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The SSD on my 2015 MacBook Pro died, and I got it replaced with a used SSD from another MacBook containing Catalina. The machine boots now normally, ready to restore from backup.

I tried to restore from Time Machine backup in the Command+R mode. I can connect to the Synology NAS where I have the TimeMachine backups, and see the backups of our family. When I select my "Peter's MacBook Pro" backup as the source, it churns for about 2 min with a "Looking for macOS system backups..." message, then shows a "No macOS system backups were found" message. So I can't proceed with the restore.

Logging in to the NAS I can see that the backup is there:

  • directory Peter's MacBook Pro.sparsebundle
  • sub-directories bands and mapped, the latest files in there match the day when the SSD failed, e.g. it's the most recent backup)
  • files info.bckup, info.plist, lock, token, 4 files starting with com.apple.*

Googling I found that the extension changed from .sparsebundle to .backupbundle in Catalina, so I renamed the directory, and tried to restore again. No luck, same error, so I reverted the name change.

I suspect the reason why the backup does not work is that the OS is different. I think I had High Sierra, but I am not sure. I looked at the files in the backup, but none of the content of the XML files indicate the OS version.

I also tried to downgrade the OS from Catalina to High Sierra, but got an error message.

I am currently making a copy of the backup to an external 2 TB hard disk (the backup is 1.25 TB), which should finish in 7 hours.

I am at a loss this time. Any idea how to get the backup recognized?

UPDATE 2023-03-21

I tried the Migration Assistant approach, I can connect to the NAS, and see the list of backups of all family members. My backup is stuck in "Loading backup...". I left it for the whole day, after 8h it reverted back to the screen where you select the server to restore from.

Any other ideas?

UPDATE 2023-04-27

After many trials and errors I got the restore finally working:

  • rename the extension from .sparsebundle to .backupbundle
  • connect Time Machine to the NAS => it'll state no backups
  • do a backup => latest backup shown as of today
  • reduce the quota of the Time Machine user to have 500G free space left
  • do another Time Machine backup => this forces Time Machine to clean up the backup and get rid of older snapshots
  • enter Time Machine => older backups are now shown!
  • restore

Moral of the story: Do not rely on Time Machine, it's too buggy! I am installing an rsyc cron to sync all files below my home directory to the NAS. I still use Time Machine, which is useful to restore single files.

I am posting this here in case anyone has the same issue.

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After many trials and errors I got the restore finally working:

  • rename the extension from .sparsebundle to .backupbundle
  • connect Time Machine to the NAS => it'll state no backups
  • do a backup => latest backup shown as of today
  • reduce the quota of the Time Machine user to have 500G free space left
  • do another Time Machine backup => this forces Time Machine to clean up the backup and get rid of older snapshots
  • enter Time Machine => older backups are now shown!
  • restore

Moral of the story: Do not rely on Time Machine, it's too buggy! I am installing an rsyc cron to sync all files below my home directory to the NAS. I still use Time Machine, which is useful to restore single files.

I am posting this here in case anyone has the same issue.

Improve this answer

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