How long does it take to make an external boot disk?

[ozone]

How long does it take to make an external boot disk? I have a 2012 MacMini, and I wanted to reinstall OSX to speed it up, and I figured since I'm at it, I might as well install an SSD. So, I have a 3TB USB 3.0 external hard drive that I'm using to make an external boot disk. There are about 390 GB worth of data on my MacMini. I have ChronoSync, so I'm using that to make the bootable disk.

But this is taking forever! It's been running since Sunday morning, so more than 48 hours now. It is progressing, but really slowly. Does it take that long? I figured it might take overnight, or even the better part of an entire day, but we're pushing into day 3 now. Is this normal?

 

[JohnDS]

Should not take that long. On you Mac boot into recovery mode, go to Disk Utility, click on Macintosh HD and run First Air or Repair Disk (depending on the version of your OS). Then do same with your external drive.

Also, what format is your external drive in? It has to be formatted as Apple Extended Format (Journalled) with a GUID partition map or it won't be bootable.

I have never used (or even heard of) ChronoSync. I use Carbon Copy Cloner (http://www.bombich.com) to clone drives to a bootable external. Or SuperDuper: http://www.shirt-pocket.com/SuperDuper/SuperDuperDescription.html

 

[ozone]

I didn't think it would take that long. Yes, the external drive is Journaled, and I wiped it first, so it should be good to go.

ChronoSync is more for syncing files, and it's really fast for that, but it does offer a make-bootable disk option and was reviewed as being a decent program to do so. I suspect the others (Carbon Copy) might have been faster.

Well, only about 15 GB to go... I think...

 

[Fishrrman]

My suggestion:
Quit trying to do this with Chronosync.

Instead, do this:
1. Download CarbonCopyCloner. CCC is FREE to download, and it's FREE to use for the first 30 days.
2. Reinitialize the target SSD.
3. Use CCC to clone the internal HDD to the external SSD.
4. CCC will also clone the recovery partition, as well.

Give this a try, and get back to us...

 

[ozone]

It worked! At least I think it worked... but it only took 68 hours to do so. Next time, I'll try CCC. Thanks.

 

[Bruno09]

390 GB in 68 hours....

With CCC, expect 90-100 GB per hour when copying to a USB 2 external 5400 rpm spinning drive.

 

[ozone]

Huh. This was a USB 3.0 external at 7200 rpm. Ah well... next time...

 

[JohnDS]

Double check to make sure it is bootable. Have you in fact been able to boot from it?

 

[satcomer]

It worked! At least I think it worked... but it only took 68 hours to do so. Next time, I'll try CCC. Thanks.

If you use the schedule the backups will only change "changed" files dry quickly. Just schedule the backups during lunch times or just before work!

 

[Fishrrman]

Again, I will suggest:
Next time, try CarbonCopyCloner.

This is what CCC was designed to do.
It's one of the finest pieces of Mac software "out there"...