How can I recover lost files from a wiped Mac desktop?

Kurt Lang wrote:

I would never, ever, use or trust iCloud as a backup. iCloud is a syncing service, not a backup solution. We use iCloud for one thing, and one thing only. And that's to have Find My enabled. Every other option is off.

Although I agree iCloud is not meant to used for backups, I've never had an issue using it to sync our Apple devices.

That's certainly your prerogative. However, speaking of "Find My", it's been inconsistent for me. Some of my devices list different devices than others. Not that I'm worried. It's unlikely any will disappear from our house. 🤔

However, speaking of "Find My", it's been inconsistent for me.

Same here. Very handy when it does what it's supposed to, but it's inconsistent.

When we had to clean out my wife's aunt's house to put up for sale, she forgot her phone there. But we couldn't be certain that's where it was because it wouldn't show up in Find My on her Mac. We ended up having to drive back to look for the phone and sure enough, there it was on the kitchen table. Phone was on with plenty of power, solid cell signal and Find My was on. But it may as well have been on Pluto with no way to locate it all from our house.

And in reverse, I forgot my phone at my sister's house last Christmas. Checked Find My when we got home, and yup, it appeared right away as being at her house.

anjuli224 wrote:

Thank you. I will do that in the future once I start rebuilding with what little I can pull from client emails.

Personally, If I placed my Business with a Third Party that is doing work for me

If I knew they did not have sufficient Redundancies in-place and always current to protect my business

Our Business Relationship would be under review- pronto

Kurt Lang wrote:

However, speaking of "Find My", it's been inconsistent for me.

Same here. Very handy when it does what it's supposed to, but it's inconsistent.

When we had to clean out my wife's aunt's house to put up for sale, she forgot her phone there. But we couldn't be certain that's where it was because it wouldn't show up in Find My on her Mac. We ended up having to drive back to look for the phone and sure enough, there it was on the kitchen table. Phone was on with plenty of power, solid cell signal and Find My was on. But it may as well have been on Pluto with no way to locate it all from our house.

For Find My to work, the device being "found" has to have 5 things:

(1) Find My must be properly activated

(2) The Apple ID account must be set up so the one trying to find the device has been allowed to see the location by the device owner

(3) The device being looked for must have a good internet connection, cell signal or WiFi

(4) The device being looked for must have a good view of at least 4 GPS satellites, preferably more

(5) The one looking for the device has to have good internet

I think where (4) sometimes causes trouble is that for some indoors locations, GPS signals are weak. In some buildings, the GPS signals have to come in through a window, of small area and four signals may be impossible much of the time, or four signals coming from the same direction in one small window may mean a reliable position is impossible to determine.

Any place with a good view of the sky should have plenty (8 or more) GPS (or GPS + Galileo) in view, But I think many of the complaints that Find My is unreliable or GPS is unreliable relates to indoor situations where GNSS signals are weakened or blocked by the building structure.

steve626 wrote:

(4) The device being looked for must have a good view of at least 4 GPS satellites, preferably more

I'll answer my question for you. Macs and iPads without cellular have no GPS so they could have a "good view" of a thousand GPS satellites and it wouldn't matter.

dialabrain wrote:

Just curious, what does GPS have to do with Find My and Macs? For that matter, with iPads without cellular.

Kurt Lang was mentioning an instance with a phone being located, not a Mac, not an iPad. The phones typically use GPS and Galileo (GNSS) for an accurate position. Without GPS, you likely can't even tell which house a device is, the circle of error can be km if it is using WiFi but not GPS.

If you have a device without GPS/Galileo/GNSS, then locating it becomes quite problematic in many cases. If one is triangulating based on WiFi signals from devices whose locations are also poor, you may get very noisy locations or even none at all.

FWIW, Find My is not designed to only work with GPS devices. As I mentioned in an earlier post, different devices in my house, locate different other devices with Find My. Which is why I said Find My has been "inconsistent".

For Find My to work, the device being "found" has to have 5 things:

✅ (1) Find My must be properly activated

It was the first thing we looked at in the settings after going back. I expected to find it off, but it was on.

🤔 (2) The Apple ID account must be set up so the one trying to find the device has been allowed to see the location by the device owner

? No idea what you mean. You login to your account in a web browser (with the same account the phone is using), go to Find My and tell it to look for the device you click on. There's nothing specific to "set up" or "allow".

✅ (3) The device being looked for must have a good internet connection, cell signal or WiFi

As mentioned, the cell signal was full strength.

✅ (4) The device being looked for must have a good view of at least 4 GPS satellites, preferably more

Actually, in the case of a phone, the nearest cell tower must have a good view at least 4 GPW satellites. Difficult to count from the ground. 😉

✅ (5) The one looking for the device has to have good internet

Our computers are in the same room using the same router. Internet access is the same for both.

Edit: "Houston, we have a problem." Regarding points 1 and 2, which mostly go together. I just logged into icloud.com with my wife's credentials. Clicked on Find My and chose her phone. iCloud insists the phone is Offline - Location Services Off.

Lies. Find My iPhone is on. As are the associated Find My Network and Send Last Location. Share My Location is on. Location Services is on. So, no idea what else iCloud could possibly want.

Edit 2: Never mind. 🫢 The phone it can't find is an old one still stuck in her account. It can find her iPhone XR just fine. At least sitting here at home. Still no idea why it wouldn't appear in a heavily populated suburb of the Twin Cities.

Oh, fer cryin' out loud. I just looked to verify and the long gone iPhone 5 is NOT listed in her account. Only her current iPhone, iPad and Mac. No clue at all why Find My thinks the iPhone 5 is still connected to her account. Especially since it was properly erased back to the Hello screen and removed from her account years ago. It shouldn't show up in Find My at all.

Kurt Lang wrote:

So, no idea what else iCloud could possibly want.

Maybe iCloud wants paid. :)

On a side note, Apple Maps indicates four different distances from my actual location on four different devices, in the same room. Three; a MBA and two iPads are practically touching each other, and an iPhone less than a foot and a half away. Go figure. 🤔

p.s. the distances vary from 36' to 100' away.

Yeah, distance has never been very accurate. But generally close enough.

I checked Find My for my devices. iPad - found. iPhone - found. M4 Pro mini - doesn't know where it is. Well, it's right here, literally less than a foot from my iPhone. Find My and location services are on for the Mac. It's connected via an Ethernet cable to a LAN port of our router on an 800 Mbs line. And yet, Find My can't locate it.