[super_mario]

How did you end up with TM backup larger than original source? Sure, total storage consumed on TM drive can be larger than source, but that is because older versions of files are stored as well. But restoring most recent versions of files should be equal to source in size.

[submeta]

I had only 600-700 gb of data on my Mac. Installed OneDrive, did not know that I had configured my NAS to do 800gb of cloud backups to OneDrive. And Time Machine downloaded that data into its backup. Although I had configured OneDrive not to download that folder to my Mac. So time Machine screwed up in the first place.

[super_mario]

Ah, ok, that's a nasty bug/scenario. I long for the good old days one could just rsync the internal drive and bless it and you have a bootable clone, or make compressed disk image. Those were the days.