by Steve Turley.
I solve this by using ftp to upload the backup to a File System repository on the server. I have a system wide repository I have set up with the name backup. I ftp the files to there and then can restore directly from that repository when I'm done.
You can set up the repository under Administration/Plugins/Repositories/Manage repositories. Choose Enable and Visible in the drop-down menu by the File System Repository, Next click on Settings and click on Create a repository instance. It will ask you for a name of the repository. This will appear as a folder in the repository directory of your moodle data directory.