Desperate Help To locate Old iPhone Backup/Pics

[tartanjulie]

Im trying to help a friend out. A few years back, I helped set up his new phone but I had to back it up thru my MacBook coz he had so much stuff on it. So I know his several "million" pics ended up on my Mac. I haven't deleted it but since then I obviously have done OS upgrades. Its important as many of the pics are family pics which include his now passed mum. Somehow he has lost many pics from his phone since then as he has been thru 2/3 phones since.
I am limited with my Mac computer skills & have failed to find them myself. I would really appreciate anyone who can assist me so I can get these precious memories to him. He does so much for us & I would like to do what I can for him.

 

[NoBoMac]

Something like iMazing can extract photos from a backup.

iMazing | iPhone, iPad & iPod Manager for Mac & PC

iMazing lets you transfer music, files, messages, apps and more from any iPhone, iPad, or iPod to a computer, Mac or PC. Manage and backup your iOS device simply without iTunes. (was DiskAid)

imazing.com

 

[eyoungren]

Im trying to help a friend out. A few years back, I helped set up his new phone but I had to back it up thru my MacBook coz he had so much stuff on it. So I know his several "million" pics ended up on my Mac. I haven't deleted it but since then I obviously have done OS upgrades. Its important as many of the pics are family pics which include his now passed mum. Somehow he has lost many pics from his phone since then as he has been thru 2/3 phones since.
I am limited with my Mac computer skills & have failed to find them myself. I would really appreciate anyone who can assist me so I can get these precious memories to him. He does so much for us & I would like to do what I can for him.

i0S device backups are stored here on Mac: ~/Library/Application Support/MobileSync/Backup/

~ is your user account name folder on the Mac. I.e., your home folder.

If the backup still exists it will be located here. If you do a restore in iTunes. then OPTN+click on the Restore button will give you a list of backups to restore.

iMazing, as mentioned above, should allow you to browse the backup and restore from it.

If you're using a version of recent Mac OS that no longer has/uses iTunes then I've no idea where backups might be stored now or how to restore.

 

[NoBoMac]

Newer MacOS still saves in MobileSync/Backup, so steps are basically the same: s/iTunes/Finder/

 

[bear_in_mind]

Newer MacOS still saves in MobileSync/Backup, so steps are basically the same: s/iTunes/Finder/

I'm having a similar issue. I used to routinely backup my iPhone(s) to my iMac because iCloud was unreliable and I wasn't crazy about all my data being on their servers.

I have a brand-new iPhone that I'm hoping to load these previous backups to transfer whatever photos and SMS are contained in them, especially from loved ones who've subsequently died.

Against my better judgment, I upgraded my iMac (Retina 5K, 27-inch, Late 2015) to macOS Big Sur (v. 11.6.8) in 2020 and I cannot locate the iTunes application, nor the backups. But I know they still exist because I'm running out of SSD space and the Apple software "assistant" suggests deleting them to save space.

When I Spotlight search for "iTunes", I only find an iTunes folder and an iTunes Media folder.

In the Applications folder, there's no iTunes application -- only the Music.app and TV.app.

I tried using Terminal to search for s/iTunes/Finder/ and find nothing.

I tried manually searching ~/Library/Application Support/MobileSync/Backup/ and the same result: there's no "MobileSync" nor "Backup" sub-folders.

Any ideas how to best troubleshoot this quandary?

 

[bear_in_mind]

Newer MacOS still saves in MobileSync/Backup, so steps are basically the same: s/iTunes/Finder/

I searched on the Apple Support website and here's the information they provide. There's no mention of iPhone backups. Incredible.

Apple Music User Guide for Mac

Learn to use Apple Music on Mac to listen to all the music in your collection, discover new artists, and add more songs to your library.

support.apple.com

 

[Tagbert]

Later, once you’ve either found the photos, or your friend has accepted their loss, you might suggest that an iCloud subscription enough to backup your phone and photos is only a few dollars a month. Too many people have all these precious photos and never consider a small price to back them up and protect them.

 

[jav6454]

Later, once you’ve either found the photos, or your friend has accepted their loss, you might suggest that an iCloud subscription enough to backup your phone and photos is only a few dollars a month. Too many people have all these precious photos and never consider a small price to back them up and protect them.

Agreed on this advise. The only problem is that the only plan that makes sense for cloud back-up is the $2.99 @ 200GB. They should really up that $0.99 plan to something like 100GB at least.

 

[NoBoMac]

for s/iTunes/Finder/ and find nothing

Because that is not real path but a Unixy shorthand for "substitute iTunes with Finder" for doing iOS backups.

iTunes was dropped in Catalina, so you use Finder now to backup iOS devices.

How to find a backup: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204215
How to backup with Finder: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT211229