[ClaraT]

I have gotten overwhelmed with information as I prepare to use a new external hard drive for the first time and hope some of you will indulge me with answering these questions please.

What is recommended for moving all your files/data/stuff from a nearly full internal hard drive to a new external hard drive as a holding place until the new internal hard drive is installed? Use Time Machine or Disk Utility?

What's the difference between cloning and backup? Can Disk Utility and Time Machine do both?

I would like everything on my current internal HD to end up on my new EHD and then I would like to back up the EHD using Time Machine. Is that possible? Can I then move everything on the EHD to a new internal HD?

Around the net, I've read that instead of opening Disk Utility from Applications, to boot the computer using the OSX installation CD, but I seem to be able to open Disk Utility from Apps with no problem so is it necessary to use the CD?

And, sorry guys, I know this a bonehead of a question, but my anal retentiveness is running rampant right now. Which is THE correct hard drive that I am backing up/cloning--the source HD? The first one in Disk Utility with the little HD icon that reads "Fujitsu MYH216", OR the one indented just below that with the little HD icon that reads "Macintosh HD"?

I know, I know. This should be obvious and simple, but I want to be absolutely sure which one to highlight as the correct HD that is getting copied and/or backed up.

Many thanks in advance for your help with this lesson.

[OreoCookie]

You should use Time Machine. It's a fire and forget-type of backup solution, the best solution if you don't want to care too much about the issue.

In order to copy your files back from a Time Machine backup, you just need to use Migration Assistant -- either launched from the install DVD or after you've finished installing OS X.

Regarding which drive to select, if you lanch the System Preferences and try to activate Time Machine, only your external harddrive should be available for selection -- unless you have connected other external harddrives.

I also recommend you name your harddrives: the internal one should be called Macintosh HD and the external harddrive something else. Call it backup, external, external harddrive, whatever. This makes things easier to figure out if you're not the technical type.

[cgc]

While I was a hard-line clone guy, I've been convinced in these forums to try Time Machine. TM is a great solution for most users...unfortunately, my TM doesn't work (forgot what the error was and I'm away from my Mac) but if need be, I'll reinstall OSX to restore TM functionality...it's that good.

[ClaraT]

Thanks so much. I'm more confident now with going forward with TM and I hear both of you saying choose easy and trust TM.

But can you boot from an external that has been backed up using TM? Thought I read somewhere that you can't.

Appreciate your time with me on this.

[OreoCookie]

No, you can't. However, you shouldn't work off a backup anyway (i. e. boot a backup volume).
Time Machine can also be used to restore any point in the past (that you have a backup of). If you eff up your system and then run a backup, you can restore to your last working configuration.

[ClaraT]

Hey there. The deed is done. Took just about 2.5 hours to back up appx. 143GB from my internal and now have about 322GB free on this 500GB external. Woohoo!

Will start deleting and trashing stuff on the internal now in order to "free up disk space for
the start up disk".

Sounds like needing to boot from another disk is not necessary, perhaps old school when you're using TM now. I certainly can see the value of this.

Thanks for the assist.

[CharlesS]

One other thing is that if you want to use the backup drive as an emergency boot disk, there's nothing keeping you from putting a minimal installation of OS X on the Time Machine drive. All of Time Machine's stuff is in the Backups.backupdb folder (well, except for some invisible files that you don't need to worry about), and you can put whatever you want on the rest of the disk.

[ClaraT]

Originally Posted by CharlesS 

One other thing is that if you want to use the backup drive as an emergency boot disk, there's nothing keeping you from putting a minimal installation of OS X on the Time Machine drive.

And how do you do this?

[CharlesS]

Boot from the OS X install disc and install it on the drive. You can go to Customize and leave off all the unnecessary stuff, as you don't need anything more than a bare-bones disc to run disk utilities from.