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oivindi · Aug 7, 2005, 12:04 PM

My original harddisk on my G5 is getting to be too small (at least the system partition of it), and I need to move the entire system disk over to another internal harddisk with more space.

However, if I use Carbon Copy Cloner - will it make an identical copy of the system disk?

In other words, will it include copy protection schemes like Pace/iLok, and other particular information pertaining to copy protected software?

Is there stuff that won't be copied? Should I be worried?

Thanks!

Tyler McAdams · Aug 7, 2005, 02:02 PM

When you "clone" a disk with CCC, it copies all of the information from the image to the target target. All information is copied.

chris v · Aug 7, 2005, 02:03 PM

Originally Posted by oivindi

My original harddisk on my G5 is getting to be too small (at least the system partition of it), and I need to move the entire system disk over to another internal harddisk with more space.

However, if I use Carbon Copy Cloner - will it make an identical copy of the system disk?

In other words, will it include copy protection schemes like Pace/iLok, and other particular information pertaining to copy protected software?

Is there stuff that won't be copied? Should I be worried?

Thanks!

It should copy everything, period. If the copy-protcection is wired to a particular drive ID, you might have a problem, but I've got Logic, which uses a dongle, Macromedia Freehand MX, and another set of proprietary Photoshop actions that are protected, and they've all cloned fine.

midwinter · Aug 7, 2005, 02:28 PM

If you were to clone your drive, it most definitely wouldn't have a soul.

ghporter · Aug 7, 2005, 02:35 PM

Cloning the drive makes a [u]byte-for-byte] copy of the drive's contents. The cloner doesn't evaluate what it's copying, it just copies it. It should also produce a fairly compact image file, when compared to the space used on the original drive, because it won't copy any "blank" or free space inbetween data; it just copies the data.

kcmac · Aug 7, 2005, 02:45 PM

I used a similar app called SuperDuper. It makes clones. It does copy everything.

I had to do this cause my hard drive was getting ready to break. A very nervous time indeed but don't worry too much. It really does work. Plus you will be able to make sure it works since you still have the original.

ShotgunEd · Aug 8, 2005, 06:37 AM

You can copy data byte for byte using ditto in the terminal as well.

osxrules · Aug 8, 2005, 07:08 PM

I used SuperDuper to clone a Tiger system because of very near drive failure. Some people said CC has issues with Tiger but it might have been updated since. I can verify that SuperDuper works fine. I am running Tiger off my FW hard drive as I write this.

SuperDuper was a bit slow though - took me over an hour for just 30GB. Only 500000 files too. I just did it once and now I manually update changes daily.

kcmac · Aug 8, 2005, 07:16 PM

Originally Posted by osxrules

I used SuperDuper to clone a Tiger system because of very near drive failure. Some people said CC has issues with Tiger but it might have been updated since. I can verify that SuperDuper works fine. I am running Tiger off my FW hard drive as I write this.

SuperDuper was a bit slow though - took me over an hour for just 30GB. Only 500000 files too. I just did it once and now I manually update changes daily.

The next time you run SuperDuper it only copies things that have changed since your last backup. On my machine these following backups take less than 5 minutes. You need to be a registered user to get that feature though.

There was some kind of bug in Tiger that also affected SuperDuper. If you have Tiger and use it, make sure you have 10.4.2.

I think it is also telling that you did your back up when your drive was near failure. I did the same thing with my Powerbook. It took over an hour to back up my whole drive. When I quit, unplugged my firedrive and shut down my PB, it would not start again. Got it just in time.

iBorg · Aug 9, 2005, 01:38 AM

SuperDuper may well work (I haven't used it), but I can assure you that Carbon Copy Cloner absolutely does work with OSX 10.4.2, despite some posts to the contrary. I used it this past weekend to clone my "old" 80GB TiBook harddrive to my new Seagate 120GB drive, and it worked flawlessly - I'm using it now!

You do need to use it correctly - use Disk Utility to format your "new" drive, use it again to repair permissions on your "old" drive (and it never hurts to use DiskWarrior on your "old" drive to make sure you're not copying a bad file system!)

If you check Bombich Software Forums for its "Before you clone" tips, you'll be fine.

I don't know if SuperDuper's capabilities are vastly superior to CCC, but it better be: it costs $20, whereas CCC costs $5.

iBorg

Randman · Aug 9, 2005, 01:53 AM

Backup 3 is supposed to have Retrospect-level features, Out later this month, according to Think Secret.

kcmac · Aug 9, 2005, 08:06 AM

Apple backup doesn't allow for application backup at this time. Is that going to change? That's why I don't use it even though I have .mac.

JLL · Aug 9, 2005, 09:19 AM

Originally Posted by iBorg

I don't know if SuperDuper's capabilities are vastly superior to CCC, but it better be: it costs $20, whereas CCC costs $5.

And Disk Utility, which is also capable of cloning drives, is free.