMac has a Firewire 800 port, you'll get the best experience from using that port, and a drive that will use Firewire 800 transfer speeds.
Scott

On a 500G MBP running Lion what's the best size to partition a 2T WD external hard drive to for Time Machine? Thankse

Just picked up a 2T WD external HD for my new MBPro with 500 G drive. Looking to use part of the external drive for Time MAchine. Not sur if I should designate 1T of it or 750G. I'm running Lion. What's the best way to format the external drive. Disk Utility?
Thanks,
Dennis

Ask in Lion: TimeMachine / MacBook Pro even - this is workstation territory
I would not use the same drive for data and for backups.
If I had to, I'd make a partition large enough to boot your Mac from though, whether 50-500GB to clone your system.
You should still be able to use Lion's Recovery boot mode.
I don't think there really is much choice in what to format with, unless you want to spend over $100.

What is the best external hard drive for iMac time machine?

I need to purchase 1TB external hard drive to use as a backup drive for iMac (lion) Time Machine. I currently have the Lacie little disk but I need more storage. All I need is a simple USB connection.

I've been happy with my silver FW Western Digital drives, I use two daisy chainned together (1TB, 2TB). These were the ones sold for mac's so they have a aluminum look to them. Only a bit more expensive than their black USB brothers.

TS1963 Migrating from Time Machine onExternal Disk, Why won't Migration Assistant see my USB Connected external disk drive?

I had to format my internal disk drive on my MacBook Pro, and reload Mountain Lion 10.8.3. The startup assistant could not see my external disk drive with the Time Machine backup files. After many tries I told it to skip restoring the files and let it boot up. I was able to see my 1 TByte external drive and could see the Time Machine files using Finder.
I started the Migration Assistant and told it to migrate from Time Machine Files on an external drive. It also did not see the backup drive. The only drive icon it showed was the Macintosh HD (my internal drive).
Isn't it supposed to show you the drive you are moving the files from? I tried starting it and it looked like it was going to try to migrate the files from the internal drive (to where I don't know, back to itselfl?) Or do I just not understand. Is it seeing the external drive, without identifying it (in the Migration Asst,)?
Really looks like it is going to back up the internal HD with files that are on the internal HD and not from Time Machine.
I need to restore my files and have been told I need to do so using Migration Assistant and not Time Machine.
Help pleae and soon, need to get my taxes finished!
Thanks!

I'm surprised that no one replied to this. But I learned a few things that may be helpful to some of you with this same question.
When you restore data from an external disk drive with Time Machine files on it. As you move through the dialog (in either System Startup or in the Migration Assistant) it will ask if you want to restore from an external disk with Time Machine files. If you select this option, it will show you only one Icon. You will expect to see your external disk drive listed as the source of the restore. The icon that is shown will look like your ilnternal drive and will be labeled something like Macintosh HD. That is not your internal drive, but is your backup drive. It is labeled the same as your internal disk drive and it is telling you that you have found the backup for your internal disk drive.
Would be nice if Apple would put a note of explanation about this as part of that dialog. I wasted several hours trying to make it work Finally I took a chance and selected the drive shown and it did restore my system. I ended up with two users since I did it from Migration Assistant. Had I done it from the System Startup, there would only be the one user.

Mac not recognizing USB external hard drive

My Mac OS X 10.5.8 isn't recognizing my Samsung USB external hard drive. The hard drive has already been formatted for a Mac (rather than PC). My computer has recognized the external hard drive before with no problems. I've used it on a campus computer to copy video files from a documentary I was filming, and I've also used it on another campus computer to copy video files from a multimedia piece. I still need these files, so having to erase my hard drive would be DEVASTATING. Now, my computer won't recognize my external hard drive, even when I have it plugged in before turning on my computer.
When I go to Disk Utility, my mac recognizes it, but when I try to repair and verify it says that it failed.
It's also not a problem with the external hard drive because I've plugged it into another computer and it is recognized on the other computer.
What should I do?

When I go to Disk Utility, my mac recognizes it, but when I try to repair and verify it says that it failed.
Sounds like it's very badly damaged, and it may be too much to expect the data to still be intact. However, you can try repairing it with a more powerful utility, like [DiskWarrior|http://www.alsoft.com/DiskWarrior/index.html] or [TechTool Pro|http://www.micromat.com>. If neither of those can fix it, then your only options will be using a data recovery tool, such as [Data Rescue|http://www.prosofteng.com> or [File Salvage|http://subrosasoft.com/OSXSoftware/index.php?mainpage=product_info&productsid=1], or paying an expensive data recovery service to disassemble the drive and recover what they can.
Of course, this would all have been avoided if you had backups of your data. In the future, you must have a minimum of three copies of any data you don't want to lose.

My MacBook Pro is not recognizing my external hard drive. The hard drive is listed in disk utilities but an icon does not pop up and I cannot access the data. Is there any way to resolve this?

My MacBook Pro is not recognizing my external hard drive. The hard drive is listed in disk utilities but an icon does not pop up and I cannot access the data. Is there any way to resolve this?

WE know Disk Warrior is more reliable, hence more useful, and should be in any disk mechanics toolchest.
For the record, I don't know anything of the kind. I have yet to see evidence that Disk Warrior is useful at all.
What I do know is that you seem to take every opportunity you get to promote it in these forums. Do you work for Alsoft?
Let me be a little more explicit. My opinion is that Disk Warrior is a waste of money if one has backups. If a journaled HFS directory is so badly corrupted that it can't be repaired by Disk Utility, then the volume should be reformatted and restored from backup, which has the same effect as running DW, but is probably faster and doesn't cost $99.

What is the best external hard drive with MacBook Pro

What is the best external hard drive with MacBook Pro?

I agree with Allan, and that link is also called OWC, their hard drives are great. Have three of their Mercury Pro Elite 2 TB quad interface drives. They will connect eSATA, Firewire 800 & 400, USB2, so broad reange of options. Drives seem to come Mac HFS formatted, but I always reformat and partition the drives. Service and quarantees are top notch.
They offer a wide range of drives/drive systems so like Allan said, spend some time seeing what the have.

HT3275 My Time Capsule has been backing up without any problems and all of a sudden it stops reading on my computer. The external hard drive beeps three times and the motter wont run within. What happened?

My Time Capsule has been backing up without any problems and all of a sudden it stops reading on my computer. The external hard drive beeps three times and the motter wont run within. The light that usually blinks while in use is no longer blinking and is on constant. What happened?

abailey46 wrote:
My Time Capsule has been backing up without any problems and all of a sudden it stops reading on my computer. The external hard drive beeps three times and the motter wont run within. The light that usually blinks while in use is no longer blinking and is on constant. What happened?
Sorry we are unclear as to the external hard drive and its connection to the TC..
For instance the light that blinks.. is that the TC or external hard disk or what.
Did you try just rebooting / restart the whole network in correct order.. modem.. router / TC.. external drive.. clients with 2min gap between each.
Are you actually running Snow Leopard as the profile states?
How old is the TC?

HT4413 What about secondary disks - where do they go when they are restored by Time Machine?

What about secondary disks - where do they go when they are restored by Time Machine?

I see the "Remove now" button next to that checkbox--exactly
what messages does that button remove? The current message?
All messages? Just the ones that don't have a blue dot next to them?
The Remove Now button removes ALL messages available at the incoming mail server for the account.
To remove an individual message from the server, select the button at the bottom of the mailboxes drawer which has a gear icon.
At the bottom of the menu window that appear, select Get Info.
Select the POP via the Account selection - the account will be already selected if you are accessing a single account with the Mail.app.
Under the Messages On Server tab at Show Messages, All messages on POP server should be selected.
The window below will reveal all messages currently available on the server. You can select an individual message or multiple messages and then the Remove From Server button.

HT4413 What if migration assistant isn't recognizing my external hard drive with my time machine backup on it.

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