Restore from Time Machine not recognizing External Drive

Hi all,
I woke up the other day to a black screen and a frozen macbook pro (4 months old). It wouldn't boot up past the gray screen, so I tried to repair the drive with the install disc. It said that there are no errors (liar!), so I wiped it and tried to restore from my latest Time Machine backup (should be the day prior).
However, when trying to restore through the install disks, I only see a backup from April (5 months ago). Even if I try to restore from that one, it says that I don't have enough disk space and won't do anything for me.
Migration assistant in OSX doesn't see my external drive, even though I can access it through finder.
I just want my system back to what it looked like prior to my crash. Shouldnt Time Machine have this capability?
Thank you for any help.

Robin Ryan wrote:
Hi all,
I woke up the other day to a black screen and a frozen macbook pro (4 months old). It wouldn't boot up past the gray screen, so I tried to repair the drive with the install disc. It said that there are no errors (liar!), so I wiped it and tried to restore from my latest Time Machine backup (should be the day prior).
However, when trying to restore through the install disks, I only see a backup from April (5 months ago). Even if I try to restore from that one, it says that I don't have enough disk space and won't do anything for me.
Migration assistant in OSX doesn't see my external drive, even though I can access it through finder.
I just want my system back to what it looked like prior to my crash. Shouldnt Time Machine have this capability?
Thank you for any help.
You should take your question to the Time Machine forum. More experts there on TM than you can ever imagine.
http://discussions.apple.com/forum.jspa?forumID=1342

Similar Messages

How to restore from Time Machine onto an external drive

Hi all,
I am a backup freak, and I don't feel entirely safe with Time Machine taking care of backing up my system unless I can test every now and then that I would be able to do a full restore. I've had problems in the past with .Mac/MobileMe's Backup.app, which would not be able to restore from an otherwise apparently successful backup, for one reason or another.
So, is there a way to test a full restore from Time Machine onto an external hard drive?
Thanks for your advice

Allamistakeo wrote:
Hi all,
I am a backup freak, and I don't feel entirely safe with Time Machine taking care of backing up my system unless I can test every now and then that I would be able to do a full restore. I've had problems in the past with .Mac/MobileMe's Backup.app, which would not be able to restore from an otherwise apparently successful backup, for one reason or another.
So, is there a way to test a full restore from Time Machine onto an external hard drive?
of course. connect an external, boot from the snow leopard DVD and choose "restore system from backup" from the utilities menu. follow the instructions and choose the external drive as the restore destination. make sure it's properly formatted. it should be formatted mac os extended with GUID partition scheme.
also, you might want to consider doing secondary backups in addition to TM by making a bootable clone on another external drive. use CCCloner or Superduper for such backups.
Thanks for your advice

After restoring from Time Machine to new Hard drive, system will not boot

I replaced my hard drive on my Macbook (2008 model) with a larger drive. I then put in my Snow Leopard disk, and followed the steps to restore from Time Machine backup. a few hours later it said it was restored, but when trying to boot up, I just get a blue screen with an occasional flicker to the Leopard screen. I tried an earlier back up as well but with the same results. Any suggestions??

Same exact problem here just yesterday, folks.
Got a bigger hard drive on my MacBook Pro (15-inch Core 2 Duo) and installed it. Followed the restore procedures from Gizmodo (http://gizmodo.com/333319/the-secret-of-the-time-machine+assisted-hard-drive-swa p). Then got the blue screen immediately after the chimes.
I only managed to transfer my old disk content by using CarbonCopyCloner.
Having said that, your solution looks uselful, Portland Mac! :
Portland Mac wrote:
... But when I decided to try and just do a fresh install and work my way back through all my software, I started by installing Snow Leopard and suddenly it boots and everything from my Time Machine backup is there...
But I would not say the following:
Portland Mac wrote:
... On a new drive apparently you have to install Snow Leopard before you do a time machine restore.
Am I mistaken, or did you do a fresh install after restoring your TimeMachine backup?
In any case, I found an interesting Apple article that might confirm that there is a problem: [Mac OS X v10.6: Issues after restoring a Mac from a Time Machine backup made with a different Mac ("Restore System From Backup…")|http://support.apple.com/kb/TS3243]. Or is it a completely different thing?
And another discussion that might give some good advice: [http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=12578529#12578529]. Personally, I will now do as the man says: two backups, on two different external hard drives, using different apps, the other one being CarbonCopyCloner...
For info, and I don't know whether that matters, my backup disk had been full and some past content had been erased automatically by Time Machine. But I don't think this should have mattered...

Toasted my installation. Restoring from Time machine to 2 hard drives?

I just installed a second hard drive into my macbook pro. SSD is the system drive and HDD is the data drive.
When it was still working, I had my home folder on the SSD and my iTunes and Photo libraries on the HDD. Things were good.
Then I decided to move the entire home folder to the HDD.
Sys Prefs -> Users -> right-click the user -> advanced -> "move the home folder"
and again, everything was good.
Then I read something about having the user Library folder on the SSD is a good thing.
So I moved the home folder back to the SSD. Rebooted and all my prefs were now gone. Figured I messed up something and didn't want to troubleshoot.
So time for a restore.
Attempt 1
- Open Time Machine, select both hard drives, selected a past date and hit restore.
- Got a message that I didn't have enough space.
* I figure this is because time machine restores the entire contents of each drive as entire new volumes as a first step.
Attempt 2
- Go into recovery mode COMMAND+R
- Discovered I don't have a recovery partition
* I guess this is because I cloned my original system drive to the SSD using CCC and it didn't move this part.
Attempt 3
- I created a LION USB Install Key
- Booted from it, and selected 'Reinstall Lion' (because I read an article that I could recover my files after Lion had finished installing)
* Discovered that it reinstalled 10.7.0 and I would have to apply all patches on top. It didn't restore my HDD either.
* Later found out this method only restores the main system drive.
Attempt 4
- Now that I have a recovery partition, I booted from it.
- I selected "Restore from Time Machine Backup"
- Was able to select my Time Capsule, and it gave me choices on which date I would like to restore to.
- I selected and hit restore.
* It's about 25% done now. And I realize that i should've done this in the first place.
Question: Will this method restore both of my hard drives?

hsmp wrote:
Question: Will this method restore both of my hard drives?
No, only a single OSX drive. If both were backed-up, and both contained OSX, there was a (not very obvious) option to select which one you wanted.
See Time Machine - Frequently Asked Question #14. Section (g) shows this.
If you want to restore the "other" drive, and it contains OSX, run the restore again and select it.
If the other drive doesn't contain OSX, use the "Star Wars" display to restore it, per FAQ #15.

Time Machine not recognizing external hard disk

I am trying to set up backups via Time Machine on my external hard drive but as I go through the process the my hard drive is not recognized in the dropdown menu. It the external hard drive is recognized in the Finder but not by Time Machine. What gives?

do you know how the disk is formatted? it may be in a format that time machine does not support, but which the finder can see. just like this guy:
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1241053&tstart=0
(solution included in that thread as well).

After full restore from Time machine, my TM hard drive won;t mount

I got my macbook pro back from a logic board repair and restored it fully from Time Machine using my leopard install disc.
Took a while, but it has installed OK. But some applications weren't restored and now the Time Machine drive won't mount on the Macbook at all. When I open up time machine - and try to choose a backup disc nothing comes up.
The drive shows up on a PC when i connect it (but won;t read it as its mac formatted) so I'm pretty sure there;s nothing wrong with the drive.

Also, be aware that TM thinks you got a new Mac, not a new logic board. Thus you won't see your TM backups in the normal way. You'll need the (badly named) +*Browse Other Time Machine Disks+* option (see #E2 in the Time Machine - Troubleshooting *User Tip* at the top of this forum).
In addition, when you start doing new backups, TM will start a whole new "sequence," as if it were a different Mac. See #C8 in the Troubleshooting Tip for options.

Restoring from Time Machine to an external hard drive

I had a hard drive crash on a MBP and am using DiskWarrior to try and recover it. DW has been running for over 48 hourse and says "speed reduced by disk malfunction: 3,177" (the number increases every few minutes) The DW folk tell me to give it another day or two. Knowing that I would need to replace this hard drive anyway, I took a brand new hard drive from another MBP and put it in a hard drive enclosure. (I put a SSD in that MBP and gave it to my daughter who is out of state so I don't have access to it anymore.) I then used that hard drive to boot up a different MBP (recall the original one is still trying to recover with DW) which was connected to another hard drive where my TimeMachine back up resides. This MBP opens with the welcome screen like you get on a brand new computer and asks me if I want to transfer data from a different computer or do a restore from TM. So I say yes to restore from TM. After that finishes, I then should have a hard drive that is identical to my last TM backup, yes? Instead, I discover that tons of data is missing. When I go back and look at that data on the TM backup, it appears to be all there. So why did it not install on the new hard drive? Does the fact that I was booting it as an external hard drive make a difference? Or is it a problem that the MBP I am using is one year newer and is a 17" whereas the TM backup is from a 15" machine?
I need to get this 15" MBP up and running but don't want to interrupt DW from doing its thing. (now up to 3,194 in the disk malfunction count, whatever that means). I am just a little concerned that TM may not have everything I need to restore the drive and my failure to successfully restore on my first try doesn't help!

Dan Bryant1 wrote:
This MBP opens with the welcome screen like you get on a brand new computer and asks me if I want to transfer data from a different computer or do a restore from TM. So I say yes to restore from TM. After that finishes, I then should have a hard drive that is identical to my last TM backup, yes?
Maybe. I'm assuming you left everything selected on the Transfer Your Information window?
Does the data that was transferred seem current? If not, had you previously done a full restore to the old MBP, or erased it's internal HD? If so, backups done after that may be treated as if they were from a different disk, and the area circled in red becomes a "pop-up" menu where you can select the one you want; you may have transferred from the older set.
It's also possible some data on the old Mac's internal HD was damaged by whatever went wrong with it, and that stuff was backed-up. Were there any odd messages during the transfer?
Try to Repair the backups, per #A5 in Time Machine - Troubleshooting. If that finds and fixes things, start the new MBP up from the Snow Leopard disc, erase the drive, install OSX, and let Setup Assistant transfer everything again.

Restoring from Time Machine after 1T hard drive replacement

I am a super computer novice. I picked up my computer yesterday after having the recalled Seagate hard drive replaced. I backed up my computer using Time Machine before I took it in on a Seagate "Backup Plus" portable hard drive.
Now, when I have tried to use the restore start up, the computer recognizes that my drive is connected, but says there are no files on that drive it can use to restore the system.
I can see that there are 50GB on the disk, and when I look in it, there are files called "Macintosh HD" so that makes me think that my stuff is in fact on my external drive. why can't my computer see it?
Do I need to get a FireWire cord to connect to my computer? I'm using the USB 3.0 that came with the hard drive.
My computer had Mountain Lion when I backed it up. I think it is back to whatever OS it came with originally. Do I need to update to Mountain Lion? If I do, how do I do so without having to pay for it again? My app store is empty since my computer was wiped.
Thanks for the help, I really need it!

The first thing to do is upgrade back to ML, which you can easily do. Just redownload ML from the app store with the same AppleID you used the previous time you purchased the ML upgrade. Your purchase is tied to the AppleID you used when buying, so you can download it again (as many times as you wish) without payment as long as you use the same AppleID.
Once you have upgrade it to ML, then try the restore from the backup (which I gather was made when while running ML before).

Restore from Time Machine, not bootable?

I had some problems on my hard drive, so I erased my OS X partition and restored it from a Time Machine backup. Now, the OS X partition will not boot. Does anyone have any suggestions on what I can do?
I do also have a Windows XP partition installed via Boot Camp.
edit: As far as I know, I did not exclude the system folders from my Time Machine backups.
Message was edited by: kjb

Before trying the restore, I had a problem with, for example, System Profiler crashing. I first ran Disk Utility from the boot drive, and when I tried to verify the disk, it suggested running Repair Disk from the install DVD. When I tried to repair the disk, using the Disk Utility on the Snow Leopard DVD, it tried three times to repair the disk before giving up, with "invalid node structure" each time. It then suggested erasing the partition and restoring from a backup; after that, I get the circle with the line through it when trying to boot OS X.

Restore from time machine on clean hard drive

I want to change my current hard drive to a SSD hard drive. Unfortunately i lost the DVD that came with the Mac, so my question is whether i can do a complete restore from the time machine backup? Does it include all the iOs file and everything?

You will need the Install DVD that shipped with your Mac...
Contact AppleCare and for a small Handling fee they will send you the Appropriate disc.
Contacting Apple World Wide for Support and Service
http://support.apple.com/kb/HE57
Apple Contact USA
http://www.apple.com/contact/

Time machine not detecting external drive after installing OS X Server

Hi,
Recently I installed OS X Server to set up a vpn but while I have been setting it up I have noticed other Mac's with in the network can not back up anymore the the external hard drive that they used to.
I have made sure that the external drive is on shared folders etc. and the other Mac's can detect the hard drive if I use connect to server to connect to my Mac Mini that the hard drive is attached to.
I have tried to connect it to the Airport we have here but it wont come up on any computers under the Airports name, we are using its hard drive at the moment to back everything up to but we need to back up to the external hard drive ASAP.
The hard drive in question is a SmartStor DS4600 6TB using USB 3 to connect to the Mac Mini and all the Mac's are running Mavericks.
This needs to be resolved ASAP so any help would be greatly apreciated.
Thanks,
Bruce

I *think* with OS X Server to use an attached external drive as a TM backup, it has to be setup this way. You're right, a shared folder is setup under a Backups folder. However, each Mac on the LAN will create its back up in the Backups/Shared and those back ups will be visible if they ever need to restore.
I don't understand why you need to have the back ups created at the root of the volume. And I don't know if or how this can be done using OS X Server. I have always used the TM Backup service and have not tried to share an externally attached drive to be used as a back up. You may be able to do this by going into the File Sharing service and define your back up drive there. You'll have to give read/write permissions to each user just like you would do for any other shared folder.

New harddrive in MacBook - restore from time machine not working correctly

Recently put a new Samsung drive into my White 2007 MacBook. I put the snow leopard disk and selected restore from backup onto the newly formatted Samsung drive. After 4 or so hours it says it has completed successfully and the computer needs to re start.
After this the computer boots the apple logo appears and the spinning thingy spins. It stays at this screen and won't go any further. Any ideas?
Should I install a fresh copy of snow leopard first then restore from backup?

Hi William:
Should I install a fresh copy of snow leopard first then restore from backup?
According to this article, yes (the new HD fits the description, I think):
http://support.apple.com/kb/TS3243
Barry

Restore from Time Machine & OS X install not working

Mid 2009 Macbook Pro
Installed new hard drive, reformatted to GUID, hard drive is verified.
Booted from USB Recovery HD
Selected Restore from TIme Machine
Plugged in external, it shows up, click on it, back up from this morning is there, pick new formatted hard drive
Get error "An error occurred while adding a recovery system to the destination disk. Restart your computer, and then try restoring again."
Do exactly that 3 times
Then try installing OS X
Get this error "An error occurred while preparing the installation. Try running this application again."
Try that 3 times
Reset PRAM
Tried both again same errors

Hi, and welcome to the forums.
First, are you running Leopard or Snow Leopard? Your settings at the bottom of your post say Snow Leopard, but this is the +Leopard > Time Machine+ forum, so I'm not sure which is right.
Did you do the full system restore, starting by booting from your OSX disc? If not, what exactly did you do?
Exactly what is wrong with Software Update? What happens, or doesn't happen?

Restore from Time Machine / Migration Assistance Utility

Sorry if this is obvious, but just want to restore wo further user complications.
_Back story:_ 2006 iMac running Snow Leopard won't boot. Genius Bar determines HD needs reformatting. Reformats and installs OS v10.5.7, not Snow Leopard. Explained to follow new setup and when prompted select from Time Machine (external HD) and restore. At home I do, it won't. Everything is recognized (External HD, Time Machine, File), but tells me OS on machine older than Time Machine files and to upgrade iMac (and can try again from Migration Assistant Utility).
Continue with prompted new setup and created User Account. iMac now ready and like new. Installed Snow Leopard. Run Migration Assistant Utility and select restore from Time Machine.
Issue: External HD recognized by iMac but not by Migration Assistant Utility. Only selection choice is internal HD. Additionally when connecting external, always get prompted (separate prompt from Migration Assistance) if I want to setup Time Machine and I've been declining. Do I have to set up Time Machine before? It didn't require that when doing new user setup.
Thanks for any and all assistance.

Chad Krukowski wrote:
Than you! that is what I wanted to do, a full restore. Unfortunately was following the direction of the genius bar.
Yup. The Geniuses (like most Apple folks) don't actually use Time Machine on their work computers, and aren't real familiar with it, so this sort of thing isn't all that unusual, unfortunately. You could even have gotten similar advice from AppleCare, depending on the expertise of whoever you happened to get. Sigh.

Web services problem after restoring from time machine!

I am getting this message every time i reload or log in to the wiki pages created on the snow leopard server after i have restored from time machine due to hard drive problems.
*The versions of the server and UI don’t match.*
*Try clicking Reload; if that doesn't work,*
*please make sure both server components are up-to-date.*
*Client: WikiServerUI-200*
*Server: WikiServerUI-198*
Anyone have a clue how to fix this issue?
I tried to restore/restart/update/....
Nothing worked....
Please elaborate as much as possible if you have any idea how to get rid of this nasty pop up every time you browse between pages or different wikis.
Million thanks in advance
cheers
/samer

I've the problem as well. When visiting my wiki-server I always get this popup message:
The versions of the server and UI don’t match. Try clicking Reload; if that doesn't work, please make sure both server components are up-to-date.
Client: WikiServerUI-198
Server: WikiServerUI-200
After a harddisk replacement I restored the server installation from TimeMachine back to the harddisk. From thereon I have the problem.
What is the problem exactly and how can I get rid off that message?
Thanx, Harold

Restore from Time Machine not recognizing External Drive

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