(For an idea of what these applications can do, read this excellent article which remains relevant to OS X El Capitan). Among other things they can create a complete copy (Disk Image) of your Mac, restore that image once you’ve repaired your Mac, and let you startup from the external drive the backups are stored on. You should now be able to choose the Recovery Drive to launch your Mac.īackup software Carbon Copy Cloner and SuperDuper are both great tools for creating Mac backups.Wait a few moments and the now connected Time Machine drive should appear (you may need a password).Hold Option when the startup chime sounds.This is how to use your Time Machine backup to access Recovery Mode: This may sometimes be the only way to get to fix (or at least rescue data) from your Mac, particularly when you can’t get it online or its drive has become damaged.

If you do have a connected external drive with a Time Machine backup then you can use Recovery Mode from the backup. You keep backups don’t you? You really should.

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