Time Machine - can't access backups of other Mac

Question

Time Machine - can't access backups of other Mac

Hi there - this seems like a repeat of the discussion at Time Machine - can't access backups from other iMac but the answer offered there does not resolve the issue for me.

I am trying to access the TM backup of my other Mac. The TM backup is on a Time Capsule along with a backup of this Mac. Both sparsebundles are visible in the Finder (by clicking on the name of the Time Capsule in the Finder Sidebar then clicking on the folder called Time Capsule). I can choose Mac Mini (the name of my other Mac whose backup I am trying to access) from the list that appears when option-clicking the Time machine icon in the menu bar and choosing 'Browse Other Backup Disks...' but the Star Wars viewer that opens up shows only a Finder view of this Mac (a MacBook Air) NOT the Mac Mini. The backup I am looking for is not in a window behind the front window as some suggest in that other post, and I have tried navigating to Computer first before opening the Toe Machine view - but this does not seem to achieve much except taking me to a Finder window in Time Machine that shows the contents of my computer. I can navigate here anyway so nothing particular gained there!

Oddly both backups (which appear identical anyway) only let browse back one step - which is to be honest quite worrying as it suggests I don't have effective backup of either computer!!

Any help with this would be really great!!

MacBook Air, OS X El Capitan (10.11.6), MacBook Air Mid 2012

Posted on Sep 18, 2016 2:15 PM

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Answer 1

Sep 18, 2016 5:40 PM in response to Mike Watkinson

This is el capitan issue.. the much increased permissions have given us a lot more problems to open Time Machine backups for other computers.

Can you extract the file you want directly from the sparsebundle.. that maybe easier than getting TM to mount the backup from a different computer.

Or can you simply extract the file using migration assistant.. which is more the Apple authorised method.. I know you probably don't have space on the internal drive to recover the files.. but simply plug in a USB drive and recover to alternative location.

There are lots of ins and outs how this is going to work so feel free to post again.

In the meantime I will see how I am going now opening the backup of one computer in another with both running El Capo.

It did work but oddly..

I could select the file I was "restoring" (you can select a folder if you want..) in TM display.. select copy.. then cancel TM and I could paste the file into the directory.

Give it a try.. otherwise directly from sparsebundle in finder.

Note that I had to mount the data disk in Finder first otherwise TM could not find it.

Note also.. seeing the previous backups in TM takes time for spotlight to index the backup .. this can take several hours over wireless.. so be patient. The now is always available but any earlier backups take time.

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Answer 2

Sep 19, 2016 2:55 AM in response to LaPastenague

Thanks for your reply. In response to a couple of your suggestions:

“Can you extract the file you want directly from the sparsebundle.. that maybe easier than getting TM to mount the backup from a different computer.”

That would make life easy! How do I extract a file from a sparsebundle?

“Note also.. seeing the previous backups in TM takes time for spotlight to index the backup .. this can take several hours over wireless.. so be patient. The now is always available but any earlier backups take time.”

Part of the issue is that the “now’ backup is not available for the other Mac whose backup I am trying to access, only the Mac I am using. Previous backups do not appear.

I have tried the Migration Assistant route (great suggestion by the way - hadn’t thought of that) but the backup for the Mac (Mac Mini) I am trying to access says ‘No volumes found in backup’ and can’t be used. The backup for the Mac (MacBook Air) I am using seems to be OK to use using this route. Checking the sparsebundle for the Mac Mini backup in Finder it does report as 516 GB so has ‘data’ in it.

Any further thoughts?

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Answer 3

Sep 19, 2016 2:02 PM in response to Mike Watkinson

I presume the Mac Mini is not available to simply copy the file across the network.. that would be too easy.

Sorry I always try and find ways to bypass problems.

How do I extract a file from a sparsebundle?

1. Turn off Time Machine so it doesn't interfere with what you are doing.

2. Mount the data partition of the TC in finder. You might need to use connect as button in finder and type in the password.

3. Double click on the sparsebundle you wish to extract files from once you get it open. You will see a new device on the left hand column under devices.. Time Machine Backups.

3. Click on the "Time Machine Backups" in the left column. You can then click on Backups.backupdb

4. Once again you will see the name of the computer. Click it.

5. Now you will see the dates of the backups.

Pick whichever date is likely to have the file you want.. ie if it was deleted from the most recent backup then go back to when it did exist.

6. Open that particular date and go through the menu structure to find the file.

Mostly it will be under users and then under documents or downloads or wherever the application stores its files.

If you then hit permissions problems go back to step 3 and simply copy backups.backupdb to a suitable USB hard disk. If it is 500GB this is going to take ages over wireless and you will need a 1TB min drive.

Once you extract the backup to a local disk you can usually get the files out.

This is sort of the manual method of migration.. but if the backup volume has been corrupted.. as you indicate with this statement.

backup for the Mac (Mac Mini) I am trying to access says ‘No volumes found in backup’ and can’t be used.

Then you might find this doesn't work either.. migrate should work.

Try running a verify of the backup.. but the right place to do that is the Mac Mini that created the backup .. not your other computer.

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