Open a Photos Library that was backed up in Time Machine

Question

Level 1

9 points

Open a Photos Library that was backed up in Time Machine

I want to open a Photos Library from Nov 2019 that was backed up to a Seagate external hard drive using Time Machine. The external hard drive was used to back up my old IMac. When I connect the external hard drive to my MacBook, I can find the photo library from Nov 2019. When I try to open the library, Photo gives me an error message "Photos attempted to repair the library "Photos Library", but is unable to open it."

I saw a similar question in the forum about entering Time Machine, but I could not figure out how to do that. That did not work for the person who asked anyway.

MacBook

Posted on Sep 3, 2020 1:22 PM

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Answer 1

léonie

Level 10

197,309 points

Sep 8, 2020 6:57 AM in response to cmatthewsri

Ou can add the menu item from the System Preferences > Time Machine:

At the bottom of the Time Machine preferences is the option "Show Time Machine in Menu Bar".

Launching Time Machine from the Launchpad or from the Applications folder will also take you into the Time Tunnel display. But I prefer the menu icon in the main menu bar. It is more versatile, because it allows us to check the time of the last backup or start the backup immediately, switch between different backup volumes.

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Answer 2

Old Toad

Level 10

210,609 points

Sep 3, 2020 2:45 PM in response to cmatthewsri

You can't open it up while still on the TM backup drive. The library must be restored to your boot drive or a non Time Machine external HD and then opened. This screenshot shows how: