MobileMe: Manually recovering a backup if Backup 3 cannot successfully restore
Symptoms
If you've attempted to fully restore your files using Backup but were unsuccessful, you can manually retrieve the contents from your backup files as a workaround.
Products Affected
Backup, MobileMe
Resolution
Try these steps to manually restore from a full or incremental backup:
From a full backup
- Right-click (or Control-click) the backup file's icon that you want to restore from.
- Choose Show package contents from the contextual menu.
- Open the Contents folder.
- Open the second Contents folder within the first Contents folder.
- Locate the Backup.sparseimage file (which contains the files you backed up).
- Double-click the Backup.sparseimage file. The contents will mount on the desktop in a volume named "Backup".
- Examine the contents of the disk image and copy any files you would like to restore to an alternate location.
- Unmount the mounted disk image by clicking the Eject icon in the sidebar, or by dragging it to the Trash.
- Repeat these steps for any other Backup archives that you want to restore.
From an incremental backup
If you cannot access the full backup archive for a set, point Backup to restore the last incremental from the set. When prompted, tell Backup to restore to a location other than that which was originally backed up.
Backup should restore most or all files. If there are still some files missing, you may have to mount the archives from each incremental to find them. Follow the steps in the "From a full backup" section above.
Additional Information
See these articles:
- HT1284: Mac OS X 10.5: When to use Time Machine or Backup to back up data
- HT2980: How to back up and restore your important Mac OS X 10.4 files
- TS1177: MobileMe: Perform a Full Backup when backing up to a rewritable disc
- Backup 3.0 Help: Restoring backed-up files using an existing backup plan
- Backup 3.0 Help: Restoring backed-up files without a backup plan
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