Super Duper or Carbon Copy Cloner

[mk313]

Hey guys,

I've been happily using Time Machine since it first came out, but something over the summer has caused it to stop working. It seems like others are having the same issue and it doesn't appear that anything (short of moving to Sonoma-which one machine isn't able to do)is going to fix the issue.

I'm looking to move on & SuperDuper & Carbon Copy Cloner seem to be the 2 most popular options. My plan is to back up both computers to one drive (if possible). It's what I do with Time Machine & simpler than using one drive for each machine.

I downloaded one of these (I think it was Super Duper) & started backing up, but I got a popup that the drive needed to be erased & encrypted, which from what I've read, seems to mean that the same thing would happen if I were to try to backup the other device (again erasing & encrypting the drive). I could be way off & this stuff is pretty far out of my knowledge base (hence using Time Machine for the last however many years).

I guess my question would be, for those that use one or the other, does either of them allow your to back up multiple computers to the same backup drive?

Any other factors that I should consider that might give one product the edge over the other? I'm just looking for a basic backup software package that I can set to automatically backup my machines in case I ever lose a hard drive or a computer. Nothing super fancy.

Thanks in advance.

 

[Apple_Robert]

I have never used SD. I do use CCC and have found it to be excellent. It is much quicker with backups than TM.You can use it to backup multiple computers. I do not suggest you use the same external drive to backup both computers. If the drive fails, you lose access to both machine backups. Depending on the size of the external drive you need, I suggest getting a Samsung T7 drive. You can get the 2TB SSD version for $119.

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[ssmed]

I am using CCC - seems great and reliable. I have not used SD. Compared to Time Machine (in the long distant past for me) it is so reliable. If you have a fairly full drive and want sequential backups and to keep some deleted files for a while you need at least twice that size.

 

[Bigwaff]

I've been happily using Time Machine since it first came out, but something over the summer has caused it to stop working.

I'm interested to learn more about why Time Machine stopped working. What errors does TM display when you attempt a backup? Is your TM an external HDD or SSD? What Mac model and year and version of macOS is installed?

 

[KaliYoni]

I'm looking to move on & SuperDuper & Carbon Copy Cloner seem to be the 2 most popular options. My plan is to back up both computers to one drive (if possible). It's what I do with Time Machine & simpler than using one drive for each machine.

I agree with @Apple_Robert that backing up multiple computers to the same disk usually isn't a good idea, depending on what kind of data (including business vs. personal, irreplaceable vs. replaceable, confidential vs. non confidential) is stored on your machines and your level of comfort with troubleshooting.

Personally, I maintain backups using Time Machine and Carbon Copy Cloner. The Time Machine drive is always connected. The CCC drive is disconnected most of the time. I do a CCC backup about once a week or before installing an OS update.

I do this for redundancy and to increase the chances of having a clean version of my entire setup in the event of a catastrophic failure or a security breach.

More discussion:
https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...re-any-advantage-of-ccc.2306894/post-30156566

 

[mk313]

I'm interested to learn more about why Time Machine stopped working. What errors does TM display when you attempt a backup? Is your TM an external HDD or SSD? What Mac model and year and version of macOS is installed?

I'm backing up (well not any more) 2 Macs, one is an Early 2013 MacBook Pro with Big Sur, the other a 2017 12" MacBook with Ventura (13.6.1).

I've tried Time Machine with both the internal (6 GB) Drive on my Airport Time Capsule (The original drive died & I replaced it two years ago & it ran flawlessly until mid this year.) as well as on a 4 GB external Western Digital Elements USB Drive. I've tried the USB drive both plugged directly into each Mac & also plugged into the USB plug on the back of my Airport Time Capsule.

Both the internal drive on the Airport & the USB drive show up just fine on my computers & I can move files to/from them to both computers with no issues, but Time Machine will run once (or possibly a few times), but then it just stops.

I get the exact same error message on every combination of drives/ computers: Time Machine couldn't complete the backup to "Drive name" The backup disk is not available. Make sure the backup disk is connected or select a different backup disk.

 

[Rich B22]

I used to use SuperDuper, but switched to Carbon Copy Cloner years ago, when there was an issue (which I don't remember) and the developer's attitude was that's just the way it is. I have found Mike Bombich and the folks at CCC to be pro-active in informing you of issues (usually due to Apple's changes), really responsive, fast and helpful with any support issues. In terms of using them, they're both pretty easy, but I don't really remember the SD UI.

As others have said, DO NOT back up multiple computers to the same drive, especially if you are only planning on one backup of each. If you must, at least have two partitions on the HD, so bad data on one MAY not corrupt both backups. Besides hardware failure, files can get screwed up through user error and software glitches, lightning storms, power fluctuations, etc.

I know I'm paranoid, having lost business data years ago due to a bad HD and backup tapes not readable. It cost me $2500 to recover the data and even that was not complete. Hard drive and even SSD storage is now cheap, and I run 4 CCC backup drives (backup to a different drive each day) TM and an online backup.

Have you tried First Aid on your TM drives? How are the drives formatted; hfs or apfs. If neither of those, TM won't work. Did you erase the 4GB WD drive prior to trying to use it for TM? There may be other information on there which could be incompatible with TM. Finally, here is a link to a mirror of the original pondini.org, which was a site maintained by a TM expert, James Pond, who unfortunately passed away a number of years ago. Perhaps, you'll find a solution there, even though the developer is gone for 10 years.

Apple OSX and Time Machine Tips

Good luck,

 

[mk313]

I used to use SuperDuper, but switched to Carbon Copy Cloner years ago, when there was an issue (which I don't remember) and the developer's attitude was that's just the way it is. I have found Mike Bombich and the folks at CCC to be pro-active in informing you of issues (usually due to Apple's changes), really responsive, fast and helpful with any support issues. In terms of using them, they're both pretty easy, but I don't really remember the SD UI.

As others have said, DO NOT back up multiple computers to the same drive, especially if you are only planning on one backup of each. If you must, at least have two partitions on the HD, so bad data on one MAY not corrupt both backups. Besides hardware failure, files can get screwed up through user error and software glitches, lightning storms, power fluctuations, etc.

I know I'm paranoid, having lost business data years ago due to a bad HD and backup tapes not readable. It cost me $2500 to recover the data and even that was not complete. Hard drive and even SSD storage is now cheap, and I run 4 CCC backup drives (backup to a different drive each day) TM and an online backup.

Have you tried First Aid on your TM drives? How are the drives formatted; hfs or apfs. If neither of those, TM won't work. Did you erase the 4GB WD drive prior to trying to use it for TM? There may be other information on there which could be incompatible with TM. Finally, here is a link to a mirror of the original pondini.org, which was a site maintained by a TM expert, James Pond, who unfortunately passed away a number of years ago. Perhaps, you'll find a solution there, even though the developer is gone for 10 years.

Apple OSX and Time Machine Tips

Good luck,

Thanks, maybe drive formatting is the issue, although both of these worked long term as Time Machine backups, prior to this summer. The Western Digital Drive is 'Mac OS Extended (Case-sensitive, Journaled)', while the Time Capsule drive is 'Appleshare'. Not sure if either of those are other names for HFS or APFS, but maybe that is the issue.

I did try first aid on the Time Capsule but not the Western Digital. First Aid showed no errors. I just ran first aid on the Western Digital now (I didn't think to try it as it had the exact same issue as the Time Capsuel, but now I am getting an error. I'll try erasing/ reformatting that one. I'll let you know if that fixes the issue.

As far as erasing the WD Drive. IIRC, I did erase it when it was new (and set it up as Mac OS Extended). I think it came as something else out of the box.

Thanks for the link. I'll look through that.

 

[HDFan]

Time machine can be maddening in its unpredictability. Just make sure that your 3-2-1 backup strategy includes only 1 TM backup.

 

[H_D]

CCC has an amazing team behind it, never asleep at the wheel. It was more essential and lifesaving when bootable backups were still working with the OS, but it still is an essential tool I use daily.

 

[mk313]

Thanks to all for the recommendations. I erased/reformatted the Western Digital drive, but it didn't fix the Time Machine error. I downloaded Carbon Copy Cloner & it works great on both drives. I'll just turn off Time Machine & use that going forward. No use fighting this any longer. Time Machine was really nice when it worked, but this is equally good and it works on all of the drives that I already have.

 

[H_D]

TimeMachine still is really nice – it just is a different tool. I personally do not use it so much anymore because most of our daily data is on dropbox and thus mirrored. But on a static system TM is the best way to have hourly snapshots when you accidentally change or delete a file. It has its benefits and I hope Apple keeps working on it to make it a besser system, ideally by coming up with online-backups à la iOS.

That said, also do take a look at Backblaze – their service is absolutely affordable and worth every single penny. It could be improved in some small ways but what it is can be a life-saver when push comes to shove (and it has been in my case). Brilliant product every Mac-User should take a look at.

 

[Fishrrman]

Try BOTH SD and CCC.
Both are free to try.
Then make your decision.

SD costs less and is VERY easy to use...
but...
...it doesn't have as many features as does CCC.

CCC costs more and the interface has grown a bit more complicated over the years...
but...
... it has more options and features than does SD.

Weigh the choices and make your decision.

 

[mk313]

Try BOTH SD and CCC.
Both are free to try.
Then make your decision.

SD costs less and is VERY easy to use...
but...
...it doesn't have as many features as does CCC.

CCC costs more and the interface has grown a bit more complicated over the years...
but...
... it has more options and features than does SD.

Weigh the choices and make your decision.

And that's why I came there. I can do a 30 day free trial of them both, but I also don't know that I will get to try out everything in 30 days (or even know what to look for). I'm just looking for a reliable backup system & wanted to see what people thought of those two (which seem to be the highest rated). Seems like more people use Carbon Copy Cloner, so I tried that one first. And it works great. I'll probably just stick with it.