Time Machine Issue, Mail and Contacts.

[chrism123]

Please someone help, I use iMac 10.15.5 and have a LaCie 4TB mobile backup.
1:When I enter time machine with email , time machine will not navigate back through emails at all,
only shows "now" although side bar goes back to February,
when I installed backup disc.
I'm pretty sure past backups are stored in mobile backup.
If I enter time machine with finder open "mail" and "contacts" instantly Grays out.
2: In I enter "contacts" via Time Machine I can only navigate back 24 hours.
I'm a bit of a dummy so need easy directions. Apple were unable to help.
PS: if I open finder, time machine will navigate back, if I have anything but mail or contacts highlighted.
please help.

 

[0128672]

You may need to go via Time Machine > Finder > your Library and navigate to your Mail folder. I found a Macworld article with some very detailed steps to try and recover a Mail folder. Hopefully this might help you.

How to recover a Mail folder from Time Machine in macOS

Sometimes Mail wonu2019t let you bring back a missing folder. Thereu2019s another way.

www.macworld.com

 

[AndrewRodney]

I am having exactly the same problem since upgrading to Catalina and can't find a fix anywhere. I do know how in the past one recovered individual emails using TM within Apple Mail, and it worked in the past. Now, like Chrism123, TM opens in Mail and shows the most current date/time but CANNOT move back in time, making it worthless. I'd love to know if this is a common bug with a fix but the OP isn't alone with this issue. I even created a new TM backup from scratch a few weeks ago and no luck.

 

[CJ Dorschel]

Same here but with Contacts. After updating to Catalina from Mojave two weeks ago on one of my Mac Pro's, my Time Machine backups connected via Thunderbolt 2 array load in Finder but anytime I try to load a core app to restore a contact or email, none of my Mojave backups load, just the Catalina ones. The dates on the right hand side show and I can navigate to a restore date, but the app shows nothing. I've been researching this for a week and a lot of people are experiencing this issue. Some resolved it by letting their Mac with Time Machine remain open for 10-15 minutes as apparently it loads past restore points after a while. This worked with Finder files. I tried it with Contacts and Mail, yet no matter how long I left Time Machine open it simply doesn't show any backup data, only backups since updating to Catalina.