Restore System Backup from Time Machine Backup on Mac OS X
It happens to all of us, one time or another, that you feel your OS is misbehaving. In my case, I have noticed intermittent mouse movement freezes today. It got to the point when it became annoying. I went through the usual checkpoints and could not find what’s hogging my system (I even had a friend make suggestions, just in case I missed something). Meanwhile I had to resort working on my Mac Book Pro, because my system was rendered useless. Then it hit me: I have Time Machine backups!
Below is the procedure you need to follow and some caveats you should be aware of:
- Get yourself a cup of coffee/tea.
- Make sure your Time Machine backup disk is connected to your computer. (If you’re restoring your system because of a problem with your startup disk, make sure the disk has been repaired or replaced. Run Disk Utility or another utility software from an external computer, such as your notebook)
- Insert your Mac OS X Install disk, and double-click the Install Mac OS X icon. (If you have Snow Leopard, I’d suggest restarting your computer and holding down the “C” key on your keyboard. Make sure the keyboard is NOT a new aluminum keyboard, because for some reason the system does not recognize the pressed keys from it at startup)
- In the Installer, choose Utilities > Restore System from Backup.
- In the Restore Your System dialog, click Continue.
- Select your Time Machine backup volume. Try to remember when your problems started and choose an earlier backup. If you choose a backup that’s corrupted, you will have to repeat this procedure.
- Select the Time Machine backup you want to restore.
- Follow the onscreen instructions.
Get yourself another cup of tea/coffee, because depending on how much stuff you had on your HD, this might take a long time. In my case the estimated wait time is 1.5 hours.
So, I have time to walk the dog.
Update: My restore crashed when it was 10% done, so I had to start over. This time I erased my HD before starting the restore procedure. I recommend that before Step 4 you erase your drive.
Update: It crashed at 19%, and then it crashed at 34.7%, which is when I lost my patience. I installed a fresh copy of Snow Leopard and restored my Desktop and Documents from the Time Machine backup manually. All my other settings were taken care of Mobile Me, and all my data resides on my other partition anyway, so that is good enough.
At this point, it’s time to get a glass of wine…
Conclusion: Backup, back up, BACKUP! And only try Time Machine restore if you have nothing better to do all day. I also read somewhere that it does not restore certain settings, so you’ll have to set your Mail and other apps up anyway (unless you have Mobile Me). On an unrelated note, I just found this article on how to change your Time Machine backup time intervals: http://maketecheasier.com/change-your-time-machine-backup-interval/2009/06/05.
