Time Machine Vs Clone

What if I wanted to restore to a past date with Time Machine - I mean the whole enchilada, OS and everything!
It appears that restoring everything can only be done from the most recent backup. What good is that if I want to go back in time to a fully functioning OS. Is something like Carbon Copy the only solution and Time Machine only good for filling in the blanks?
I can't find a method to restore everything from a specific earlier date using Time Machine.

In the rare case I had malware or screwed up something deep in the OS, it would be nice to pick an earlier date to do a complete restore. That is one big advantage of having a mirror image. I'm not sure picking my "Macintosh HD" folder and highlighting all the folders would be equivalent to doing a mirror image backup. Are there things that aren't restored using the above method? I could have been more clear in my original question.

Similar Messages

Restore from Time Machine or Clone Drive?

If I am moving everything to a new hard drive is it better to restore from time machine or just clone the drive using something like carbon copy cloner?

Unless you encrypted the backup you should be able to open the backup.bachupdb folder and copy items out of it.
It is just a folder like anyother where all your files got placed by time machine. I have accessed mine every now and then and just copied the data I need directly from that folder.
Open a finder window and browse to that folder and open it.

Time Machine - bootable clone?

I just got a new Mac, so I am used to System 10.4 and retrospect. With retrospect, I would create a clone on my external. The clone was also a boot disk. When my G4 hard drive died, I was able to boot from the clone and keep working.
Does the time machine backup create a bootable clone? Or is it just a backup? I would also like comments about retrospect express and using that for System 10.5. Thanks.

How often do you do a Retrospect incremental backup? I assume you have the process automated and scheduled.
Since TM uses some of OS X's new features to keep track of files that have changed, I suspect TM is more efficient (it's been a few years since I gave up Retrospect).
If you ever have to perform a full restore, just boot the install disk, choose restore from TM (one of the menu choices), and you're done.
I suppose Retrospect has improved since the time I used it; it was always a royal pain to restore one or more files when needed - it couldn't be easier with TM.
100 GB for a TM backup disk seems a bit small. I back up 3 macs, each using its own TM disk and the smallest is 250 GB - that's used for a mac with under 100 GB of files that are backed up, and I wouldn't want the TM disk to be any smaller. My other macs have 500GB and 600GB disks for the TM backup. Those are quite ample!

Does anyone have a procedure to downgrade to OS X Mavericks? Regrettably, no Time Machine or clone available.

Downgrade to Mavericks

You are welcome.
Activity Monitor - Mavericks also Yosemite
Activity Monitor in Mavericks has significant changes
Performance Guide
Why is my computer slow
Why your Mac runs slower than it should
Slow Mac After Mavericks
Things you can do to resolve slowdowns see post by Kappy
Try running this program and then copy and paste the output in a reply. The program was created by Etresoft, a frequent contributor. Please use copy and paste as screen shots can be hard to read.
Etrecheck – System Information

Transferring HD data - Time Machine vs. Bootable Clone

I'm upgrading the HD on an old MacBook Pro (3+ years old) to a SSD drive. But I'm going from 500 GB to 240GB.
I originally was going to move some files off to an external drive but I kept getting ".DS Store file" messages.
So now, I'm considering selectively restoring from a clone or a Time Machine. Does it matter which one?
Also besides the .DS_Store file, here ae some othe issues that have crept in over time:
1)     My Mail program was running a 40 minute delay for a week or so after installing Mavericks, until Mail stopped working entirely.
2)     My Photo Library has been mangled at least once and haven't been able to restore it completely.
3)     I don't know if this is normal or abnormal, but over 2 apple laptops, and 5-6 years, I've 6-8 external/internal HDs have died. The last one was my Time Machine Backup, 2 months ago. I haven't been doing anything that intensive, I'm not usually a game player and I'm usually pretty good at properly ejecting the external HDs. I was able to test 6 of the failed HDs when a friend lent me A friend recently lent me a SATA to USB cable. Plugging the HDs directly into the computer, 5 of 6 drives were functioning, but only 2 of them had usable data. I've already erased and repurposed one to temporarily act as a Time Machine backup.
Do I have too many errors floating around in my Libary, User,Permissions, etc?
Am i better off doing a selective installation from Time Machine, a Clone or starting from scratch with a new copy of Mavericks, restoring apps and files bit by bit whatever I can?
Thanks,
Joel

Gentlemen,
                 Thanks for all your great advice.
The ".div_Store" error messages, the bad Photo Library, and current Mail issues have me concerned with possible errors in Permissions, User, Library files. I'm a total novice at this, I make no claims to understand code or the intracicies underneath the hood of my machine. Maybe I'm being naive or just paranoid about some of these issues I've experienced, but these files have been through 10+ years of OS upgrades and at least 3 different computers. Maybe there has been a clean install or two along the way but something is going on.
I'm concerned with deleting original files, especially with this ".div_store" error message. Every copy has the chance of error even if it's small and there already is some error creeping in. I can perserve the original disk, along side the clone and the Time Machine Backup and do a selective install.
And if I'm willing take my time, I can test all the different possibilities. I've got the original disk, and a clone and a TM backup. I can test them both the TM & the clone, and see how any of the selcted files do after installation.
Heck, after a clean install, I could even start from scratch pull software off old disks, from the Apple Store, etc. and reinstall only the 1/2 dozen programs I really use. I've got way too many programs and files, I never use. It's great to have them available but they are not needed. Before I can try copying current files I really need to the cloud, and test whether the ".div_store" issue comes up going to cloud or bringing them back. If I take my time and make sure I've got apps, programs, files, passwords I need I should probably be able to create everything I need from scratch.
It's not the fast way, but I've got a computer that works, slowly but it works, so I don't need to rush I can test a clone or TM first,. And I've perserved the original and leave open the possibility of even rebuilding from scratch if need be.
                Thanks again to all,
                              Joel

Time Machine hard drive back-up. Is it gone?

Hi,
I just bought a My Book 3T to backup my macbook pro 2009 (OS X). It asked (and I agreed) if it would be my Time Machine and I agreed. I didn't realize that Time Machine would actually erase files if the hard drive gets too full. I don't need this as I already have Blackblaze to provide backup in this form. I just need a hard drive to keep my files safe there so I can erase them from the mac which is running out of space (this would be backed up less often, but also backed up on Blackblaze).
Sooo... AFTER installing time machine and backing up the whole thing I went and did a partition on the hard drive so I could use it as time machine in 1 T, clone in 1T and keep the other 1 T for future use.
Obviously I did so successfully because I can no longer see the time machine drive. My question is is it gone or is it saved somewhere using up space in the hard drive? Can I now safely back up as Time Machine and Clone in those compartments?
Thx

If you partitioned using the normal disk utility you will have deleted your old TM backup. You will now need to start a new one.

Can i have two completely separate backups with Time Machine

Hi
Before i did this i thought it best to ask the question here.
Basically i have two huge iTunes libraries. One for official music, the other for unofficial stuff. Both of these libraries have their own separate external hard drives.
For one of the libraries i have Time machine backing it up using a 3rd external hard drive. What i need to do is add a 4th external hard drive to back up the other library using the same Mac and same Time Machine. Can this be done does anybody know? Im on 10.6.8 so quite old but its fine for what i need.
Many thanks.

You would have to change the setting in System Preferences/Time Machine as you switched which external drive you were backing up. Creating a clone would be an easier option I think.
Clone - Carbon Copy Cloner (Often recommended as it has more features than some others)
Clone – Data Backup
Clone – Deja Vu
Clone - SuperDuper
Clone - Synk
Clone Software – 6 Applications Tested
Time Machine Versus Clones and Archives
Commonly Used Backup Methods

How do I protect a Time Machine back up from being automatically deleted during new backups?

Hi, any help would be appreciated.
I used an external hard drive Time Machine backup to restore my music and photos after losing nearly everything during an update. I followed the instruction from Apple Support and turned on TM so I could enter and recover the needed libraries. Unfortunately I wasn't aware that TM would continuously backup for the next 7 hours as I searched for duplicate music files, merged iPhoto libraries, etc...until I received the message that TM had deleted all my backups (all the way back to 2010).
Just to head off the "how could you not know?!" comments - I had previously left TM off and just selected backup now when I attached the external drive.
The good news is that the backup I used to restore my music and iPhoto library from May still appears to be intact, so how do I make sure it doesn't get deleted the next time I back up? My concern is, once I've removed all the duplicate music and photo files I would like to back up again prior to upgrading to Yosemite - just in case I experience the same issues with losing files again I'd like to be prepared.
My external hard drive is an Iomega with 83.1 GB free of 320 GB.
I'm on a Mid-2009 MacBook Pro / 2.26 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo / 8 GB 1067 MHz DDR3 / 43.76 GB free of 159.18 GB
OS X 10.9.5 Mavericks
Any help would be greatly appreciated. If it's written for someone who is not very technologically advanced (read: step-by-step instructions) that would be even better! Thanks in advance!

You need to get a bigger external drive, 2 to 4 times the amount of data you are backing up. I would also recommend a minimum of 2 backups. You can do that with 2 Time Machine drives or use a clone to give you a bootable backup.
Time Machine FAQ
Try E1 in the 1st linked article.
Time Machine Troubleshooting
Time Machine Troubleshooting Problems
Time Machine Versus Clones and Archives
Clone - Carbon Copy Cloner (Often recommended as it has more features than some others)
Clone – Data Backup
Clone – Deja Vu
Clone - SuperDuper
Clone - Synk
Clone Software – 6 Applications Tested
Commonly Used Backup Methods

Restoring From Time Machine Migration Assistant (and other ??)

Hello
Please bear with me on this long question....
For several reasons I reinstalled ML which involves erasing the HDD first. I do have everything bakced-up to Carbonite and TM. Carbonite is slow as molassess so I opted to try Migration Assistant/TM to restore my files. MA does not allow you to choose an older (good) backup and the backup that was used was an incomplete one as evidenced by the photo library being incomplete. Another poster had a similar question and the solution involved using the install disk. There is no install disc since it was a download from the Apps store.
Carbonite has a tendency to freeze-up during a long download. Restarting it brings your download back to the very beginning. I'm not happy about Carbonite. I've heard of SuperDuper and seems to have gotten good reviews.
Questions:
1. Is there a method to access an older TM backup from MA?
2. Is there a better option that Carbonite?
3. Is SuperDuper a good option for backups?
thank you, Bruce.

If your Mac shipped with a System Install DVD then boot from it and choose "Restore from Time Machine backup".
If your Mac shipped with Lion already installed you should be able to use OS X Recovery. Boot while holding ⌘ R and choose "Restore from Time Machine backup".
Either one should present a dated list of complete system backups from which to choose. Ideally it should be the most recent one, but if you have reason to believe it is incomplete (it should not be) then try an earlier one.
You can also boot from a locally connected Time Machine backup volume. Make sure it is connected with USB or FireWire and boot while holding an Option key. This will invoke Startup Manager, from which you can select your Time Machine backup volume. It will present the same restore options as OS X Recovery.
These options will be faster and should be less prone to difficulty than using Migration Assistant.
Time Machine and "clone" software use very different philosophies. SuperDuper! is good, so is Carbon Copy Cloner. They are more customizable than Time Machine, whose customizable features essentially consist of an "on / off" switch
Of course that is also its sole advantage over the others - it's boneheadedly simple to use.
Forget Carbonite, as you learned it does not work well on Macs. I know of no similar offsite backup services to recommend.

Time Machine is EXTREMELY SLOW. What is the best way to make a complete, reliable copy of the hard drive before i erase the disk?

I was given an older iMac (from 2010) on the condition i first create a complete, reliable copy of everything on her hard drive and then wipe it clean. Is Time Machine the best way to do this so that she can use this data when she needs it? I started Time Machine but it is so slow, at this rate it will take at least 10 days to do the first backup. I'm already on the 3rd day now at about 2.5 GB per day. Is there a better way that is reliable? perhaps some kind of disc copy? This iMac has 4gb memory,processor: 3.06 gHz Intel core i3, model iMac11,2, 1 processor, 2 cores. thank you

Choices.
Clone - Carbon Copy Cloner (Often recommended as it has more features than some others)
Clone – Data Backup
Clone – Deja Vu
Clone - SuperDuper
Clone - Synk
Clone Software – 6 Applications Tested
Time Machine Versus Clones and Archives
Commonly Used Backup Methods

TIME MACHINE - Backup & Restore Inquiry

I'm new to using Time Machine and I just need to better understand exactly how it works.
Here is my current config:
Mac Pro Tower (2006-2007)
Running OS X: 10.5.8
Primary Hard Drive: 250GB
Primary Use: Logic Pro (for music production)
I want to upgrade the OS to Snow Leopard (which I already own the discs I purchased in 2009). As well I'm going to be chaning out the current 250GB hard drive to a new 1TB hard drive. This drive will be the main operating drive.
I have already done a Time Machine back up of my current 250GB hard drive to an external hard drive, but I'm confused about the restoration. Since this is a new 1TB drive being put in, and since it won't be formated for Mac use already, will I need to boot up from my OS X Leopard discs and reinstall that first?
If yes, I don't know what to do from that point forward in order to restore the rest of the programming from my Time Machine backup (if it's even possible). I need to better understand if Time Machine does a backup of the current hard drive to restore onto my new one, or if regardless of backup I have to re-install all my software (including Logic Pro and tons of plugins) all over again?
Anyone who can help me understand this process better ASAP would be so greatly apprecatied.
THANK YOU!

Yes, I suggest you initialize the new drive while you have the entire resources of Mac OS X available, and because you can start the process and surf the web or catch up on your emails while it works away in the background.
Those "Full Retail" DVDs say they are upgrades, but generally do not require you to install 10.5 Leopard first -- you can install 10.6 Snow leopard onto a newly-initialized drive if it is GUID formatted, MacOS X Extended (journaled). Then use Software Update to bring it up to date.
When you do this you have the equivalent of a "new" machine. Use Pondidini's article (blue underlined text above). he recommends you use Setup Assistant to restore from your backup onto your new machine, and provides instructions.
Setup Assistant is designed to transfer all or selected data, apps, etc. from one Mac, or its Time Machine or "clone" backups, to set up a new Mac just like the old one.

I have time machine saving onto two usb drives. The backup is 4.6TB. Each drive is 6TB. Why is time machine only updating one drive? (The other has been the same for two weeks.)

I have time machine saving onto two usb drives.
The total size of the files being backed up is 4.6TB.
Each external USB drive is 6TB. So I have 12 TB of space for Time Machine.
Why is time machine only updating one USB drive? (One drive has been the same for two weeks.)
I have selected both drives in the Time Machine settings panel.
My understanding was that it would do a full backup, and then incremental backups of changed files, getting rid of old copies as needed, and alternate between the two drives.
But it looks like drive A has one complete backup, dated two weeks ago, and drive B is the only one getting action.
There is a red icon on drive one that says the drive needs 120GB more space to do a backup -- which is strange since the whole backup set is only 4.6TB in size, and the drive is 6TB in size...

You could try a clone instead.
Clone - Carbon Copy Cloner (Often recommended as it has more features than some others)
Clone – Data Backup
Clone – Deja Vu
Clone - SuperDuper
Clone - Synk
Clone Software – 6 Applications Tested
Time Machine Versus Clones and Archives
Commonly Used Backup Methods

Confliciting info - Migration Assistant from Time Machine Backup

I want to do a clean install of ML, There are certain applications that I did not want to migrate. I was told that you had no choice, it would migrate all of them.
when using Migration Assistant from a Time Machine backup.
Is this true before I start
Thank you in Advance

That's correct (whether you migrate directly from another Mac, or its Time Machine or "clone" backups). See Transferring Applications for an explanation and possible workarounds.

Does a fresh OS X install wipe out Time Machine history?

I just did a fresh Mac OS X install in a (failed) attempt to correct an elusive WindowServer problem:
Quit all apps.
Start a Time Machine backup and wait for it to finish.
Turn off Time Machine.
Clone the boot HD ("Hobbes") to another drive using SuperDuper!
Boot from the Snow Leopard install DVD.
Use Disk Utility on the DVD to erase the "Hobbes" HD, retaining the name.
Install Mac OS X.
During installation wrap-up, migrate everything (all accounts, settings, additional files) from the backup (step 4).
Run Software Update to get back to 10.6.8.
Resolve minor details to get everything back to normal.
Before turning Time Machine back on, I verified it was still set to use the same backup HD and that my exclusion list had been preserved. As expected, the backup dates were empty.
With Time Machine's Preferences still open, I did a Backup Now from the TM menu. The "Preparing" step almost immediately reported 10's of thousands of files. I thought, "Yikes! This looks like Time Machine is going to start over from scratch!"
So I quickly pushed the "stop backing up" button. Time Machine promptly stopped ... and filled in the Oldest and Latest Backup dates.
When I calmed down, I realized Time Machine was probably using folder update timestamps to find the new & modified files.
Before I kick off an actual Backup Now, I'd like assurance that Time Machine will simply take a long time to discover the relatively few files that actually need to be backed up, preserving more than a year of incremental backups.
-- Ward

After installing and initializing the new Time Machine 3 TB hard drive, I made a couple of attempts with SuperDuper! to clone my 1.5 TB drive (nearly full) onto the new drive. The progress bar on the first attempt got to about 90% in 24 hours and appeared to stall. So I restarted (for good measure) and attempted to complete the clone, which ran for many hours and stalled.
Thinking that the original TM drive might be corrupted, I used Disk Utility to Repair the drive, which ran for many hours and stalled. When I canceled the Repair, the drive had lost its volume name and would not mount. Yikes! A repair using TechTool Pro 6 ran for hours and hung. Fortunately, it did repair the drive sufficiently so that it would again mount. Whew!
Disk Utility Restore managed to do a block-level copy onto the new drive, taking about 8 hours.
When I pointed Time Machine at the new drive, it immediately warned me that something might be amiss. I clicked the button to proceed with backup set on the new drive.
Backup Now started TM's "Preparing items..." phase, which took about 30 minutes to prepare nearly 3 million items. Next came an "Indexing backup..." phase. That gave me hope Time Machine would eventually "bless" the new drive and pick up where it left off last week. But my hope faded after 24 hours of indexing. The only "backupd" messages in the Console log were periodic reports of waiting for indexing to complete. So I pushed the stop button.
I'm at a fork in the road:
1. Erase the new drive and give Time Machine a fresh start, keeping the old drive around for while in case I need to restore an old file.
2. Give Time Machine another chance to "bless" the old backups on the new drive.

I cannot connect my time machine to my WD mycloud, anyone figure out how to do this?

I purchased a 2tb WD My cloud, one of the reason was because it was compatible with the Time Machine for back ups, since I upgraded to Yosemite 10.10.2 I have not being able to use it nor my time machine finds it. I am able to do everything else and my macbook does see the WD cloud, I only have this problem with time machine back up. Does anyone have an idea how I can fix this problem?
Thank you

You don't need the WD My Cloud to backup your data. You are paying more for a drive that has a feature that you really don't need. Any USB 3.0 drive will work to backup to Time Machine.
USB 3.0 drives work on USB 2.0 but you do get 2.0 speed. They are cheaper because they are popular PC drives. If you get a new computer you'll get the bump to 3.0 speed. I don’t recommend FW. The newer computers don’t have FW ports. You would need a connector in order to use the drive on a newer computer.
Size: I recommend either the 2T or 3T drives. Often they are cheaper than a 1T drive. The 4T drives have more issues and failure rates.
Many drives come formatted for PC but easy to format in Disk Utility.
This Western Digital drive has good reviews: Has a 2 yr warranty. Comes formatted for Mac but I would still format using Disk Utility.
WD My Book Hard Drive for Mac 2 TB (WDBYCC0020HBK-NESN) $99
WD My Book Hard Drive for Mac 3 TB (WDBYCC0030HBK-NESN) $119.99
Check the warranty when comparing. The longer the warranty the better the drive. WD makes cheaper drives but with almost no warranty.
Locally, Best Buy seems to have the best prices.
You can get one drive fr both Time Machine and clone, but it’s recommended that you use different drives for each. If the drive dies you lose both types of backup. Time Machine needs 3X the amount of space on your drive.

Time Machine Vs Clone

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