Is it possible to take 2 time machine backups from 2 seperate MacBooks and migrate each backup to an iMac under separates user names?

I was sucessful migrating the first macbook to the imac under the first user name but I havent been able to get the second migration to happen under a second user name on the imac. Is this possible? can you only use migration assistant once or should it work?

Yes, you can do that.
If the second set of backups has a user account with the exact same short name (home folder name) as an existing one, you must rename one of them, per the last sample in the pink Transferring Accounts box of Using Migration Assistant on Lion.

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Is possible to have a time machine backup on an external hd connected to either a primary or secondary router and not have "back to my mac" using 10.7.3?

Is possible to have a time machine backup on an external hd connected to either a primary or secondary router and not have "back to my mac" using 10.7.3?

The bottom line is that Apple does not support Time Machine backups at the USB port of the AirPort Extreme. If they don't support their own router, they certainly don't support other routers from other manufacturers.
Connect the drive directly to the Mac using either USB or FireWire.....or....use a Time Capsule. Either of these setups will be supported.
If you want to try the unsupported method(s), you can certainly do so. But, I would suggest that you have a secondary backup plan in place if this is important data that you will be backing up.

HT201250 Can I take my time machine backup drive and put in on another iMac

Can I take my time machine backup drive and put in on another iMac

Setting-up a new Mac from an old one, its backups, or a PC

Is it possible to boot or Time Machine restore from an external Thunderbolt disk drive?

(There are several questions - search for "?".)
I purchased a Seagate Backup Plus for Mac Desktop Drive 3 TByte with default USB 3.0 interface, and also acquired the Seagate Thunderbolt Adapter for Backup Plus Desktop Drives and Thunderbolt cable.
I do a redundant backup to the Seagate Drive using both Carbon Copy Cloner (nightly) and Time Machine (hourly) using its Thunderbolt adapter. BTW: One never knows when Time Machine will choke - see discussion titled, "UPDATED: Serious Time Machine bug on Mountain Lion", which I had; Rest In Peace Pondini (James Lewis Pond).
Booting from the external Seagate Backup Plus via Thunderbolt inteface from System Preferences -> Startup Disk:
I select the Time Machine OS X, 10.8.5 Startup Disk (Thunderbolt attached drive), click Restart, confirm my choice, the computer reboots, however, it reboots from the internal Macintosh HD OS X, 10.8.5, NOT the selected external Thunderbolt drive. The SSD drive was used as the Startup Drive, not the selected external Time Machine volume as indicated by the display free disk space command (df(1)) and seeing that the Macintosh HD OS X, 10.8.5 volume is mounted as root. That is very deceptive in that both the internal and external drives will appear in the same manner from a GUI point of view! OS X doesn't even inform me that it did not boot off the selected volume. This is the first half of the problem, that is, Is it possible to boot from an external Thunderbolt disk drive? In my case, the answer is deceptively No. Can anybody else boot off a Thuderbolt attached disk drive? Note that if I remove the Thunderbolt adapter, and attach the drive via its USB 3.0 cable, the MBP boots off the external Seagate Backup Plus just fine, as is expected.
Booting from the external Seagate Backup Plus via Thunderbolt inteface from boot-time "Option - Select startup disk" method:
When I restart the MBP using the startup Option key to select the startup volume, the externally connected Seagate drive ONLY SHOWS UP if it is attached with the USB 3.0 cable, not when it is attached with via the Thunderbolt interface. Can anyone else boot off a Thunderbolt drive with the startup Option key sequence? At least the MBP doesn't deceive me in this case - I know right away that the external Thunderbolt drive is not an option when connected as such.
Time Machine restore from the external Seagate Backup plus via Thunderbolt interface from the "command-R - Recovery Parition" method:
After booting from the recovery partition, I attempt to perform a Time Machine restore from the Thunderbolt connected Seagate Backup drive. When Time Machine attempts to present me with a viable backup Time Machine volume, the external Thunderbolt drive is never offered as an option. So I switch the Time Machine volume to use its USB 3.0 interface, and then Time Machine displays that drive as an option, and the MBP proceeds with the restoration as expected. The interesting thing to note is that while booted in the recovery partition via the Thuderbolt cable, the MBP Disk Utility may be selected, and the Thunderbolt attached drive may be operated on just fine. Can anybody else restore their MBP using Time Machine and the Recovery Partition via the Thunderbolt interface?
This is also a big problem for me in that I am forced to restore my MBP via Carbon Copy Cloner using the USB 3.0 interface, because I cannot even boot off that volume's Thunderbolt interface. Of course, the option may be that I could use yet another eternal USB 3.0 drive, boot from it, and then use Carbon Copy Cloner to restore the Macintosh HD via the aforementioned drive connected by a Thunderbolt cable, but that is less than ideal and not elegant, so I'm not going there.
Another side issue is that the commercially available program, TechTool Pro 7's eDrive, which I installed on the Time Machine volume, will not boot off that eDrive as advertised, but I won't got through those steps here, because that would be beyond the scope of this issue, however, I must say, It does not work either when the Time Machine volume is connected via the Thunderbolt interface, but works just fine when connected via the USB 3.0 interface.

If this helps anybody else make a decision about whether to consider Apple because of Apple's superior customer service:
Apple sells this entire line of drives right in their store, from 1TB to 4TB. I spent 1 and 1/2 hours, yesterday, confirming that the 3TB model IS NOT 100% Thunderbolt compliant. A MBP cannot boot, nor can it Time Machine restore from this drive, though EVERYTHING about the drive is normal.
Apple's South Coast Plaza store management had at least two responses to me personally about how to proceed:
1. Buy a different drive from another drive manufacturer, and to attempt to return the drive to COSTCO. A lead genius suggested going with GTech drives, for instance.
2. Wait for Seagate to fix their problem.
I told Apple management in the store that the drive is advertised as Mac Compatible (see picture) and that it is advertised as being a Thunderbolt drive (see picture). I pressed management that my purchasing decsion to get the best possible MBP Retina was based on the availablity of Inexpensive Devises (raID), and that not having this complete compatibility is a show-stopper for my needs, and that I wanted a refund. Their response? They needed to talk with "Merchendising" to see if they are on or off the hook for these kind of 3rd party assertions, and would get back to me.
I am not holding my breath.
Note: I do not hold this against the Geniuses that helped me, nor against the management I've dealt with, nor the upper level engineers that I've corresponded with through Apple Care - their problem solving skills were helpful - although I could have arrived at similar conclusions given enough $$$. (For instance, try a Lacie TB drive and see if that works - we did, and it did not work. Or, we have a different TB cable and a different TB adapter, let's try those - we did, and it did not work.) I blame myself for not doing enough homework before going with Apple's solutions.

Is it possible to move a Time Machine backup folder?

I have been using Time Machine with an external drive connected to my iMac via FireWire. Today I connected the external drive to my network using my AirPort Extreme via the USB port. The drive is no longer directly connected to my iMac
When I setup my Time Machine to back to the new drive location, it created a new backup set.
Question: would it have been possible for me to move my old time machine backup folder someplace so that I could continue backing up rather than having to create a new backup folder?

no, you can't do it. remote backups use sparse bundles and directly attached ones don't. you'll have to start a new backup sequence to back up remotely.

Is it possible to reassemble a Time Machine backup from recovered files?

I have kind of a sad story that I'm sure some of you can relate to. My Macbook was briefly stolen but by the time I got it back, the partitions had been erased. I had an external backup... but the backup disk failed catastrophically a couple days before it was stolen. The external backup doesn't even mount anymore and makes grinding noises if it's plugged in...
The MacBook had two hard drives in it and one was rather large, so there was space for a partition that I used only for Time Machine. It was erased during the theft, but since nothing had been written to the disk yet, I figured that the chances of recovering data were pretty high. So I went online and looked around for utilities (I used StellarPhoenix... Not sure I'd recommend it to a friend) and managed to spend the next four days recovering the time machine backup to an external computer. I recovered a lot of directories with raw directory IDs attached to them and interesting recovered files inside.
I want to put these files back together as a Time Machine backup (haha, I know right?), because the alternative is around 60 gigabytes of data to sift through by hand.
Here's the top level structure:
MacBook:Root alleygator$ ls -a
.fseventsd
.journal
.DS_Store
.journal_info_block
.HFS+ Private Directory Data?
Lost Folder(s)
.Trashes
"HFS+ Private Directory Data?" and "Lost Folder(s)" directories contain about three hundred thousand directories altogether.
.journal is 33 megs of unicode-looking data that I have to believe is the HFS+ "Journal" part of a journaling file system.
.journal_info_block appears to be an empty file.
.fseventsd contains only a few tiny files that appear to be the the heads of .plists.
Anyway.
The HFS+ folder looks like this:
dir_2243617          dir_2255418          dir_2283556          dir_2383839          dir_880892
dir_2243619          dir_2255421          dir_2283558          dir_2383860          dir_880907
dir_2243621          dir_2255424          dir_2283560          dir_2383882          dir_880909
dir_2243623          dir_2255427          dir_2283562          dir_2383927          dir_880916
dir_2243626          dir_2255430          dir_2283564          dir_2383980
dir_2243628          dir_2255436          dir_2283566          dir_2383986
dir_2243630          dir_2255439          dir_2283571          dir_2383989
dir_2243632          dir_2255442          dir_2283574          dir_2383992
While Lost Folder(s) looks like this:
Folder 1919459          Folder 236881          Folder 346820          Folder 640530          Folder 999005
Folder 1919462          Folder 2368812          Folder 346824          Folder 640534          Folder 999016
Folder 1919465          Folder 2368813          Folder 346826          Folder 640591          Folder 999021
Folder 1919468          Folder 2368817          Folder 34683          Folder 640595          Folder 999024
Folder 1919471          Folder 2368820          Folder 346879          Folder 640599          Folder 999027
Folder 1919474          Folder 2368823          Folder 3468793          Folder 640603          Folder 999030
Folder 1919477          Folder 2368826          Folder 347019          Folder 640607          Folder 999035
Folder 19196          Folder 2368829          Folder 347083          Folder 640611          Folder 999044
Each of these directories seems to contain a few files that I'd want to keep, and Stellar Phoenix tells me that it recovered a couple million files total. A bit of "light reading" into the HFS+ file system suggests that HFS+ uses these integer file descriptors instead of file names, and that the file names are stored elsewhere?
I've looked around on the web for anybody who's had a similar problem and have yet to find anything. It'd be really neat if all you had to do was create a new .sparsebundle and throw all the files into it, but I somehow doubt that'd work...
I'm really concerned that I can't put humpty dumpty back together again at all.
If I can't, what would be the next best thing? I've considered copying the files back to the drive and letting Spotlight chew on them. Eventually, I would probably be able to find the most important files on the drive. But I would prefer something more user friendly than that.
Oh, and feel free to suggest your favorite online backup solution.
Thanks for reading,
Bill

Are you trying to bring all the stuff over? Use Migration Assistant in Applications / Utilities.

Time Machine backup disappears when iMac sleeps

Tried finding this topic but could not find the specifics. I have an Intel iMac running 10.6.7 and I use a Mercury enclosure with a Seagate Barracuda 2TB SATA for Time Machine backup, connected with FireWire. Every time my Mac goes to sleep overnight, the next morning, the Time Machine icon disappears from the desktop. It's been disconnected, because when I run Check Time Machine, the log reads thusly:
<<Thu Apr 21 10:29:30 com.apple.backupd-auto Not starting scheduled Time Machine backup - time machine destination not resolvable.
Thu Apr 21 12:30:05 [0x0-0x2d22d2].backupd-helper Not starting Time Machine backup after wake - failed to resolve alias to backup volume
>>
Occasionally I'll get the error message on the Mac that a device has been "improperly disconnected" but most of the time when it sleeps the TM drive icon just goes away (even tho the backup drive is still on).
Any ideas? Can I fix this or have to live with it? Are there alternatives to TM that may work better?
Thanks for any help/suggestions.
Best,
Mike

I had the same problem as Bru-Hed, but with a Samsung G3 Station 1 TB with USB-connection. After waking up the MAC the message "improperly disconnected" appeared. Was happy with the solution you gave and changed the power save settings accordingly, the drive holds its power, but....... things did not change. Switching off the MAC and restarting gives no problems with the back-up drive, but after waking up I have to reinstall the back-up drive every time by disconnecting and connecting the USB-connector. After choosing the drive again in Time Machine, everything works properly until the next time the MAC goes asleep......
Any other solution to this problem ?

I have an external hard drive set up as a Time Machine backup on my IMac. I want to add a second external hard drive and put my Aperture Photo Library on it. Is there a way to have the photos on this second hard drive automatically back up to the Time Mac

I have an IMac with an external hard drive set up as a Time Machine for automatic backups. I want to add a second external hard drive and load my Aperture Photo Library on to it so that the library can be shared by both me and my wife. Is there a way to automatically backup the photo library that will be on the second hard drive to the Time Machine hard drive?

Open System Preference > Time Machine
Click Options....
Ckick on external disk in list and hit the - button below the list to remove from the Exclusion list
Allan

Time Machine Backup No longer available under Lion

I was having a problem with Time Machine, although I didn't know it until today. It had been going through the backup procedure every day. But today, I decided to go into Time Machine just to look around. It took several tries but it finally came up, however, there wasn't any dates listed on the right side other than today. On the Time Machine Preferences panel, it showed the oldest backup was from August. After reading some comments online, I went into the Select Disk option in the preferences, with the backup disk selected, I set do not back up. I then went back into the Select Disk option and reselected the same disk. Now it shows the oldest date to be none. Other comments said that it would update once a backup is done. When I attempted to do the backup I got an error message that the Backup Disk is not available. Here is the messages:
Dec 1 21:56:09 MacbookPro com.apple.backupd[482]: Backup failed with error: 19
Dec 1 21:58:18 MacbookPro com.apple.backupd[506]: Starting standard backup
Dec 1 21:58:18 MacbookPro com.apple.backupd[506]: Attempting to mount network destination URL: afp://Becky%[email protected]:548/TM%20Backups%20MacBookPro
Dec 1 21:58:19 MacbookPro com.apple.backupd[506]: NAConnectToServerSync failed with error: 80 for url: afp://Becky%[email protected]:548/TM%20Backups%20MacBookPro
Dec 1 21:58:29 MacbookPro com.apple.backupd[506]: Backup failed with error: 19
This backup disk is mounted on an imac, which is also mounted on my MBP. I can open the disk and see all the backup files, however, Time Machine will not honor it (for some reason).
I have rebooted both the MBP and the imac, thinking that would fix it, but it hasn't. I have turned off all backups for now. Can anyone tell me if I can still use the old backups or do I have to start again? If I have to start again, what did I do wrong?

Daniel Wieder wrote:
This backup disk is mounted on an imac, which is also mounted on my MBP.
Try connecting it directly to your MBP. To see the backups, you'll have to manually mount the sparsebundle they're in (since Time Machine isn't expecting that), and use the Browse ... option, per #E2 in Time Machine - Troubleshooting
You may want to try repairing them, per #A5 in that same article.
If that either finds no problems, or fixes whatever it does find, re-connect it to the iMac and go through the setup procedure again, per #22 in Time Machine - Frequently Asked Questions.
Here's the next thing I tried, with no luck.
MacbookPro:Volumes dwieder$ sudo tmutil inheritbackup
That only works when you get a new Mac, don't use the normal ways to put your data on it, but want to continue using the same set of backups. See #B6 in the Troubleshooting article.

Time Machine backup on OSX Leopard Server, no user logged in

Hi
I'd like to use Time Machine to do backups of a Mini running OSX Leopard Server. It has a TimeCapsule connected, which it backs up to fine, at the moment.
However, I've been wondering, if it still backs up, if no user is logged in? I've been reading a few old tips about making removable drives not dismount, when no user is logged in by adding/modifying a key in /Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/autodiskmount.plist, setting AutomountDisksWithoutUserLogin to true.
Is this still nescessary?
Is TimeMachine actually running when no user is logged in?
Is it a good idea to set the key, if my users homedirs is on a removable drive too?
If TimeMachine is NOT the way to do it, which way is the best/smartest?
Best regards
Nicolai

When reading my report, I forgot to mention how the external hard drive is formatted :
Hard Drive FW/USB:
Manufacturer: LaCie
Model: 0x0
GUID: 0xD04B78070AD64B
Maximum Speed: Up to 400 Mb/sec
Connection Speed: Up to 400 Mb/sec
Sub-units:
Hard Drive FW/USB Unit:
Unit Software Version: 0x10483
Unit Spec ID: 0x609E
Firmware Revision: 0x110
Product Revision Level:
Sub-units:
Hard Drive FW/USB SBP-LUN:
Capacity: 298.09 GB
Removable Media: Yes
BSD Name: disk1
Mac OS 9 Drivers: No
Partition Map Type: APM (Apple Partition Map)
S.M.A.R.T. status: Not Supported
Volumes:
Aristotle:
Capacity: 297.97 GB
Available: 164.85 GB
Writable: Yes
File System: Journaled HFS+
BSD Name: disk1s3
Mount Point: /Volumes/Aristotle
Raf

Time Machine backup/restore on iMac with SSD and HD...

Time Machine backs up the SSD and HD on my iMac into one "sparse bundle" for the computer. I need some direction on how to get to the HD backup in order to restore individual files and folders.
PLEASE do not give an answer like "Just enter Time Machine and click Restore." I have been trying to get this to work for hours - if it was so easy, I would not be asking. (I don't mean to sound rude so please don't be offended.)
Thanks for any help.

Sorry, Bob, I see that I didn't say at the beginning of this discussion, but the SSD has all my applications and OS X system. The purpose for the SSD is to run the system and apps faster, while having all files/documents on the slower and larger HD.
So my home folder (my UserName) in the left panel is on the SSD. I have no problem accessing the SSD backups in Time Machine.
When I choose the MacHD in Time Machine, I cannot select a date from the timeline of backups on the far right because all the backups are grayed out (not available). Choosing the SSD gives no access to the files from the separate HD.
I also have a MacBook Pro. It is backed up to the same Time Capsule using Time Machine and has its own separate "sparse bundle." But the iMac puts both of its separate drives into the same sparse bundle. I asked the Apple Support person I spoke with the other day whether I should have separated them before doing the backup, but he said no - it is backed up correctly.
Does anybody out there know if Apple has any specific support articles about using the two separate drives on one computer, whether for backup and restore or for any other purposes?

Is it possible to restore the time machine backup of a mac 10.9 imac on an imac which was reset to the mac os 10.6

I have my imac since 2010. It was delivered with OS 10.6. Now after three years the harddisk failed. I got a new HD installed and now i have a backup from the last mac os 10.9 with all data.
The recovery program of 10.6 allows only to recovery my data... but i am now afraid, that it leads to an inconsistent system with 10.6 as OS and all programs and data from 10.9.
Does anybody has a solution?

Whether you want to remain with OS X 10.9 or revert to OS X 10.6 there will be some incompatibiities. but in the long run it will be easier to move forward to OS X 10.9. Data can geerally be converted forward and seldom if ever backward. If you use Migration Assistant in Mavericks' Utilities folder it will prevent overwriting more recent application versions quite nicely. What MA cannot do is automatically upgrade applications or replace applications that are no longer compatible. That almost has to be a manual process.

Time machine backup from external hdd to time capsule

Is it possible to transfer an time machine backup from an external hdd to a time capsule? I have changed the original 2tb time capsule hdd to a 3tb hdd because of loud sounds from the 2tb hdd. Now i want to transfer the backup from the (now external) 2tb hdd to the new 3tb hdd which is now in the time capsule. Could anybody help me?

Yes, it should be easy.. just copy the sparsebundle from the old 2TB plugged into your computer to the TC.
This will take a few hours maybe a lot more if the drive is near full.. use ethernet.. do not even dream of using wireless.. Do not plug the 2TB into the TC USB.. that is super slow.. plugged into your computer with a FW hard disk holder would be the ideal.. but USB is ok.
http://pondini.org/TM/18.html
Is it worth it??
Saving old backups.. or simply start again.. a clean fresh backup is much more efficient. Put the 2TB drive in a draw.. if you haven't needed any files on it in 6months from now.. wipe it.

Time Machine: backups failing because "connection failed"

I have a 500GB external HD connected to my Airport Extreme base station base station via USB, and I use it for wireless Time Machine backups for my iMac and my MBA.
(Yes, I know this setup isn't officially supported. But, it's been working well for a couple years now.)
But over the last few months, backups keep failing because the HD keeps getting disconnected. If I go to find the drive in the finder, it appears, but when I click it, it says "connection failed".
I've found that if I reset the AEX (via airport utility) that allows it to connect, but, never long enough for a full backup to happen.
And, several times recently I've gotten some message about how the backup needs to be verified or something like that- the bottom line is always that the old backups are lost and I need to start all over with the initial backup that takes days. But of course I can never finish it, because it always drops the connection.
At first I thought the problem was only with the iMac backups, which would lead me to believe the drive/router/etc isn't the problem and that it's something on the iMac, but then I had the problem with the MBA too, so I'm guessing it has to be something with the AEX base station (firmware maybe?), or the HD itself...
Is my HD dying? I've run disk utility on it and it checks out OK. Not sure how else to troubleshoot that.
I used to have tons of problems with my internet dropping out when backups were running, but an airport firmware update eventually solved that, and things had been running fine...
I'm running Lion and all the latest software/firmware updates.
Ive found tons of threads about this problem, but they're all at least a year old, and none had a solution...
Does anyone have any thoughts??
Thanks!!

Alexroet wrote:
And, several times recently I've gotten some message about how the backup needs to be verified or something like that- the bottom line is always that the old backups are lost and I need to start all over with the initial backup that takes days.
That's not one of Apple's clearest messages -- it means the backups are corrupted beyond OSX's ability to repair them. See #C13 in Time Machine - Troubleshooting.
Is my HD dying?
Possibly.
But more likely is the usual cause -- network or power problems that the Airport can't deal with well enough to prevent corruption.
Part of the reason you're seeing problems now may be more networks, cordless phones, microwaves, etc., in your area causing more network problems. Another part may be that it's only in the last 18 months or so that Time Machine started running the periodic checks to find the problem. You may have had trouble earlier but didn't know it.
Bottom line, you need to find a reliable way to back up.
In your case, it's actually easy: Delete the sparse bundle containing the iMac's backups, and start backing-up to it directly. Then back the MBA up to the same drive (preferably to a separate partition) via your network. See Time Machine - Frequently Asked Question #22 for setup instructions. Also see #33 there.

Cannot access user data in Time Machine backup

I had some corrupt files on my iMac and after a lot of troubleshooting I had to do a clean install of OS X.
I had a Time Machine backup of the Mac with the corrupt files so I did not use the migration tool. I just want to get the files off my desktop and some other user files (/user/userX/desktop) from the backup.
When I go into the Time Machine backup to restore anything in the User folder; I get access denied.
Is there a way to take ownership of that folder? I need this data.
Message was edited by: Tom515

Strongly suggest erasing, reinstalling the OS, and using the migration tool. Resolves all such permissions and access issues.

Is it possible to take 2 time machine backups from 2 seperate MacBooks and migrate each backup to an iMac under separates user names?

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