Sam, Oracle keeps all backup information in the controlfiles, even if you have a recovery catalog. So yes, oracle would use your incremental backups. Wat you would need to do is to restore the controlfile from autobackup, mount that controlfile and then follow the normal restore/recovery steps (without recovery catalog). set DBID=<your dbid> set controlfile autobackup format for device type disk to '...%F' restore controlfile from autobackup; Regards, Freek D'Hooge Uptime Oracle Database Administrator email: freek.dhooge@xxxxxxxxx tel +32(0)3 451 23 82 http://www.uptime.be disclaimer ________________________________________ -- //www.freelists.org/webpage/oracle-l