Perform a full time-machine restore without an install disc?

Question

I have a computer with a blank hard drive where, fortunately, the user has a complete Time Machine backup.

Unfortunately, my Leopard install Disc was eaten by an unhappy disk drive, and while I do have some install discs kicking about, they are model-specific and not for this model. I am able to boot the machine up into Leopard with an external hard drive or over the network.

Is it possible to do a full time machine restore without the installer disc?

Solution 1

No. I have a copy of my restore disc on my Time Machine drive so it is bootable. Good luck.

Solution 2

I know this is an old question, but I just wanted to note that there are two useful tools that might have resolved this situation.

1. Migration Assistant - Boot up however you can and, with the Time Machine disc plugged in, open Migration Assistant. Choose to migrate using Time Machine, and get that all done, then...

2. SuperDuper! - Or any other good cloning software. I think Disk Utility can accomplish this just fine, but I'm not sure. Copy the external, bootable drive with all your newly migrated TM data to the internal, empty drive.

From there, just change whatever setting, user accounts permissions, etc you need to change, and you're done. And definitely do a software update.