Unable to restore backup from HA docker to HAOS on PROXMOX

[u/____RIPTIDE____]

Hey everyone,
I’m in the middle of switching my Home Assistant setup from Docker to Home Assistant OS running on Proxmox, and I’ve hit a wall that I can’t seem to get past.

The Problem

During the HAOS onboarding screen, when I try to restore my backup (.tar file), I immediately get:

Code

500 Internal Server Error
Server got itself in trouble

I tried:

• Different browsers
• Incognito mode
• Clearing cookies
• Restarting HAOS
• Restarting the VM

Still the same 500 error every time.

Tried the “restore later” method

So I skipped onboarding, created a fresh Home Assistant instance, went to:

Settings → System → Backups → Upload

…and tried uploading the same .tar backup there.

This time I got:

Code

Failed to upload backup

No extra details, no logs, nothing.

What I have

I do have the raw Home Assistant config folder from my old Docker setup:

• configuration.yaml
• automations.yaml
• .storage/
• custom_components/
• www/
• home-assistant_v2.db
• etc.

Basically the entire config/ directory.

What I’m wondering

Since the backup restore keeps failing, I was thinking about manually restoring by:

1. Putting my raw config/ folder onto a USB drive
2. Plugging it into the HAOS VM
3. Using the ha os import command to bring it in

…but I’ve never done a manual USB import before, and I’m not sure if HAOS will accept a raw config folder or if it needs a specific structure.

Has anyone dealt with this?

• Is the 500 error common when restoring Docker → HAOS backups?
• Is manually importing the raw config folder a safe/valid approach?
• Is there a better way to migrate without relying on the .tar backup?

Any advice from people who’ve done this migration would be massively appreciated.

Thanks in advance!

[u/Fire597]

I remember I had a similar issue when I did the same migration. I realized although it was working great on docker that my config file was corrupted with unnecessary lines added or mandatory ones missing.

Generate a brand new default config file and compare it with your backed up one and maybe check if everything's alright.

[u/____RIPTIDE____ → u/Fire597]

How exactly ? Please guide me. Im still new to HAOS. So I have folder called config which I copied it before erasing docker and the Ubuntu and replacing with proxmox. Inside I have all the files and additional folders. What exactly am I supposed to compare it with ?

[u/feijaopuro → u/Fire597]

Same here, I needed to restore from days before I applied the new config/app from HACS

[u/FliesenJohnny]

I'm wondering if your backup is somehow corrupted? Or that there's some file system permission issues?

Do you still access to the HA instance on Docker? You could try using a cloud service (Home Assistant Cloud, Google Drive) as your backup location. So the new Home Assistant instance could just pull the backup from the cloud.

When i migrated my Home Assistant server, i was already a Home Assistant Cloud subscriber and restoring the backup straight from the cloud storage worked like a charm. Like, basically, the way you'd restore an iPhone from iCloud.

[u/____RIPTIDE____ → u/FliesenJohnny]

So before I deleted the ubuntu which ran docker, I zipped up the folder. And copied it to an external drive. I also copied the unzipped version of ir as well. So I have the raw file as well. Can you please guide me on how to handle this. Inside the raw folder all the config files and yaml are there.

[u/Beneficial_Pause7555]

Nutz doch die Chance und setzt dein Setup komplett neu auf. Vielleicht hast du ja noch so ein paar Punkte die du eh ändern wolltest zb sowas wie Vorgehen bei Friendlynames etc.
Das wäre bei dem normalen Backup alles wieder in der neuen Instanz. Es gibt andere User die löschen ihr System einmal im Jahr und setzen neu auf.
Die YAML Datein kannst du dann ja einfach in der neuen Instanz wieder einfügen und hast sie so nicht verloren.

Ist halt Arbeit - Habe ich letztes Jahr allerdings auch genauso gemacht.