Recover Outlook folders from Time Machine Capsule

now trying to recover emails on another Mac (MBA) from my Time Machine. I use Outlook 16.30. To import doesn't seem to work. What am I missing?

When you say import, explain exactly how you are trying to do this?

Was the MBP on the same OS as MBA?

Apple greatly increased the security of Time Machine backups. To use backups from one computer on another is not easy. You are not intended to simply open the backup in the normal Time Machine method. The backup does not belong to the computer you are using.

The way around it is to migrate files.. or recreate your MBP disk.. or sometimes you can open the backup in Finder once you have fixed its permissions.

Catalina has its own new set of issues.

https://www.macworld.com/article/3445481/can-t-find-your-time-machine-backup-after-upgrading-to-catalina-look-for-a-backupbundle.html

When you say Time Machine backups, where are they? Are they on a Time Capsule? Or do you have a local disk with backups? The method you use changes with the way backups were stored.

mikael166 wrote:

1. Edit:

Actually I found it (this is my first time trying to recover a time machine backup) - Backups.backupdb/folders with dates/Macintosh HD/ Folders "Users", "Library", "Program", "System" I can drill down to Program/Outlook and see that that file is 2GB which seems a bit small since I have archived (=saved locally/This computer in Outlook) lots of emails.

So

question 1: How do I retrieve emails from here? I wish only to import certain folders.

question 2: the locally stored emails, where should I look for them?

From Finder.. if you have been able to access the backup.. then just select the files you wish to use and paste them to your MBA disk. You must restore the files before you can import the info from them. Just the copy and paste from the backup will do restore the files.

To actually pull emails out of the outlook.pst file is not something I have ever done.. on a Mac at least. Done it lots of times on PC in the olden days. Just open the whole pst file in outlook select the mails and export them.

Sorry I do not understand the second question.

question 2: the locally stored emails, where should I look for them?

How are these emails different from your main emails.

I really hate Outlook. If you are finding it difficult to find all the emails.. I strongly recommend you use the restore whole MBP disk and boot from it.. so you are back into your original Outlook setup and export all the emails from there.

Outlook was a horrible mess to fix because it stores stuff all over the place.. at least in PC form.. Mac I have no idea.

mikael166 wrote:

1. Thanks for reply. Appreciate it.

I just tried to (in Outlook) File-Edit-Import

2. Nope, 2 different versions. MBP Catalina and MBA is on Mojave

3. Find that strange. The backup cannot only be with a hardware failure - computers gets stolen so if Apple makes it impossible its a quite useless backup device I would say. The Capsule is also PW-protected so strange that they make it difficult for a normal user.

4. I cannot via Finder see anything unfortunately

5. Catalina-issues: well. - the last backup I did was before my update to Catalina actually so hopefully not affecting me.

6. Yes, they are on my Capsule

Please help! :-)

Thanks.. let me answer point by point.

1. You cannot import files directly from Time Machine backup.. you must recover files first.
2. Crossing versions makes things much harder.. especially as Catalina is really unknown quantity.
3. You can use the backup in specific ways. It used to be far easier but Apple became paranoid and ransomware far more effective so they go to pains to secure the backup. The way you would do this is migration or reconstruction of the original disk. Sorry but that is what Apple decided was needed.
4. Finder is the easiest method but permissions need to be fixed.
5. Check on the TC if there are two backups or more.. because it will depend how far into Catalina install you got what happened.
6. TC also makes thing a little bit harder.

Migration is the easiest way to get the files back. This is how Apple expects you to use the backup.. this will NOT work however if the backup did change over to Catalina and the MBA is on Mojave. You cannot downgrade via migrate. If your point 5 is fact.. the backup is still Mojave OS then you can migrate the files to the MBA.

There is another messy factor.. did both computers use the same username. If so you might require changing the current user name on the MBA as the migrate will create your old user on the MBP.

Details of running migration are here.

https://support.apple.com/en-au/HT204350

There is not a lot of fine selection in migrate. So you need to recover all the user files. If there is not enough space on the MBA disk then use a USB drive.. HFS+ format is probably best.. but if the original is APFS it should be ok with APFS. Make sure the migration is directed to the USB drive instead. Once completed you should be able to access the files and copy your outlook file to your normal user account. Then import it into outlook.

If you run into issues give me details. Permissions can still be a problem.

Another method which I think is better in some cases.. assuming your MBP and MBA are roughly same era is to use a suitably sized USB drive and recreate the whole MBP disk. And boot from it on the MBA.

In this case you will use recovery partition on the MBA. Boot to recovery and use Setup Assistant. You can select the backup from the Time Capsule you wish to restore. And restore it to USB drive. This ensures your MBA boot is unaffected. Make sure you have a good backup of it before you start though.

Once complete you should be able to boot directly from the USB drive and you will be effectively running exactly the same setup as the MBP. You can export your outlook files to the internal disk and then reboot the computer and import to Outlook.

There is a third.. not approved method.

If these emails are crucial to your business for example.. make a backup of the TC disk before you start.

Archive is available in the airport utility and you just need a USB drive plugged into the TC. Mac OS extended format of equal size or larger than TC drive.

Once you have an archive on USB drive it allows you to be a bit more flexible with the TC backup.