carbon copy cloner

ok, im in the process of using CCC to make a backup of my bare bones boot disk setup (os, core production apps, email settings, etc...)

and its taking QUITE a while to clone.

my question is this: if i have a dedicated external drive with sufficient space, would there be a problem in just copying by dragging the icon of my "Macintosh HD" to the external drive and calling it done??? am i getting any benefit from using CCC?

Hi Wayne,

There are a number of invisible files in the Mac OS that you will not be able to 'drag' over. CCC does the transfer properly. BTW, there is a CC for Panther and one for Tiger. Be sure that you are using the proper version.

Yes, it tales awhile.

--ken

thanks ken, i imagined that was the case.

it finally finished (not too bad, just under 2 hrs). so my result was the same visible folder structure from my hard drive.

whenever i should need to restore it do i just reverse the cloning target/destination?

Hi Wayne,

Correct, reverse the process. Boot up from the CCC drive, erase the original boot drive, then CCC back.

2 hours sounds about right.

--ken

thanks for the tips ken!

and (providing i used the tiger version of ccc) everything shows up exactly as id cloned it... right?

thats just the damned coolest thing ive ever seen. way better than having to reinstall all my apps individually everytime i wanna wipe my boot drive

Wayne,

Unless you deleted any thing it the CCC box before you cloned, every thing will be over there, including CCC.

I have a 160 gig FW attached to all three of my Macs, each one holds a CCC version of my boot drive. Every few months (depending on the amount of upgrades) I redo the process. This is for backup only. I believe that you can use CCC to automatically do the process on a schedule.

Before I CCC, I always do full maintenance on the drive to be cloned. I am still waiting on Tiger version of and Cache Out X. Mac Janitor has been updated to version 1.3 which is for Tiger.

After CCC I always boot from the CCC drive and run for awhile just to be sure. One time, several years ago, I forgot that I was booted from the CCC and ran for about three weeks from the CCC.

Very cool yes, If you are mid project and have boot drives problems you can boot from the CCC and continue on. When you have the time you can either clone back or get into the drive for repairs.

--ken

On a somewhat related note;

Does Final Cut clone properly with CCC these days? I remember having problems with this a year or two back, Final Cut wouldn't open because it checked the "machine signature", or something of that nature.

We are up to 22 Final Cuts here now, and although I use CCC to clone the basic OS and some other apps, it's a pain to manually install FCP after the clone.

Any help would be appreciated.

When you serialize FCP the Mac machine number gets placed in with the serial number.

When you CCC, you must clone you entire boot (a few exceptions) so that the FCP serial number and machine number get transferred.

If you attempt to run your CCC drive with another Mac if won't let you because the Mac machine numbers don't match.

--ken

You really don't need CCC anymore in my opinion. You can copy a disk using Disk Utility's "Restore" function.

Kevin Monahan

Hi Kevin,

You mentioned this before, but I asked if the 'Restore' function would create a 'bootable' drive.

Does it?

--ken

I'm not clear on what you meant by that.

KM

Hi Kevin,

When you use CCC to clone your boot drive to another drive, there is the option to make the clone drive bootable.

I don't think that you can do this with 'restore'.

--ken