iCloud just saved my butt

AsSiMiLaTeD

My wife's iPhone 4S had a problem during an update to the most recent iOS, and I ended up with the dreaded 'connect to iTunes' screen. I haven't seen that in years, didn't know it was even still used. So I plug it into iTunes and sure enough it says the phone is hosed and needs a restore, which means installing a blank OS and losing all the apps, data, and media on the phone. Not Cool.

So after the restore I remember that I have all of our devices backed up to iCloud and decide to restore her latest backup (it backs up every night when plugged in so latest backup was a few hours ago) and see what I end up with. Voila, everything was there! All her apps, data, photos, videos, and all the icons were even in the same place! It was easy enough to do, just select restore from iCloud back, enter apple id, select the backup that you want to restore, and wait for it to download all my data. A few taps and she'd never know her phone crashed.

Brilliant.

Admittedly, it would have been preferable for the phone NOT to crash in the first place, but **** happens and it's nice to have options when it does.

Moral of the story, if you have an iPhone or another phone with a similar backup program make sure that feature is engaged.

Strong Bad

Yep, my iPhone and iPad are backed up to iCloud. Sometimes **** happens! We are dealing with an electronic device here, so it's not 100% foolproof.

Not to stray too far off subject, but I also love Time Machine. The HD in my iMac was part of the recall last year, so I had it replaced even though I had no issues with it. WTF, why not get a new HD. Before the tech came, I did a backup the night before just to make sure it was up to that point before I shut it down. Next morning the tech comes, replaces the HD, we boot to OS disk, go through the GUI and in less than 2 hours my iMac was exactely where it was when I shut it down the night before.

Moral of the story...BACKUP BACKUP BACKUP your data!

AsSiMiLaTeD

Yeah Time Machine has been a nice feature as well, I haven't NEEDED it yet, but when I swapped my OS over to the SSD it was helpful to have a single backup to restore, even though I just ultimately used the clone feature which was even easier and much faster.

codyc1ark

I use plan b on my nexus, haven't needed it but it is a nice piece of mind. Really cool features are that you can GPS your phone if you have lost it, or like me can't find it at the house and can log in and make it 'scream'. Sure makes it easy to find.

AsSiMiLaTeD

Yeah we've had to use the find my iphone feature once when she left hers in a fitting room at Macy's, love that feature as well

mantis

I back my phone up hard wired every few days to my computer. I move around my music , pic's and videos anyway , update podcasts so this is a usual thing for me. I also upgrade my phone every year or so , so I always am ready. If I break my phone , I have no worries or crash it which has never happened since the original IPhone and I have had them all since.

AsSiMiLaTeD

It just happened again today. Apple released an update to iOS8 that broke cellular service for some users, I was one of the people affected. I was able to revert back and come away with no issues or lost data thanks to being able to restore from iCloud.

Granted, Apple shouldn't have pushed a bad update to being with but that's another discussion, having iCloud set up really saved my **** again today...

voltz

Glad to hear it, those clouds are starting to pay for themselves.

KrazyMofo24

I'm definitely keeping things backed up. I just had to download IOS 8.0 and restore from that because 8.0.1 fiasco. But in the end it wasnt too bad I was able to restore everything pretty easily.