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Restore document files from a Time Machine Backup

I need to resore documents from my last Time Machine backup on an external drive. It is app. 120GIG with hundreds of folders with thousands of files; word, excel, pdf, jpg etc. in them. My Macbook Pro is basically dead and I do not want to restore from Time Machine to the new computer I am buying. The reason for all this is that my Macbook pro is dead and I am buying a new iMAC that I want to start from scratch with software, preferences etc, and just copy over all my data files to the internal hard drive of the new computer.

MacBook

Posted on Nov 21, 2019 10:34 AM

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Posted on Nov 21, 2019 9:06 PM

When you buy your new Mac and turn it on, it will ask if you want to transfer information from another Mac or its Time Machine backup. Select that option. It will present you with the opportunity to transfer selected items, such as your User Account and all its data, exactly as you propose. Click the "reveal triangles" in your User Account to expand the selections.


Refer to Step 4 in Set up your new Mac - Apple Support.

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Nov 21, 2019 9:06 PM in response to JBwiz

When you buy your new Mac and turn it on, it will ask if you want to transfer information from another Mac or its Time Machine backup. Select that option. It will present you with the opportunity to transfer selected items, such as your User Account and all its data, exactly as you propose. Click the "reveal triangles" in your User Account to expand the selections.


Refer to Step 4 in Set up your new Mac - Apple Support.

Nov 21, 2019 2:29 PM in response to JBwiz

One approach you can take is to setup your new iMac with the same user name and password as your old machine and name the hard drive the same. Open the Documents folder on the new machine, enter Time Machine and access the backups from the old machine. Make sure you're in the Documents folder, do a Select All, ⌘+A, and restore to the Documents folder on your new machine.


Restore document files from a Time Machine Backup

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