iMazing questions...

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I've been updating my iPhone 8 Plus with iMazing (Windows 10) and backing it up periodically. This has worked without any issues.

The problem started last week, when the need for restoring from backup came up. The restore process started and around 3/4 of way through, it stopped and gave this error:

imazing restore error nn.jpg

Repeated attempts resulted in the same error message.

Contacted iMazing and support advised, quote:

Can you please make sure to check the option 'Erase target devices' before restoring your backup? Wiping the device does not affect iOS, only the user data on the device (which will be wiped anyway during backup restoration).

That's not my preference, but pretty much had no choice, initiated the restore with the erasing the device option enabled. And erase it did; when the iPhone restarted, it greeted me with the welcome screen just like the first time I've started up this device. At one point, iMazing app took over and restored the device from backup. That's an overstatement, since quite of few things had to be restored manually.

The Apple ID disappeared and initially, the password did not work. The reason being that the 2FA was active and the iPhone, that had not been verified as of yet, could not receive the text with the PIN. It's annoying at best and downright nasty, if you cannot get it by different means. Luckily, I remembered to login in on my MBP and get the text message there, but it took me awhile to remember.

Once that step had been done and evaluated the restored iPhonequite a few things had not been restored, like the finger prints, downloaded apps, Wallet with CCs, ringtones for family members, some of the settings, etc., disappeared. All the local music files, added to the iPhone from my CDs, had disappeared as well. It took me about an hour or so to set back everything where it was. Prior to erasing the iPhone, the storage size was 34 GB, after restore it shows 26 GB; that's eight GB of storage freed up. Some of the freed up storage could be related to wiping out all of the Apple logs, failed iMazing restore, etc., but that's just my guess.

Is this the normal procedure to restore with iMazing?

If you use iMazing restore feature, do you enable the 'Erase target devices' switch?

TIA...

PS: This is the first time the restore function had been used. Maybe I didn't understand what it has backed up, but my expectation was higher than this...
 

chscag

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I have never tried a restore with iMazing although I do make backups with it and also iTunes. (Now that iTunes is no longer available with Catalina, I make backups using the Finder.)

However, after reading thru your post, I'm now leery about using iMazing to do a restore. It seems to me that erasing the iPhone before restoring a backup is an unnecessary step which only adds to the complexity of the entire ordeal. Then when you add 2FA to the process it becomes even more complex.

I might add here that I have made many successful restores with the older iTunes app.
 

IWT


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I'm truly sorry you had such a miserable experience.

May I ask if you initiated Encrypted Backup in Options? Reason I ask is that if not, then no passwords or any other private data will be backed up - for example your Apple ID that you had trouble with. And, I guess your fingerprint access.

Apps are handled differently. You have to use the app feature to manage your apps whilst the iDevice is connected and by so doing, your apps can be recovered and re-downloaded. If you didn't do that then you can't recover them via the restoration process. It has to be done manually.

Music should have been okay.

So I've not been much help in retrospect, but for the future, maybe?

Talking about the future, I may be a backup freak; but I would never rely on only one BU.

There is iCloud (again choose the encrypted option - in fact I think you have to). There is iTunes (Windows or Mac - encrypted for PWs etc).

I use all three methods.

The one and only time I used iMazing for a restore, there were no significant difficulties. One other time I set up my new iPhone by restoring from iCloud. No hassles at all. My wife restored from iTunes and that was a breeze.

Ian
 
M

MBAmtloin

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Losing data and spending a hour recovering that is quite trifling!
from my experience I use iTunes which is available on Windows 10 for ipad and iphone 5s back ups stored on my Dell XPS due to SSD size.
imazing was an free alternative i used and forgot why, but did not use that for backing up anything.
that was nice of them to respond, not too many companies do nowadays.
 
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I can second Cr00zng's experience. Last week I replace my iPad mini with a new refurbed mini 5. I tried to use iMazing to do the transfer and found that none of my music transferred at all. In addition, no passwords, none of my ebooks, nothing in the Wallet transferred either. I ended up making a new backup of the old mini using Finder, then did a recovery from there to the new Mini and got it going that way. Not impressed with the failure of iMazing. Haven't had time to try to chase it down, but I can say that I DO use encrypted backups, or at least the box is checked and I have provided a password, but based on what I saw with this fiasco, what it backs up is pretty much nothing. Maybe it's part of the transfer process that failed, but iMazing is no longer a trusted app for me. I've gone back to using the Finder in Catalina to make backups of my iDevices. Sad, as iMazing looks really nice.
 
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Thanks everyone for your feedback...

I didn't really have to restore my iPhone, manually restoring the data was an option, but did it anyway. One of the reasons was testing the restore feature; I am a firm believer that the backup need to be restored to determine, if it is working.

The fact that at the startup the PIN had to be entered twice and iOS didn't remember my Apple ID seems to indicate to me, that the 'Erase target devices' option is really a reset for the iPhone. Had I've known what it does, I would have reinstalled iOS first. The "Do not disturb while driving" activation automatically still does not work on my iPhone.

Yes, all of my backups are encrypted, regardless of the platform; iMazing backup was no exception. I actually asked support about encrypting the backup 2-3 month ego, prior to purchasing the licenses. They informed me, that in order to backup email account configurations, encrypted backup is required. All six email accounts had been restored during the restore process, that worked just fine. So did restoring my texts, pictures, call history, contacts, browsers history, settings and wallpapers.

Maybe it was my misunderstanding, but... If the app backs up your data, shouldn't that include the Apple ID? Maybe not the ID password and the fingerprint for security/privacy reason, but not even the Apple ID? It's just a fricken email address. Coming from the Linux and Windows world, where image backup is the king, I expected more from the iMazing.

I don't use iCloud for my data with Apple; my Apple ID is logged in to the iPhone for getting a handful of apps and for the Wallet app. All five of the apps downloaded and installed, once my Apple ID logged in to the iPhone.

Yes, support did response, but their advice on issues is iffy at best, quote from support:

Wiping the device does not affect iOS, only the user data on the device (which will be wiped anyway during backup restoration).

That's not true, wiping erases pretty much everything, except the iOS. Restore on the other hand only erases data and will not remove the Apple ID, fingerprints, etc. Support should not give bad advice to customers. Not to mention that the original issue may have not been resolved either, the restore without erasing the device had not been tested as of yet. It seems to me, that I may get a refund from iMazing.

I'll test iTunes on Windows just to see, if it is a viable option for backing up iOS.

I learned more about my iPhone during the last couple days, than during the two plus years I have it. That's a positive for sure, even if I forget all of it couple of month later...;D
 

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I too have 2FA and use an encrypted backup to iCloud and encrypted backup to iMazing on my MBP for both iPhone and iPad. I note that for a restore which I have only done once via iMazing that the restore password which I setup at the first backup was required at the beginning.
This was a restore from an old iPad to a new one and it ran flawlessly. All passwords, apps and settings were restored except for a few third party apps. Email accounts restored from iCloud separately.
I have also used the encrypted iCloud backup and restore a friends new iPad but it is very slow compared to iMazing. That may be partly due to my network speeds so that could vary.
The only way of testing now would be to erase my iPhone and try a restore from backup which I'm loath to do.
 
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Update…

After resetting and backing up my iPhone, the restore completed without errors.

Prior to the restore initiating, it asked for disabling the “Find My iPhone” app. This had not come up during the previous backups, the first time I seen this during restore process. After the app disabled, the restore proceeded without an issue; the iPhone displayed the “Restore in Progress” message and the backup restored.

iMazing restarted the iPhone and after the restart, it asked for the PIN once. The known wifi connection established, entered the prepopulated Apple ID password and the iPhone was back to normal, including fingerprint access to the iPhone.

The Wallet is an iCloud app, setting up the prepopulated credit cards required entering the password for the Apple ID and the CVV numbers for other credit cards. Just a minor bump on the road…

Based on supports feedback, the error my system has experienced seems relatively common with iMazing, quote:

This issue only happens when there's a security protocol preventing your backup from being restored. Thus you see a "security.xpc" error.

That explains why even escalating my ticket, the only solution is to erase the iPhone, prior to restoring from backup.

If iMazing continue to work as described above, I’d be fine with it.
 

Rod


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Darn, I guess I’m so used to that now it goes by me but yes, Find My has to be switched off for any “erase” type procedures and this was the same with iTunes and I imagine with the current Finder method.


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Coming in late to this discussion, and have only perused the previous posts - for our iDevices I do 3 backups each, iCloud OTA + Finder non-encrypted (now on Catalina), and iMazing - to date I've setup 4 or so new iPads using iCloud BUs OTA w/o an issue, e.g. PWs remembered which according to Apple is an encrypted BU to the cloud (see link and pic below) - this has always worked fine for me - NOW, I've not restored via iTunes or now Finder or using my iMazing BUs and am rather disturbed about the latter - will keep up on this (and other similar) threads - and for those having iMazing issues, maybe their support team should know of the issues discussed here? Just my thoughts - thanks for the insights - Dave :)
.
iCloudBUs.png
 
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I sent a message to the iMazing developers. What I got back was that music is NOT restored and that to restore passwords you need to have an encrypted backup, which I did. Basically, they were not really responsive to the issue I had at all.

So what I am doing now is to backup using Finder, and also making iMazing backups. I think the iMazing backups may be useful if I need to completely whack my iDevices and go back to factory status, but frankly I don't trust it any more. I know it works for folks, and that others have had no trouble, but once trust is lost, it is very hard to get back.
 
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Jake, I had the same impression about support as well; one really have to push them to get an answer.

Push I did and just got my answer from support about the why the iPhone had to be erased, quote:

It's an iOS-related issue, we cannot debug it, only Apple can. The only workaround we know of is to erase the device first.

While it is understandable that the company does not want to publicize this issue, dragging out the resolution/explanation does not make it any better. Not to mention, why they wouldn't work with Apple to resolve this issue? It's not like people won't get to know the root cause of this issue.

Tried using iTunes for Windows and yes, it does work. I didn't know that iTunes for Windows comes from Microsoft, at least until I found it in the Store, but iMazing did and popped up this message:

ms itunes.jpg

Do I take the blue pill, or the red pill? That's the question it seems...

The message suggest to use Apple drivers instead, probably because the MS drivers may add additional issues when backup/restore performed with iMazing. Contrary, if the Apple drivers restored, then the chances are that iTunes won't work right. And that's just great...

I really didn't want getting involved with backup this much and should've stayed ignorant about what the backup does and keep using iTunes. It's too late by now...
 

chscag

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I didn't know that iTunes for Windows comes from Microsoft, at least until I found it in the Store,

iTunes is licensed to Microsoft from Apple so that it can be downloaded for free from the MS store. In the same way that Microsoft Office is licensed to Apple so that it can be sold in the Mac App Store. iTunes has always been an Apple product.
 
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Yes, iTunes is an Apple product and licensed to Microsoft, but that does not mean iTunes is the same as it had been previously. The user interface is pretty much the same, but how it runs on Windows 10 is different.

Case in point...

The iTunes, from the MS Store in Windows 10 is installed via an "exe" file, or through the "Settings\Apps & features" interface. The uninstall is only through the "Settings\Apps & features" interface, instead of the traditional Control Panel.

Most of the "Apps & features" listed applications in Windows 10 64-bits run in sandbox, including iTunes from the Store. As such, the Apple drivers are not shared with other programs. That's an issue for iMazing on Windows and to correct this, the program requires Apple drivers.

The support was kind enough to let me know, quote:

In order to communicate with your iOS devices, iMazing uses the same drivers as iTunes.
The problem with the Microsoft Store version of iTunes is that it basically does not "share" its drivers, and uninstalls other iTunes drivers when launched.

iMazing handles this by reinstalling the "normal" iTunes drivers* when you launch it.

*-Presumably, there might be other differences with the MS drivers

As such, the answer to my question earlier (blue vs. red pill) I had to take the red one to have iMazing working. Once iMazing reinstalled the "normal" drivers, it runs and so is iTunes without issues.

IMazing is feature rich application, when compared to iTunes. Being able to export/import all of data from the device to various data format in itself worth for the licensing cost. Not to mention other features that might be worth for on their own. And yes, the backup/restore feature as well... if it works... :Smirk:

I think I had enough with configuration changes on my system for awhile. I still need to document the issues encountered for my records and how to fix them. The chances are that couple month down the road, I won't recall...
 
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Greetings: long time mac user, since 1985. Mid 2011 27” High Sierra. I thought I’d wade in on iMazing.
The first time I backed up my phone to iTunes, I selected no encryption. Later, when I tried to access my backup, it asked for my password. I was never able to solve that. And never able to use the b/u system.
So when I got my new phone, a couple of years ago, I started using iMazing instead, not trusting iTunes. There have several weird problems. They answered some of my questions. Sometimes they answered a different question than I asked. One issue has never been resolved: When I plug in my phones, (6S+ and XR) it says update required. I just ignore it it seems to back up normally. When I asked about this, they said to update iTunes, which I did, but it still appears. When I asked them, due to my ignoring this notice, am I really getting a b/u and how do I tell? No response, really.
So after this thread, I think I should do an iTunes back up as well. I hope I never need to find out if I have a backup!
 
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There are several "gotchas" with iMazing that can make your life miserable, if you don't pay attention to how iMazing works. Some of these "gotchas" are due to not RTFM, while others are not clear even in the guides/manual.

Encrypt iMazing backup, if you want to restore email and other accounts with passwords. Plain-text backup will not restore accounts with passwords and you'll need to add these accounts manually after the restore has completed.

Any data restore, full or just a single data source, starts out with erasing all of the data first on the target device. In another word, if you select only the Calendar to restore, all other data will be erased on the target device. Do full restore instead, if you don't want to clean up other data, such as messages, photos, etc. Email accounts are restored, if you encrypted iMazing backup, regardless of the type of restore selected.

Here's the restore option Windows:

iMazing restore.jpg

Please note, that any type of restore will erase all data first.

If the restore fails, your only option is to erase the target device that is equivalent to resetting your iPhone. This gets tricky, if you have 2FA authentication enabled for your iCloud account. If you have another Apple device, iPad and/or MacBook where your account can receive text messages, you're fine. You'll need the six digit PIN # from those devices to login to your iCloud account. Restore will complete and your iPhone data restored.

If you don't have another Apple device, you'll need to disable 2FA. In another word, only authenticate your iCloud account via password. You can activate the 2FA authentication option, after the restore has completed, if so desired.*

*-That's not correct, 2FA cannot be disabled, please see dscag's comment below...

iMazing works just fine to backup iDevices, update the iOS and move data off and on the iDevice. Restore on the other hand is not as smooth as other features of the iMazing app.
 
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chscag

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If you don't have another Apple device, you'll need to disable 2FA. In another word, only authenticate your iCloud account via password. You can activate the 2FA authentication option, after the restore has completed, if so desired.

My understanding is that 2FA can not be disabled. Where do you see that it can? I've been thru this before with Apple and unless they have changed the rules for 2FA and allow it to be discontinued you may find yourself locked out.
 
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My understanding is that 2FA can not be disabled. Where do you see that it can? I've been thru this before with Apple and unless they have changed the rules for 2FA and allow it to be discontinued you may find yourself locked out.

I did not know that the 2FA cannot be disabled, thanks...

That raises couple of questions, that I don't know the answer to.

If you just have an iPhone with 2FA, how do you reset the iPhone? In case of iMazing, that's erasing the device.

Does Apple offer alternative to texting the six digit PIN? My MacBook Pro from late 2013 is getting old and at this point, I don't see a reason to replace it in the future.

Is Apple's 2FA mandatory? My wife's 6s also has 2FA enabled and we are not clear on how it had been enabled.
 

IWT


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2FA became compulsory for new Apple IDs about 3 years ago. Before then, it was optional.

And it's true you cannot disable 2FA. But what you can do is go into iCloud.com. Then into your account, then look at the Security settings.

From there, you can enter a rescue email address and a rescue phone number, even a landline, if your iPhone cannot receive 2FA.

I would advise all people to take advantage of this because you never know.......

Ian
 
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Thanks Ian...

The rescue info had been set from the beginning of opening my account with Apple, also changed a number of times.

What I do not recall is seeing an option for verifying the iPhone to my account with different method than PIN number, when my iPhone had been erased/reset via iMazing. I did mention this issue in my first post.

If I erase an iPhone with iMazing again, I'll try to take an image of "entering PIN # screen".
 

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