Time machine & USB hard drive to restore after erase and install, reassurance sought.

[Bernie Steak]

This is probably a stupid and obvious question, but I'm new to using a Mac as my main computer, and sometimes the simplicity of things can seem unnerving.

My iMac is off for repair later in the week, it has all my personal details, banking, and business etc on it.

Am I correct in thinking that I can use the OSX (10.5) install disk to erase and install a clean OS, take to get repaired, and then when I return plug in my USB hard disk I use with Time Machine to restore the iMac to my personal last used state?

Does this put back everything, by that I mean all applications, files, preferences, the whole thing, so it's "My" iMac again, as if I never clean installed OSX?

Sorry for the basic questions, but I really fear loosing data just to get my iMac fixed.

 

[blodwyn]

You could do as you suggest with TM, and it should work.

I would personally use SuperDuper! to make a bootable image of your system disk on to a second external disk before you wipe your internal disk. Restoring from a SuperDuper! image will get you back to the exact same situation as when you took the image backup, and SuperDuper! has never failed me. It's about as rock solid a backup application as you can expect.

 

[misterredman]

You could do as you suggest with TM, and it should work.

I would personally use SuperDuper! to make a bootable image of your system disk on to a second external disk before you wipe your internal disk. Restoring from a SuperDuper! image will get you back to the exact same situation as when you took the image backup, and SuperDuper! has never failed me. It's about as rock solid a backup application as you can expect.

I also think that two copies are better than one. So keep the timemachine backup and do a clone to another external. It's really worth the money if all your businnes is on that drive. Plus restoring from the clone will be much faster. If you don't want to get Superduper you can use Carbon Copy Cloner, which is also very good and completely free.

 

[blodwyn]

I also think that two copies are better than one. So keep the timemachine backup and do a clone to another external. It's really worth the money if all your businnes is on that drive. Plus restoring from the clone will be much faster. If you don't want to get Superduper you can use Carbon Copy Cloner, which is also very good and completely free.

Agreed, apart from a reminder that SuperDuper! is also free if you don't want incremental backups, which in this case is not an issue

 

[Bernie Steak]

Thanks for the replies. I'll also give SuperDuper! a look, but only have one spare hard drive to use for the backup, not sure it can take a Time Machine backup and a SuperDuper! clone, but I'll check the space and go from there!

Thanks again.

 

[SHADO]

I wiped my HD and then restored it from my latest Time Machine backup and if worked flawlessly. All my prefs, files, folders, apps, etc were all there and worked great. The only difference is when you open each application, a dialogue box comes up saying "You are opening _____ for the first time" but that does not affect anything within the app. If you really want to make sure everything is in the Time Machine backup, just enter the Time Machine and check