Restore from Time Machine Backup on NAS

[mk313]

I bought a Synology NAS for Christmas & set up partitions for our Time Machine backups. They seem to have been working ok up until now (the Time Machine icon in the menu bar shows that they are backing up regularly). But we just got my wife a new computer and I tried to reset from backup. I was trying to use the Restore from Time Machine utility when we first logged in. I can get on the network & see the Time Machine backups, (both mine & my wife's) but when I select the backup, it says it is encrypted & asks for a password. I put in the password she used, and it says it failed to mount. Thinking she might have forgotten her password, I tried recovering from my Time Machine backup but I got the same message & I know for sure that my password was correct.

I just looked at my Mac & it still shows that it is completing the back ups (completing the hourly backup as I speak), but for some reason, I'm just not able to restore from backup. Any ideas?

Anyone have any idea what I may be doing wrong here

 

[Brian33]

I can get on the network & see the Time Machine backups, (both mine & my wife's) but when I select the backup, it says it is encrypted & asks for a password. I put in the password she used, and it says it failed to mount

Note that it's asking for the password for the backup's encrypted disk image, NOT your login password. They are (usually) different! If you have no record of what the backup encryption password is, probably you can find it in her Mac's keychain, using Keychain Utility.app. Obviously if Time Machine can still back up, it still has access to the desired password -- and I expect it would be stored in a keychain.

I don't have a Sequoia machine using Time Machine, but I have a Monterey laptop, and I am able to find the password for the encrypted backup sparsebundle using Keychain Access. It's in the "System" keychain, the name is "Time Machine", and Kind is "application password". You'll need to be an admin user to display the password you need.

In Sequoia, Apple buried the app in an unusual place -- that is, it's not in the Applications or Utilities folder anymore. (Boo!) But it still works. To find it, navigate to:

/System/Library/CoreServices/Applications/Keychain Access.app

and double-click it to open it.

 

[mk313]

Note that it's asking for the password for the backup's encrypted disk image, NOT your login password. They are (usually) different! If you have no record of what the backup encryption password is, probably you can find it in her Mac's keychain, using Keychain Utility.app. Obviously if Time Machine can still back up, it still has access to the desired password -- and I expect it would be stored in a keychain.

I don't have a Sequoia machine using Time Machine, but I have a Monterey laptop, and I am able to find the password for the encrypted backup sparsebundle using Keychain Access. It's in the "System" keychain, the name is "Time Machine", and Kind is "application password". You'll need to be an admin user to display the password you need.

In Sequoia, Apple buried the app in an unusual place -- that is, it's not in the Applications or Utilities folder anymore. (Boo!) But it still works. To find it, navigate to:

/System/Library/CoreServices/Applications/Keychain Access.app

and double-click it to open it.

This is the most helpful reply I've ever received on here (and I've had a lot of good ones in the past).

Thank you for explaining it & showing me the way to find the password on Sequoia. I was able to follow the path & see the password.

This is fantastic! Thanks again!