How to back up computer

I personally just make a copy of the Home folder. I don't like to trust any of these third party apps to do it, but that's just me.

 

You could use SuperDuper

Woof, Woof - Dawg

 

thats all i do as well. just back up that folder and i have everything that i need right there

 

My backup tool of choice would be SuperDuper (linked to above).

Using SuperDuper clone your PowerBooks drive to your external drive. When your PB comes back, plug in the external drive and boot from it (which you will be able to do, as it is a clone of the PB's boot drive anyway), from there log in and run SuperDuper again and clone from the external drive back to the onboard drive.

 

CCC

I have used Carbon Copy Cloner to do exactly what you are talking about. My PB needed to go into the shop and I needed to make a back-up that I could work from while it was away. Here are the steps:

1) Use CCC to make a clone of your HD onto an external drive.
2) Plug HD into another Mac via Firewire
3) Select the external drive as the StartUp disk and reboot.
4) You should now be able to run on an EXACT copy of your old HD, but on the new machine.
5) Send the PB off for repair.
6) Keep working on the external drive.
7) The PB returns so plug in the external drive and select it as the StartUp disk.
8) Now that you are working off of the external drive on your newly fixed PB, just run CCC one more time to clone the external drive to the PBs internal drive.

It has worked for me multiple times. The key is that you can only clone to a non-StartUp disk so you have to StartUp using the copy that you want to retain.

Good luck.

 

Edit: duplicate info - nevermind...
Gotta get more coffee in me before I strt posting...

 

CCC Works?

I loved CCC, but I haven't been able to get it to work (it freezes at the authentication window) in a long time many updates ago. I just re-checked the web site, and it still hasn't been worked on since 2003. How are people still using it? Are you still in Panther? I'd love to see it come back to life.

 

CCC works w/Tiger

There is an updated version for Tiger:

http://www.bombich.com/software/ccc.html

Alternately, there are various hacks for running the old version under Tiger. Search for CCC and Tiger on macosxhints.com. The easiest "hack" is simply to run it as root, but even easier is simply downloading the Tiger compatible version linked above.

 

Better versioning

Huh - thanks for the info. You know, the version I had, which doesn't work, is 2.3.

I just downloaded the 2.3 you pointed me to, and it authenticates with no problem.

And both Versiontracker and Bombich's site (in some places) say that it was released in 2003.

Me thinks there are version numbering issues.

But, in any case, thanks for bringing back my old friend CCC, which I would have left for dead until seeing a version number increase.

 

HFS+ with Journaling enabled. Same as the internal...

 

Duff-Man says...yup, same thing....oh yeah!

 

I also have been trying to back up my HD. Have successfully backed up Desktop, Documents, Movies, Pictures, Public, and Sites to a CD. It took two to complete the task. Also mades a duplicate CD. Haven't started on Music yet, but do wonder if I save it via Toast data. Think it said it would save 19 songs at a time.

My more immediate problem is with Library, which Doctor Q said is very important. Toast would almost finish copy then it would find a bad file in Tech Tools Pro. The CD locked, had to force quit. Do an erase. Found the offending file which I put in the trash. Restarted the copy, then it found another bad file. A that point I quite not knowing what is going on. Did a force quit. Also was able to successfully erase the disk. Any comments, not sure if my information is complete enough. Either ask questions or maybe iChat would help.

 

Impression

For CD or DVD backups, working through the Finder and Toast just doesn't work after OS9. I use Impression (which can be downloaded at www.versiontracker.com). Tell it which folders to backup and let it figure out how to split them up on the CD's. All you have to do is pop them in when it wants you to.

There are other programs that do similar things. All have strengths and weaknesses. None are perfect yet (that I've found.)

HTH