As you may have heard, Apple released the public beta for OS X El Capitan yesterday. Since I tend to ignore the risks of beta software in favor of all the new features, I downloaded it on my mid-2011 MacBook Air. Do yourself a favor: don’t be like me. Understand and acknowledge the risks of beta software. It’ll save you time and data.
Luckily right before I downloaded, I moved some files and folders from local storage into iCloud Drive. A few weeks prior, I conveniently decided to upgrade to the 200GB storage option for $3.99 per month. I didn’t back up anything from my Mac either because I live on the edge, but I am fully invested in the Apple/iCloud ecosystem.
Once El Capitan finished downloading, it prompted me to restart my computer and begin the installation. Probably only a minute or two after the installation began, I got a message that read “File system verify or repair failed.” I wasn’t entirely sure what that meant but by the looks of it I knew it couldn’t be good. The only option here was to “Restart and try again” so I did. I had no luck after four or five additional attempts.
Then I decided to just give up on installing El Capitan and revert back to Yosemite in Recovery Mode. This time, I got a different error message that said “An error occurred while preparing the installation. Try running this application again.” I was officially stuck in OS X limbo. El Capitan wouldn’t install and my Mac wouldn’t let me revert back to Yosemite.
Off to the Genius bar I go carrying the weight of my anxiety with me. Sure enough, the genius who took care of me told me he would need to perform a clean install of Yosemite, thus wiping everything out. I nonchalantly agreed because I knew it was either that or live with a paperweight for a laptop.
I’m not as unlucky as most people who don’t back up their computers. My investment in Apple and iCloud is what seriously saved me from a painful amount of data loss. When I got home and turned on my like-new MacBook Air, I found that just logging into iCloud restored around 80 percent of everything I had. My most important files were waiting for me in iCloud Drive, all my notes, reminders and calendars were ready, photos were in iCloud Photo Library, music was all available in iCloud Music Library (thanks Apple Music, you were just in time) and even my bookmarks and passwords were there in Safari.
There are two lessons to be learned here. First, dedicate yourself as much as possible to Apple’s ecosystem. It’ll pay off in situations like this. Keep your music, photos and important files in iCloud. This shouldn’t be too difficult since you’re likely to want to access all of those on multiple devices anyway. If calendars, notes, reminders, bookmarks and saved passwords are also important to you, sync those too. Mail already lives on the Internet so that’s not of huge concern.
If you’re like me, insisting that you don’t need to back up your Mac, the second lesson is for you: back up your Mac, or at least store files externally. Whether you upgrade your iCloud storage or buy an external drive is up to you, just as long as your important files don’t live solely on one machine.
Of course I did lose the files I stored locally, but none of them were anything I desperately needed. Within about an hour, my computer looked as if nothing ever changed. I’m still in shock now thinking about it. Even five years ago if I had to get my hard drive wiped, I would have lost almost all of my files without a backup. It’s astounding how iCloud was able to automatically restore just about everything meaningful to me.
Ultimately, don’t trust beta software (especially beta operating systems like El Capitan) and always have a little healthy skepticism about stable software, too. Let iCloud store what it can and back up the rest.
George Tinari has covered Apple and technology for over six years. On the rare occasion that he’s not sitting in front of his laptop, you can find him eating, awkwardly socializing, listening to music or singing along loudly to said music. You can also follow George on Twitter if you need more complaints and sarcasm in your timeline.
55 responses to “How iCloud could save your Mac from El Capitan’s destruction”
When will people learn to either create a bootable external/flash or just create a VM?
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“Yes back up, always.
No don’t install a beta version of an OS over your current OS. Durp.”
Exactly! I can’t believe this crap is on Cult of Mac. How is someone even qualified to write for them if they don’t know the following:
1.) BACKUP YOUR COMPUTER
-If you you are not backing up your computer then you have NOBODY to blame but yourself for data loss or problems like these.
2.) Before you install any Beta operating system; Stop and think really hard… Do You REALLY want to do this?
-Do you rely on this computer? Is there a risk that you could lose data that isn’t backed up? Are you willing (even if you have backed up) to spend several hours restoring if you decide the beta is not stable or something goes awry?
Mac users have it easy. Time Machine is free; it comes with OS X. All you have to do is buy an external hard drive (A good 1TB USB 3 external drive is as little as $50) and plug it in to your Mac. When you plug the drive in OS X will immediately ask you if you want to use it as a Backup Drive using Time Machine. All you have to do is select ‘Yes’. How much easier can they make it?!
I (like the poster above) would suggest having a Time Machine backup as well as a separate bootable backup using Carbon Copy Cloner (or a similar program).
Time machine is free and built-in, there is no excuse not to use it
iCloud is a great place for photos and documents and irreplaceable stuff. For everything else, and quick restores in case of emergency, Time Machine is amazing. If you’re using a Mac and not at least using Time Machine, something is seriously wrong with you.
Exactly. I had a HD crash hard a few years ago; it was no longer recognized in Disk Utility. I replaced the drive, fired up a reinstall of OS X using a Time Machine backup and within an hour was fully restored.
George, when I look in my iCloud Drive, it has folders for specific document types, corresponding to those apps that I have on my iPad and/or iPhone. I don’t keep my files on my Mac segregated like that, though. Can I put folders with mixed file types together on the iCloud Drive?
Yes you can.
Funny how this is the only comment you reply to. Not the others which suggest you don’t know what you’re doing. Rick I would suggest getting your advice elsewhere.
This had nothing to do with a beta release of El Capitan – but with the authors lack of maintaining his computer long before installing it.
Agree with @lolwut. Time machine is free and is a 100% solution not 80%. Your post is written as a success story but actually you lost 20% of your data.
I don’t know about 100%. I like time machine and I use it on my local storage. I also use Carbon Copy Cloner to make a bootable backup image.
NEVER install a Beta over your real production system (duh!)
Maybe not 100 percent, but TM is a 99 percent backup – and works on the fly. You turn it on and don’t have to think about it.
True, but personally I would never rely on it if I was going to do something I know might mess up my system(i.e. install a Beta).
Having a true bootable clone of your working system is IMO the way to go (in addition to a time machine backup).
Time machine gets you something more, which is the ability to travel backwards through your data history and recover deleted items, which is brilliant.
I use Time Machine and Carbon Copy Cloner (to create a clone/bootable backup) as well. It has served me extremely well for many years. I highly recommend the combination.
Time Machine
I have moved all my files to iCloud to avoid such issues. If anything happens to my Mac, everything is saved on iCloud, same with iPhone and my 30k photo library and 1k video library.
I do have a few network drives that I have for movies and stuff I download that I don’t necessarily need to keep but it is just for convenience. iCloud is really a good tool.
el crapitan!
it’s far from ready to be a public beta release. i successfully crashed my late 2015 13in retina mbp (with 512gb SSD) and now, i am rebuilding everything from backup. yes, i do have a backup, and though i did have a 15in mbp as well, which technically was my secondary machine, but i chose this one to crap with the el.
i had to download yosemite again, because the crapitan wouldn’t let me install from an older USB stick, and i’ve spent the night awake already. it will take me many hours more to have my book working again.
and now, i have a red coloured 1 showing above the settings icon on my iphone 6 plus – that’s because it has the ios 9 downloaded. but yeah, i am just not about to install it after this experience.
Again, with the “don’t install a beta over your OS and user data” use an external or flash drive. Dump.
But again, anyone who knows how to use computers properly knows that.
There used be a time when Apple stood for being a brand that made computers which could be used by people who didn’t know how to use them. And iPhones were built for people who didn’t know what the Internet was. And now we are supposed to know for a public beta release, how to use computers properly. Consider the years GMail run as a beta.
Apple still stands for that and is known for that. Betas are betas for a reason. They are incomplete software.
I put the betas on my machines knowing that there were risks involved and I made sure to back up redundantly first. The pre-release notes even say to use the beta software on a secondary machine if possible.
You don’t need special knowledge to use Time Machine. Whenever you connect a new drive, you are prompted and asked if you want to use it for backup. The only proactive thing a user needs to do is buy the external drive – and yes, have the basic knowledge that one must back up.
To the author: how does one get to be a tech writer without knowing NOT to “live on the edge” and that to do a MINIMUM of ONE backup is and has always been a necessity. And, then, write an article about how great it was to discover a way to recover…um, 80%, of your files? Great lesson for your readers.
*sigh*
time machine recovery doesn’t work when you need it. i’ve always used time machine backed up to my time capsule, since both became available. but unfortunately, it never works when you call upon it. even last night, it said “some error has happened” and the recovery failed from the backup. i’ve tried to run it as a test earlier as well, but it’s never really recovered stuff. i have never used it to go back and dig out old versions of files. but because it’s a feature, i always back up all the machines to the time capsule. it’s like having an insurance policy that you run the risk of not paying up when it’s time. erin brockowich perhaps. or just another way of selling more hard disks.
RUBBISH!!! Never had an issue with Time Machine backups. It’s clearly the moron using it.
That is an ignorant analysis. There are many different situations and Time machine can and does fail on occasion.
If you had read his comment before it was deleted, he said it never works. I don’t know what’s more ignorant, his comment or your inability to read.
I replied to you, not to the article. Try reading yourself.
Bite me some more.
There also was a time where Apple didn’t release it’s betas to the public to prevent stupidity like this.
I’ve never really heard complaints about GMail losing data. Yes, some functionality might have not worked for some people, and features were offered in a phased manner. but as an email service, it always sent your email successfully. add to that, if you compare Gmail to an operating system, yes – it can’t be compared. But then with El Capitan, basic features are missing, that the machine should actually boot up reliably.
FFS, IT”S BETA!!! It’s not designed to be fully functional, moron.
Calling people names only shows you have problems.
Bite me.
Stop blowing up my inbox about Gmail and how great it is then deleting your comment. Thanks.
FFS, YOU’RE USING A BETA SOFTWARE!!!!!!!!!!!! Do you understand what “BETA” stands for??? Obviously not, yet you call it crap. IT’S BETA!!!!! MORON!!!!
Just logging into iCloud did not restore around 80% of your stuff. It didn’t need to be restored, it was never gone. That’s as silly as saying after logging into gmail all my email was restored. Wow, magic.
A tech writer that doesn’t use time machine on his Mac, at a minimum, and installs a beta on his primary computer, should not be a tech writer. Period. No excuses.
in my case, my data on iCloud was never restored. In fact, what Apple did was ask me to leave a computer unattended for 3 weeks, while connected to the internet. as though, the data would “magically reappear”. They had me run some routines, so their testing team could access the machine remotely and analyse what had gone wrong, when Pages 5.0 and its siblings were released. But in the end, they just came back “we understand it’s a loss, but we couldn’t do anything about it”. there was no backward compatibility. they could see all the files in the iCloud directories, but the files had no data in them. All 0 KB. For a long time, we could not neither delete the files, nor access them. They just sat there, until some day, we could “magically” remove the files from the cloud (and clear the skies).
I’m now convinced, you sir are an A grade moron, and a huge liar.
“what Apple did was ask me to leave a computer unattended for 3 weeks” Yeah, right!!!!
“They had me run some routines”. Apple don’t have “routines”. Absolute bullshite.
You sir are a massive story teller. Utter BS!
Now you have a clean install of Yosemite I bet the El Capitan beta would install OK.
What worries me is you’re writing on an Apple forum, giving people advice. I shall note your name and make sure I don’t read anything you write. Hell, my kids know not to install beta software over your current system, and always make back ups. It takes guts or shear stupidity to admit how dumb you are on a popular blog.
I’m requesting the moderator to remove all my comments please. I am trying to do so, but some still seem to be in the queue. I do not want to argue with anyone. Neither the writer of this article – if El Capitan is good or bad, or anyone else who is facing trouble or is an expert at testing public betas.
Why do “tech” writers fell the need to share what I consider to be extremely embarrassing stories? This is something that was better left private. How can you consider yourself tech savvy and not have a backup plan in place? And then your advice to readers is to have a backup plan? Why because you yourself failed to understand why such a plan is needed? In my opinion, there was never any need for a trip to the genious bar if you understood how the apple ecosystem worked. Like actually using time machine. Or bothering to understand how to do a clean install of the OS. Or bothering to understand how to install a VM to avoid the very same issues you encountered after installing a beta OS. In my opinion, you are not ready to be writing for a tech blog reporting in apple products. Step back, then educate and train yourself on the products you will be reporting on. Otherwise, you just look foolish to those of us who really are tech savvy.
Maybe this article wasn’t meant for the tech savvy, but for the vast majority of people who just have a computer to use Facebook, play music, and store their photos.
There’s a reason they call it a beta. You ought to be prepared for all eventualities, including for it to steal your dog and burn your house down.
As for iCloud drive, Apple still doesn’t get cloud services. I wouldn’t trust them with any of my data, after the numerous problems with even simple things like syncing safari bookmarks and my contacts.
I learned my lesson years ago while running beta crap on Windows with no backup at all and when I moved to the Mac in 07 and found that I could back it up a lot more conveniently than Windows. I steadfastly refused Apple’s attempts to have me try their beta software. I told them that if they wanted me to try it they provide the computer to do it. No response from them came and besides they have enough employees to test their beta software out on their computers.
If you’ve ever been invited to test a public beta from Apple after you signed up to their program, they quite clearly state on the terms of agreement in the first line, that you shouldn’t run beta software on a primary machine or over the top of a current OS. Many blogs have given step by step, easy instructions on how to install beta software on a partition or from a bootable external drive. My question to you is, you’re saying Apple approached you personally to test beta software? I find that extremely hard to believe. Apples public beta programs are an opt in service (you have to sign up to it yourself), and developer betas are only provided to registered developers. So which is it?
Before these beta programs started enmass they keep asking to beta test their new OS’s.
I’ve been using Mac OS’s for over 25 years, and they’ve never asked people to test their beta software the way you’re “suggesting”. They set up their developer program to do that.
>Since I tend to ignore the risks of beta software
>I didn’t back up anything from my Mac either because I live on the edge
Thanks for making these disclosures early in the article. It tells me that I need no further advice from you.
iCloud is NOT a backup. It’s a sync solution that happens to store stuff too. If your synced data gets corrupted somehow, you no longer have any good data.
DO A BACKUP.
I decided not to do the Beta on my iMac. I opted instead to put it on my laptop which is just my travel machine. No worries about screwing up my main use machine.
Please take down this crap of article!
If you really want to have your life simpler, just get a WD MyCloud for $150. It is compatible with TimeMachine and backs up wirelessly. No cables no hassle.
I’ve got to the point now where even when the software is finally released to all and sundry i tend to wait a while until the bugs are ironed out, i feel that with the last few realises especially the Yosemite one, there were simply too many bugs when first released to make it a worthwhile update…….Now though Yosemite is great and probably my favourite ever OS X version
You could have tried booting from an external drive and then moving all your files to that. Or boot into recovery mode go to disk utility and make a .dmg to the drive of your choice. wiped your drive out rebuilt and then applied your files back. Lastly you could use a products like Crashplan, or Synchronize! Pro to do scheduled backups and you would not have to worry about wether you backed up or not.