ITunes could not restore iPhone (from backup) because not enough free space on *iPhone*?!

Question

Hey everyone,
I recently upgraded to iOS 6 and before I upgraded, I made sure to make a backup because I know upgrading to the new OS can often cause people to lose their things. After upgrading to iOS 6, I found I had everything except for all my messages and some of my contacts (it appears all contacts I added within the past 6-7 months or so are gone, but the older ones are there). I need my messages and those newer contacts, so I want to restore from the backup I made before upgrading to iOS 6, but unfortunately, I get an error message saying iTunes could not restore from backup because there is not enough free space on my iPhone. Note, not my computer or my hard disk, my iPhone. First of all I don't see why I would need free space on my iPhone to restore it, and secondly, I have about 5GBs of free space on it. What can I do?

Answer 1

Yes. Those are the only ones saved by iTunes, as the working assumption is that all the other photos are on your computer and thus can be synced from that source, without the backup duplicating them and taking long time and lots of space. Photos on the camera roll are assumed to be not yet Transferred.
A few random-thoughts suggestions...
Not sure if you tried this multiple times, but it might worth doing. Just remember to cancell the Sync as soon after connecting so you don't overwrite the backup.
1. Check if you still have an older backup that might have the pictures. Follow the instruction by user Linda Custer in this discussion: https://discussions.apple.com/message/13011509#13011509
2. Check the links in the More Like This box on the right, or do a search for your issue on these forums or on Google.
3. Find third party utilities that treat the iPhone as an external USB disk and therefore allow for extracting photo files directly from the device, bypassing iTunes. Search here, Google or check MacUpdate:  http://www.macupdate.com/
And perhaps the most obvious, that I forgot to ask about:
4. If you switched iCloud on, and selected backup to iCloud you should have a backup outside of your computer; just select the iCloud backup, instead of the local one, for Restore.
5. If you switched iCloud on and checked PhotoStream on, you should have the camera roll photos in the cloud and can retrieve them from the cloud via the Web site, your Photo app, etc.
Good luck.