Q: Time Machine restore point failure - a WARNING!

Sounds like you've been bitten by a bug we've just discovered, and Apple may not be aware of yet.  See #D10 in Time Machine - Troubleshooting.

If so, all is not lost.  Home folders are not affected, and should be recoverable, via some finagling.

It hasn't happened to me, and I don't know how to reproduce it yet, so I can't file a bug report myself.  It seems to happen only when extra Apple or 3rd party apps are involved.

We found it by helping folks with the problem, and noticed a hidden system folder was excluded that the TM prefs panel won't let a user exclude, so we knew something nasty was up.  Part of a long story: Serious Time Machine bug on Mountain Lion

So far as we know, only one good bug report has been filed through normal procedures (see Reporting a Problem to Apple), which may not get quick attention, but I do have copies of the affected file from 6 others.  As noted in #D10, are trying to recruit others. If we can find someone with the problem who's covered by AppleCare, or willing to spend the $60 they charge to others, that will help.  

Some of us have another avenue that may get quicker attention, and we're working on replicating it so we can file reports.  I suspect that will happen in a few days.

And the Geniuses rarely, if ever, find out about these things before they're fixed.  AppleCare will, once the engineers identify it.

I have a business Joint Venture account and I'm willing to help out. Unfortunately I may have blown it already by deleting my plist file before I found this thread. I'm in the process of doing a full back up after a TM reset to a local USB drive. It should finish tonight.

I found this issue because I was trying to restore a TM backup to a new Mac that I got this week. I simply could not make it work.

Anyway, if my TM backup / restore fails, I'll post back here.

I may have a bad plist file that we can use. I noticed that my "full backup" was substantially smaller than my drive usage. I went back through Pondini's full TM restart steps (and added a reboot in the middle for good measure) and seems like it may have worked. My current scheduled back up looks to be the same size as my drive usage.

MooneyFlyer wrote:

. . . I was trying to restore a TM backup to a new Mac that I got this week

Do you mean, doing a full restore from one Mac's backups to a different Mac?  If so, that's generally not a good idea, and the installer often won't allow it.

If you mean using Setup Assistant, yes, that's one of the things this bug prevents. 

MooneyFlyer wrote:

 

I may have a bad plist file that we can use. I noticed that my "full backup" was substantially smaller than my drive usage.

It should be somewhat smaller, as TM automatically skips some things, like system work files, most caches & logs, trash, etc.

I believe I have this Time Machine 'bug' you describe on my Late 2012 27" iMac that I've had for 4 months.  I turned on TM on 2/23/2013.  Since then I've observed the hourly, daily & weekly backups available in TM and even did some unneeded restores just to verify my backups.  Everything looked good - and still looks good.  But yesterday, for the first time, I did a cmd-R restart and selected 'TM backups'.  I was surprised to see that my latest 'full backup' that was available for restore was 5/4/2013.  There were 'full backups' listed for every week in the period from 2/23/2013 to 5/4/2013, but nothing after 5/4/2013.

I'm on 3-year AppleCare, so I called Apple.  After explaining my situation, I was passed from the first-level to a supervisor who used their remote access tool to lead me around my iMac.  After checking 'backup folders' in TM, and a few other things, they concluded there was nothing wrong with my system.

But, I asked, what about the missing 'full backup' restore points missing when a cmd-R restart is done.  And how do I get them started again?  "No worries" was the response.  "We have better ways of recovering a full system than by the cmd-R restart method, should you ever need it" were the exact words used.

Is this the problem you are seeing?

San Lewy wrote:

. . .

After checking 'backup folders' in TM, and a few other things, they concluded there was nothing wrong with my system.

 

But, I asked, what about the missing 'full backup' restore points missing when a cmd-R restart is done.  And how do I get them started again?  "No worries" was the response.  "We have better ways of recovering a full system than by the cmd-R restart method, should you ever need it" were the exact words used.

That's outrageous!   Things you didn't exclude are not being backed-up, and they think that's ok?!?!

There is a different method, not a better one.  It involves erasing your HD, installing a fresh copy of OSX (4+ GB download, unless you saved the installer), then using Setup Assistant to transfer everything except OSX from your backups.

However, if you do have the bug in question, that won't work either:  The hidden private folder, also at the top level, isn't backed-up either, and that prevents Setup Assistant or Migration Assistant from even recognizing the backups as backups!

Is this the problem you are seeing?

Sure sounds like it. 

Here's what I'd recommend:  Start up Migration Assistant (in your Applications/Utilities folder), go through the first few windows, far enough to see if the backups are recognized.  See Using Migration Assistant on Mountain Lion or Lion.  If your backups don't appear in the Select Your System window (in the tan box), that's what's happening.

If so, call them back and ask what their "better" method is; if they mention either Setup Assistant or Migration Assistant, tell them you've tried that.  Then refer them to any or all of the following:

My thread here:  UPDATED: Serious Time Machine bug on Mountain Lion.

My web page on the issue:  #D10 at http://pondini.org/TM/Troubleshooting.html Also tell them I have evidence of something changing the Time Machine "plist" on several other Macs running with Mountain Lion with this same problem.   While I don't know how to reproduce it on my Mac, I would be GLAD to talk or e-mail with them to help get this identified.

Pondini wrote:

 

... ask what their "better" method is; if they mention either Setup Assistant or Migration Assistant, tell them you've tried that.

On my original call to AppleCare, the above (Setup Assistant & Migration Assistant) was their "better" method.

Unfortunately the Setup & Migration didn't work for me using Time Machine when the bug was in place. The Mac could see the disk but not the TM backup.

My update - last night I finally had a successful TM run with the full ~240GB of data. I'm attempting to put that on my new box now to see how it goes. I'm using Setup Assistant after a clean OS X install.

Pondini -

>Do you mean, doing a full restore from one Mac's backups to a different Mac?  If so, that's generally

>not a good idea, and the installer often won't allow it.

I'm doing this now! What is the big problem that I should watch out for and what are my other options if this doesn't work.

It's in the process now and claims about an hour to go.

MooneyFlyer wrote:

 

Unfortunately the Setup & Migration didn't work for me using Time Machine when the bug was in place. The Mac could see the disk but not the TM backup.

 

 

That's the same thing I just got when I started Migration Assistant as Pondini suggested - no 'Time Machine Backup' icon to select.

After looking further at my system, it appears to me that all my weekly backups are available, good and showing in TM - but that those weekly backups since 5/4/2013 are not appearing in the list displayed on a cmd-R restart.  So ... I don't know exactly how I would proceed if I needed to completely recover my system.

Backup software such as TM must not only work, it must instill confidence in the user that all backed up data will be there should the need arise and that the restore process will go smoothly.  Right now, I don't have that confidence.

MooneyFlyer wrote:

. . .

>Do you mean, doing a full restore from one Mac's backups to a different Mac?  If so, that's generally

>not a good idea, and the installer often won't allow it.

I'm doing this now! What is the big problem that I should watch out for and what are my other options if this doesn't work.

It's in the process now and claims about an hour to go.

Unless it's the same model and build period, various things can go wrong.  Sometimes, the Mac you restore to can't run the version of OSX that was on the other one (usually the installer won't let you do that); other times various settings will conflict with the different hardware.  See  Issues after restoring a Mac from a Time Machine backup made with a different Mac ("Restore System From Backup…")