Dead Time Machine

[davowolf]

I suddenly lost one of my Mail folders (in left hand column).

So starting Time Machine, it all loads up on screen with the 'pack of cards' view centre screen and dates 'mountain' to the right, which all looks very pretty as you scroll over it...

But absolutely nothing happens...... it seems static and dead. No clicking works on any previous date.

However it does seem to work after a fashion, with the Finder pages, although the Restore button seems dead this time and inactive.

How so ?

 

[ferrarr]

When restoring for Mail app, you need to have Mail open, then enter “Time Machine”.


Sent from my iPad using Mac-Forums

 

[davowolf]

Yes Bob thats what I'm doing but its all still dead...

 

[pigoo3]

Here are a some possibilities:

1. Have you tried rebooting your Time Machine...never know...might help?
2. I did some Google searching...and see that there can be some Time Machine issues with Catalina (I see you have Catalina on your iMac). Here's one article to check out:

Time Machine and backing up in Catalina – The Eclectic Light Company

3. Unless another solution can be found...it's possible the hard drive in this Time Machine is starting to fail...or has failed.

- Nick

 

[davowolf]

Ahh thanks Nick. I'll look into 2, for sure. As for 3, its a Glyph 1TB Studio; how would I know if its failing ? Bought new May 2017.

I'll re-boot the TM but how do I do that ? I do of course see it in Applications and in my dock.

 

[IWT]

I think that maybe Nick was referring to (Airport) Time Capsule??? As here: How to reset your AirPort base station - Apple Support

Ian

 

[Slydude]

I think this might be a kink in how Mail backups are handled by Time Machine when running under Catalina. When this thread first startedI tried the typical recovery procedure with no luck if I click on the entire mailbox that I want to recover and that didn't work. It's hard to truly test that since I didn't need to recover a mailbox at the time.

It occurs to me now that I may not have tested the following:
1. Open Mail and create a new mailbox. The name isn't important ant because it's temporal.
2. With Mail still open launch Time Machine and select the backup that you want to use to recover ,messages from
3. Select the Mailbox to recover and then select the messages too be recovered.
4. If the Recover button is available to click on now in Time Machine click Recover

It's the last little bit in bold on step 3 that I may not have tested. I haven't fully tested this recently because I haven't had anything I needed to recover in Mail but I seem to vauguey recall doing it this way in the past.

×

 

[MacInWin]

My experience with TM is that as the backup gets larger, it takes TM a while to build the links back to the oldest unchanged files. So when you first open TM, give it some time to build those links and display the backups. It is NOT fast process, but should finish in minutes, not hours, but it's a lot of minutes that seem even longer.

 

[davowolf]

I'm still struggling with this and still to try some of these fixes.

But I can now also report that since my 'Energy' mailbox disappeared mysteriously, now my 'Drafts' has gone ! Hence the need for TM which isn't working.

What is going on with my mail ??

 

[Slydude]

Is the Drafts mailbox itself missing or is there nothing in the Drafts mailbox?

 

[MacInWin]

Sly, on my system Drafts is only there when there is something in progress or I save it as a draft. Once I send it, the Drafts folder disappears.

 

[Slydude]

Sly, on my system Drafts is only there when there is something in progress or I save it as a draft. Once I send it, the Drafts folder disappears.

That's what I thought happened. Hence the question. I suppose I could have explained that better.

 

[davowolf]

Great point y'all but not quite. So test email saved as a draft and yes hey-** the draft file decides to come back, but wait for it, along with the dozen or so drafts that were there already but hiding !!

How strange is that ?

But is this related to the oringinal issue of the TM being dead in the water ? Me thinks not.

 

[IWT]

So test email saved as a draft and yes hey-** the draft file decides to come back,

Good. That's what it's meant to do.

along with the dozen or so drafts that were there already but hiding

Yes, I've had that happen too. My reasoning, which be wrong, is that once you've saved an email as a Draft - (or it has done so itself if you have taken a long time on the email or left it for a break) - and then you come back to it and add something else, then "Send"; the original draft is kept.

It is variable, I admit; but all I do is check in the "Sent" mailbox that it has been sent, then delete the Draft.

So you can safely delete any drafts you come across after checking that they were indeed sent.


Ian

 

[davowolf]

Thanks Ian. I think that comes under the heading of 'idiosyncrasy' !

 

[MacInWin]

Thanks Ian. I think that comes under the heading of 'idiosyncrasy' !

Or maybe, "design." Consider this: I have an email I send out to a lot of folks, but before I do, I personalize it with one additional sentence. So instead of typing the whole message in over and over, I create a draft, put it in the Drafts folder, then when I'm ready to send it, bring it back, add the edit and the addressee and send. Handy!

 

[IWT]

Exactly, Jake. Much better put than I.

Ian