Does Time Machine Restore Defeat the Purpose of a Clean Install?

[holden57]

I apologize if this has already been resolved somewhere else, but here is my question.

My friend asked me to do a clean install of Snow Leopard on his MacBook, the purpose being to restore how fast and snappy the OS is when you first buy it.

My question is does reinstalling Snow Leopard and then restoring from Time Machine defeat the purpose of this?

Is it better to just install Snow Leopard and then manually move files over from Time Machine or another location?

This may be a stupid question, because I don't personally use Time Machine, I just back up my files elsewhere, so I honestly don't have much experience with using Time Machine.

Thank you for your responses!

 

[ScoobyMcDoo]

I don't really know the answer to this, but had some of the same concerns. When I moved from leopard to SL, I used my time machine backup only to restore user accounts. I manually installed all applications afterwards.

 

[petvas]

If you have configuration issues, then it doesn't make any sense to restore the whole time machine backup. I would install from scratch and then restore only my files and nothing else.

 

[holden57]

If you have configuration issues, then it doesn't make any sense to restore the whole time machine backup. I would install from scratch and then restore only my files and nothing else.

Thank you, as I don't use Time Machine, after I've done the clean install can I just manually restore individual files from my friends Time Machine which he wants on his computer?

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I also forgot to ask this in my original post, but can I use my Snow Leopard install disk on my friend's computer, or do I have to use his or get a new one?

 

[petvas]

Thank you, as I don't use Time Machine, after I've done the clean install can I just manually restore individual files from my friends Time Machine which he wants on his computer?

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I also forgot to ask this in my original post, but can I use my Snow Leopard install disk on my friend's computer, or do I have to use his or get a new one?

Yes, you can do that. Just plug the time machine volume after setting up Snow Leopard, and you can restore anything you want.

 

[darbyclash34]

One way of avoiding backing up OS issues is to have all of your system files excluded from your backup. You do it through the Time Machine preference pane, you add the system folder to the exclusion list, and then a dialog box appears and asks if you want to exclude all system files and applications. Personally I've always felt that this should be done by default, but I've always enabled this on all Time Machine backups and have never had an issue return after a Time Machine restore.

 

[robgendreau]

Restoring is restoring, that is putting everything back. It will work. But it isn't a "clean install."

Your friend may find that the "snappiness" of his original new machine won't return unless he just gets lucky and happens to delete something that was slowing his computer down. Slowness has innumerable causes, and only some of them are fixed by this procedure. And it may introduce new problems.

For example, if you manually copy over some stuff from time machine you may neglect to copy some of the necessary supporting files because unless you read all the installer log files you aren't going to know what to put where. And then something won't work.

I suggest that if you do this (I sure wouldn't) you do a migration instead; it will give you some choices and you can pick out the user data stuff. Then reinstall all the applications from downloads. Then reenter all the serial codes, etc. Then hope it all works.

Good luck.

 

[holden57]

For example, if you manually copy over some stuff from time machine you may neglect to copy some of the necessary supporting files because unless you read all the installer log files you aren't going to know what to put where. And then something won't work.

I suggest that if you do this (I sure wouldn't) you do a migration instead; it will give you some choices and you can pick out the user data stuff. Then reinstall all the applications from downloads. Then reenter all the serial codes, etc. Then hope it all works.

I assume that my friend didn't want any applications backed up, and this was simply limited to various files which he wants to keep, so I'm not super worried about that, however I will have to check and make sure.

One way of avoiding backing up OS issues is to have all of your system files excluded from your backup. You do it through the Time Machine preference pane, you add the system folder to the exclusion list, and then a dialog box appears and asks if you want to exclude all system files and applications. Personally I've always felt that this should be done by default, but I've always enabled this on all Time Machine backups and have never had an issue return after a Time Machine restore.

Okay, thank you for the advice. I'm just trying to make sure that this gets done right, as I'm doing it for a friend, and not for myself.