can you restore mac from backup on an external hard drive

[katy59]

I upgraded to Yosemite on my Macbook Pro and would like to revert back to Maverick 10.9.3. I have a backup from my other Macbook Pro that has Maverick 10.9.3 on an external hard drive. I was wondering how to use that backup to revert my other Macbook Pro from Yosemite back to Maverick.

 

[SuperSoph_WD]

Welcome to the community, katy59!

I believe it's possible to downgrade back to Mavericks from Yosemite, but you should make sure you've backed up your current data using Time Machine. Be patient with it though, as it might take some time reverting back to the previous OS X. I think I found a tutorial that might help you: http/osxdaily.com/2014/10/22/downgrade-os-x-yosemite-to-mavericks/

Hope it helps you! Good luck!
SuperSoph_WD

 

[luna74]

Perhaps there is a way to actually perform a true "downgrade" from a technical standpoint, but if you're looking to simply move from Yosemite to Maverick and you already have Maverick on an external HDD, here's what I would do:

*This is a brief guide to copying everything new since the backup that you'd like to keep, excluding Yosemite obviously, then turning your macbook's hard drive into a clone of the external hard drive once the backup has been MANUALLY updated*

1. Turn off your mac.
2. Plug in the external HDD
3. Turn on your mac while holding the "option" key (this will allow you to select the drive your computer boots from)
4. boot your computer from your external HDD (it'll probably be the orange icon incase you aren't familiar)
5. now that you are booted into your backup copy over everything from the current state of your computer that is important to you/ you'd like to keep (if that is everything but the new operating system try simply dragging the newer version of your *insert your username here*'s folder to your older *insert your username's here*'s folder and if any of the files are already present they won't be copied twice)
6. Once you've copied everything over go to the magnifying glass in the top right of your screen and use it to search for "disk utility"
7. select the tab labeled "restore"
8. select whatever the name of your backup external hard drive is (the one you're currently booted from) from the column on the left and drag it to the section labeled: "source"
9. drag the name of the hard drive holding Yosemite to the field labeled "destination"
10. hit restore
11. DO NOT TOUCH ANYTHING and BE SURE THE COMPUTER IS PLUGGED IN!
12. Wait while disk utility clones your external hard drive onto your main hard drive
13. Once Disk Utility is finished, shut down your computer
14. unplug the external hard drive
15. turn on your computer
16. BOOM! OSX Mavericks is back...