Migration Assistant fails to recognize a Time Machine disk (itself migrated using Disk Utility)

So I outgrow my Time Machine disk. I listen to the advice (repeated in multiple places) that one can simply use Disk Utility's Restore tab, select the old time machine disk as source and the new one as destination, and click restore to copy block-by-block, then rename the disk.
This works very well. I have indeed been able to use Time Machine on the new disk without losing any of the history.
But now I am in trouble. I am also outgrowing my MacBook disk. I put a larger disk in and install Snow Leopard from scratch. Now Migration Assistant does not recognize the new Time Machine disk (perpetually spinning wheel). Renaming the disk to the old name does not help. M.A. does recognize the old Time Machine disk, but that means manually managing the changes (and giving up on the larger TM disk). I reinstall Snow Leopard and do not miss that time the option to restore from Time Machine, but it still does not see the new Time Machine disk.
How does one convince Migration Assistant to use a Time Machine disk that duly has Backups.backupdb as a root folder and where "ignore ownership on this volume" is not set?

Thanks, Pondini, but the Time Machine disk passes the Disk Utility repairs and only the spinning wheel was visible under both the Setup Assistant and the Migration Assistant.
I now have some good news, and some bad.
First the good news: Lion's Migration Assistant offers the option to copy user (and other) files from the previous OSX disk, not just the Time Machine disk. If this option was already in Snow Leopard, then I missed it.
Now the bad news..
I spent several hours reading (Pondini's and others') suggestions to ensure that my Time Machine is as seamless as possible, namely, for the next backup to be incremental. No luck: all user data are copied. Until the interface of Time Machine stops trying so hard to shield us naive users from making decisions on our own, one idea is to keep the iPod and pictures/video collection backed-up by the straight-forward rsync. Then whether Time Machine is really incremental will not matter, and in any case a spare copy of the documents you wrote by hand is nice in case the some blocks of the disk fail.
But I may have been the one who messed it. In Preferrences \ Time Machine \ Options... I excluded all users except the user "Admin" who restored the user accounts. The idea was to test first whether the mildest user will get a full backup. It may be that Time Machine does not look in the history to see if a given file or set of files already have some copy in the past. If a file does not exist in the very last backup, it is saved to the Time Machine disk.
If you're reading this and are keen on an incremental backup, try this: restore your user accounts using a user Admin, but do not start to backup until after the accounts are restored. Will the backup afterwards be incremental?

Similar Messages

Migration assistant doesn't see my time machine backup

Since upgading to mavericks migration assistant no longer sees my backup on my external drive that I use for my time machine backups. The drive mounts fine and I can access my backups through my finder using "enter time machine", but I can not restore because migration assistant can't see the drive. I don't knoe if it's a time machine issue or a mighration assistant issue. I have tried on several macs and with several different hard drives but migration assistant cannot restore from my time machine backups. I suggest everyone make sure they can restore from their time machine backups because this may be a major problem and result in complete loss of data. I have found no solution yet.

Here are the articles I have on Migration Assistant. None of them had the answer to your problem (or at least I couldn't find it). Check what you did versus the recommendations in the articles is about the best I can offer.
Migration Assistant
Migration Assistant (2)
Migration Assistant – Tips and Tricks

HT4889 Migration assistant refuses to see my Time machine backup in mountain lion

I made a full Time machine backup on a 1 TB hard disk.
I connect this to my other mac.
I follow EXACTLY the apple support instructions TO THE LETTER.
Time machine says - "looking for other computers" - there are no other computers - only the time machine backup disk which is correctly powere and can be seen in OSX prior to loading backup assistant.
I wait
and wait
and wait
three hours later it becomes apparent this isnt working
I try again - same result
I try again with a different disk
same result
I do a new FULL time machine backup on yet annothe disk
Same result
I try with two different macs - same result
What am I doing wrong and how do I fix it?
I am following the EXACT instructions as posted on the apple website... what does it not tell you? For example does this not work if your mac is a core2-duo - or does it have to be a particulr brand of external hard disk? There must be something becuase I simply cannot get this to work AT ALL period.

This simple procedure will clear your Time Machine settings, including exclusions. The backups won't be affected. If you have a long exclusion list that can't be recreated easily, you may prefer a more complicated procedure that preserves the exclusion list. In that case, ask for instructions. Otherwise, do as follows.
Triple-click the line below on this page to select it:
/Library/Preferences/com.apple.TimeMachine.plist
Right-click or control-click the highlighted line and select
Services ▹ Reveal
from the contextual menu. A Finder window should open with a file selected. Copy the file to the Desktop. Then move it (the original, not the copy) to the Trash. You'll be prompted for your administrator password. Reboot and recreate your settings in the Time Machine preference pane. It will show that you have no backups. Don't worry; that's expected. Run a backup to test. The backup may take much longer than usual. If TM now performs as expected, delete the file you copied to the Desktop.

Migration Assistant can't see external Time Machine

I appreciate Macs and all they can do but I am not great with the technical side. I apologise if this is an stupid question. Probably all my technical questions seem stupid to people who can find their way around the mac.
Shiny new iMac. Yah!
Hmm there's a problem.
External drive with Time Machine backups on it shows on the desktop, however when I use Migration Assistant to transfer info it can't find it.
The external drive is plugged directly into the iMac.
I can open the external drive and see there are Time Machine backups.
The Time Machine App is currently set to off on my new iMac. Is it as simply as switching it to "on"? I was concerned about overwriting the old backups and losing them.
Thanks for assistance.

Most likely, some folders were excluded from your backups as the result of a failed or aborted software installation.
Starting from a clean installation of OS X, set up a new administrator account and log in. Enter Time Machine and press the key combination shift-command-C. The front window will show all mounted volumes. All snapshots should now be accessible.* Select the one you want and navigate to your home folder (in the Users folder at the top level of the old startup volume.)
You should now be able to restore your user data. I suggest you do this in two stages. Quit all applications except the Finder before you begin.
Restore all the visible items at the top level of your home folder.
Hold down the option key and select Go ▹ Library from the Finder menu bar. Enter Time Machine and restore all items in the Library folder. Log out and log back in as soon as the restore is complete.
Any other invisible folders or files at the top level of your home folder that you want to preserve will have to be restored separately. For most users, that isn't necessary.
You'll have to reinstall all third-party applications from scratch, or restore them from another kind of backup, if you have one.
You'll have another problem if this is a new computer, or if you erased the startup volume: The next time you back up, Time Machine won't recognize any files as being the same as they were before, and will make a full copy of all files. There might not be enough space on one or more of your backup volumes for that. There are different ways of dealing with that situation, depending on your needs. The easiest way is to set your backup drives aside, if possible, until you're sure you'll no longer need the data on them, then erase them and start over. Meanwhile start a new backup on one or more empty storage devices. If that solution isn't workable for you, ask for instructions.
*If you don't see any snapshots in Time Machine, exit the time-travel view and then hold down the option key while selecting
Browse Other Backup Disks...
from the Time Machine menu, which has an icon that looks like a clock running backwards. Select the backups of your computer by its previous name. If you don't have the Time Machine menu, open the Time Machine preference pane in System Preferences and check the box marked
Show Time Machine in menu bar

Migration Assistant Does not see my Time Machine Backup disk

I have a TM backup disk connected via Firewire that I have several months of backup on. I did a clean install of SL. When I went to restore using Migration Assistant, the MI does not show the TM backup disk. The disk is mounted and visible through the finder. Time Machine itself sees the disk just fine. But when I run MI, the only drive it shows me is the one where the new SL is installed.
I found another post describing the same situation and the solution there said to make sure that the TM disk is formatted the same way, ie GUID. I check with Disk Utility and both the SL volume and the TM volume are formatted GUID.
HELP!

sorry, i don't know what else it could be then. if you have another external drive you can try doing a full system restore from the TM backups onto that drive and see if MA will recognize that drive and migrate from it. other than this there is always manual migration. slow and tedious but it can be done. see this link for help with that
http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=6185507

Migration Assistant fails or freezes every time

2008 iMac running Mavericks to a new iMac over ethernet connection.
I have run software update on both iMacs, I have run "repair disk" and "fix permissions" on both.
Every time i run migration assistant, it never completes. it looks like its running, and the esitmated time left begins to count down, but eventually it just stays at 2hrs remaining, or 2hrs 30 minutes remaining. And I let it run for 15 hours.
I am forced to reboot the computers to get them back, and the new iMac has NO data transferred, and the old Mac remains as is (as expected).
Also, Time Machine fails on the 2008. I have tried to run time machine to more than one firewire drive.
Not sure how to proceed.

Sounds like you've been through the ringer . After Apple replaced FW with Thunderbolt my boss tasked one of the techs and me to investigate alternatives. We both found WiFi useless for anything more than a couple GB of data and even then we experienced too many failures to recommend it. Theoretically migrating with Ethernet should be a good choice but once again we experienced failures we couldn't explain. That led us to recommend users back up via clone or TimeMachine to an external drive and migrate using the external drive.
That should have ended the matter but I've since added a qualifier to that recommendation; a USB external drive may be your best option. We've always known that some FW chipsets were flaky but an additional layer of flakiness has been added with the Thunderbolt/FireWire adaptor.

The Migration Assistant can not find my Time Machine Backup

Hello,
I had to reinstall Mountain Lion on my iMac. So I made a fresh backup with TM on friday, everything was fine with it.
Then I formated my HD and installed 10.8.2 from the AppStore. After setting up the Admin-Account I opended the Migration Assistant
to migrate my User Account from the TM-Backup, but it is not showing up. There are 4 backups on the Time Capsule, but only 3 are
showing up. And for sure it is mine, which is missing. :-(
When I start in Revorery-Mode and choose to set up the iMac from a Time Machine Backup, the latest Backup is from the 1. of November,
which I really don't want to use right now.
Would be very nice to get some help in here.
Thank you

No, both the backup and the new system are OSX10.6.
I'm afraid your solution doesn't work. If I go through finder and open up the folders on the backup, and try, for example, to open my "Movies" folder (which is one I dearly hope to recover), I get a message that:
"The folder "Movies" can't be opened because you don't have permission to see its contents."
I have tried Repair Permissions, but this doesn't help. All of the important folders have a little red stop sign on them.
Thanks though.

Migration Assistant won't recognize my Time Capsule's sparse-bundle so I can migrate to my new iMac

Background.......
iMac (intel core duo) hard drive crashed while backing up to time capsule. Had Snow Leopard OS 10.6 (100% up-to-date)
2. Purchased new iMac with Lion. 100% updated.
3. Want to migrate from Time Capsule to new iMac
Problem.......
4. Migration Assistant does not see (recognize) my sparsebundle, message says it's "possible that it is in use." But it's not of course.
5. If I mount the Time Capsule from the Finder, I can see the sparsebundle I want to migrate. So, it present but the Migration Assistant doesn't see it!
6. Time Capsule recognizes the sparsebundle of my other Mac (#2) that backs up to the same Time Capsule
Question.......
What do I have to do to get Migration Assistant to recognize my sparsebundle so I can migrate to my new iMac?
Thanks

I finally solved the problem by disconnecting the Time Capsule ethernet cable from the internet. Then the sparsebundle suddenly appeared.

Migration Assistant won't see my Time machine backup disk

Hi,
I've seen some other discussions but they apply to slightly different situations and turn out to be too complex for me to follow. My situation is this. My Dec 2008 Macbook running Lion just died. Not sure what the problem is but it seems to be the hardrive. It will take me a while to get it fixed and in the meantime I have a farly new mac mini running Lion.
I also have been making Time Machine backups to an external drive. I read that I could migrate content from a time machine backup and I connected the backup to my mac mini and launched Migration Assistan (MA), seleted the option to migrate from a Time Machine backup. MA is stuck trying to find my disk even though it shows up in Finder. This is the screen I'm talking about http://screencast.com/t/AC0OiVzxx
I'm hoping there is the equivalent of a little on/off switch that I'm not seeing and you can direct me too.
How can I get MA to see my Time Machine backup disk? Thanks for your help.

sorry, i don't know what else it could be then. if you have another external drive you can try doing a full system restore from the TM backups onto that drive and see if MA will recognize that drive and migrate from it. other than this there is always manual migration. slow and tedious but it can be done. see this link for help with that
http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=6185507

Migration assistant cant see files on time machine backup

Hi all,
I just bought a new 27" iMac, and wanted to transfer files from a time machine backup i have on an external drive, from my old machine.
I dident try this on the first setup, but waitet till i had configured it first, so i use migration assistant.
I startet migration assistant just fine, and it could se my time machine backup(1)
Heres the problem
when i select the backup i want to use and click continue, all i get is a little white box under the imac icon(2).
It whont show me a list of things to transfer. Please help.
Bonus info
I tride to use disk utility to repair my disk, but no luck there.
when i select the drive, it whont let me repair disk permissions, no matter what disk i choose.(3)
I am able to access and mount the time machine image, browes the backup and copy files manually.

No, both the backup and the new system are OSX10.6.
I'm afraid your solution doesn't work. If I go through finder and open up the folders on the backup, and try, for example, to open my "Movies" folder (which is one I dearly hope to recover), I get a message that:
"The folder "Movies" can't be opened because you don't have permission to see its contents."
I have tried Repair Permissions, but this doesn't help. All of the important folders have a little red stop sign on them.
Thanks though.

Migration assistant can't find my time machine backups?

Here's the situation: I just bought a new 13" Macbook Pro 2.53 GHz last night to replace my current 13" white Macbook. I've kept Time Machine backups on the white MB for well over a year on an external 500GB USB drive, so I figured I'd use migration assistant to move all my data over. Well, I plugged in my external HD to my new computer, it recognized the disk, and asked if I wanted to use it as my time machine backup disk for the computer: I said no, for the time being. Then I went to migration assistant, opted to restore from my backups.... but when I got to selecting from where, it gave me no options, just a totally blank selection screen. I figured I must have screwed up, so I tried rebooting, then making the external HD my backup location, all to no avail. The only thing I can think of that's messing it up is the fact that I have probably 50GB of virtual machines and other things on the HD in a separate folder from my backups.
What am I doing wrong?

mily_pl wrote:
I've found the solution!
You have to simply delete from TM disk all backup folders made by Snow Leopard. Then migration assistant will see your backups made from 10.5 Leopard.
Do that only as a last resort, and only via TM, not the Finder, as that can hopelessly corrupt your backups. See item #12 in the Frequently Asked Questions *User Tip* at the top of this forum.

Migration assistant does not see my time machine disk

I had an issue with my hard disk on my imac in which I had to re-format and reinstall the OS. Since 10.7 is not available as a "rescue reinstall disk", I had to reinstall 10.6. When that finished, the install asked if I would like to transfer my stuff from Time Machine. I said "yes". Unfortunately, my time machine disk does not show up! Migration Assistant thinks my "macintosh HD" system disk is the only disk available as the time machine backup. So I skipped migration. I went ahead and did all of the OS upgrades to get back to 10.7.3. I re-connected all external disks (I have 4-the time machine disk included) and tried migration assistant again. The only disk migration assistant still thinks is available as the time machine backup is the macintosh HD system disk, not the one called "Time Machine Backup". Time machine backup is a western digital 2TB usb 2.0 disk.
So....
I decided this morning to re-do everything again (since I still could not get my data back). Guess what?!?! the same thing is happening! Migration Assistant thinks that the macintosh HD is the time machine disk and does not see any others - even though the disk is there and mounted!
Please help! I would like my data back, but I am not able to pay Apple at the Apple store or a phone call to them for help!
Thanks!
Diana

Diana Stephens wrote:
Migration Assistant thinks my "macintosh HD" system disk is the only disk available as the time machine backup.
Those are your backups. Migration Assistant shows the name of the disk and system that were backed-up, not the disk they're on. It will not show the disk you're running from.
See the tan box in Using Migration Assistant on Lion.

Migration Assistant doesn't see USB Time Machine drive

My dad recently got a new MacBook Pro and wants to restore from his Time Machine backup, stored on a USB drive. He didn't use the Setup Assistant at the start - I'm really not sure why, but anyway...
Now we're looking at Migration Assistant, and it can't find the Time Machine drive. On the 'Select your disk' screen, the wheel just spins and spins. The backup drive is plugged in and mounted. We've checked the drive for errors using Disk Util, and it's fine. Moreover, I tested this with my own MBP and it's backup drive and the same problem occurs.
He also tried booting from the install DVD and using the 'restore' option from the Utilities menu, without success.
Is this because he has started to set up the machine using a user (as admin) with the same account name as the Time Machine backups? This website suggested that maybe that's what happening: http://web.me.com/pondini/AppleTips/Setup.html. Before I take him through a reinstall, etc, I'm hoping to confirm that this is really the problem!

Just create a new user account with a different name. Logout of the current account and log into the new one. Be sure the new account has admin status. You can then try migrating and see if it now works. Also see OS X 10.5- Migration Assistant keeps "looking for other computers".
See User Tips for Time Machine 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.

MIgration assistant doesn't detect my Time Machine external drive

Hello.
I just upgraded to Snow Leopard (cleaning first the Mac HD).
After installing SL, I then used the Migration assistant to restore all my previous files and applications previously backed up with Time Machine.
In the Migration Assistant I selected the Time Machine option, and my surprise was not to find my external hard drive in the hard drives list. The only drive that appeared on the list was the Mac HD.
The external Hard Drive can be selected with the finder but not possible though the Migration assistant.
Note: External HD has 2 partitions, one for Time Machine and other with extra data.
PLease help!!!!
Thanks
Pedro

Hi - I am trying to use Migration Assistant on a MacBook Pro to transfer my files from a La Cie external hard drive - which has all my files back up from a 2005 mac book (photos, music etc) The migration assistant does not recognise the LaCie Hard Drive although it is connected to the MacBook via a cable and I can see it on the desk top.
What did the last response mean when the hard drive needed to be formatted a certain way ? Why wouldn't migration assistant just recognise the files directly from an old mac ?

Migration assistant can not find a time machine back-up

I'm attempting to restore data from my old mbp to my new mbp 15". I hook up my time machine back-up from the old mbp and open migration asst. Get throught the windows till it attempts to find my time machine - just hangs up here.
Any ideas to try would be appreciated.
John

No, both the backup and the new system are OSX10.6.
I'm afraid your solution doesn't work. If I go through finder and open up the folders on the backup, and try, for example, to open my "Movies" folder (which is one I dearly hope to recover), I get a message that:
"The folder "Movies" can't be opened because you don't have permission to see its contents."
I have tried Repair Permissions, but this doesn't help. All of the important folders have a little red stop sign on them.
Thanks though.

Migration Assistant fails to recognize a Time Machine disk (itself migrated using Disk Utility)

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for