Backing up up using carbon copy

[Tomos]

Many months ago I did look at the software and fount it okay.
so I thought to have another go at it. But when I downloaded the CC it tells me that the 30 dat trial has expired.
to all you experts would I benefit a great deal by getting the full license for £32.00. Or stick to the time mac as that does similar to the cc.
many thanks.
David.

 

[MacInWin]

David, CCC and Time Machine do two different kinds of backups. Time Machine creates a historical backup, where you can go back in time if you need to recover a file or folder from some time ago that maybe got deleted, or changed, and you need the version from before the change. Time Machine backups are not bootable in the sense that you can run your Mac from them, although you CAN boot into Recovery from a TM backup and from there reinstall the OS and recover your files to the internal drive. But if the drive fails, you cannot use the machine until you get a replacement drive installed and then install the OS and then recover your files.

CCC does a clone, a copy of just how the system looks at the time of the backup. That clone is bootable and can get you running again if the internal drive fails. When the new drive is installed, you can boot from the external and clone it back to the internal and it's like you never had any issue at all.

So, is it worth the cost? That depends on what you want from your backup. If you just want to be able to restore and don't care if you are not able to run your laptop for a few days while you wait for the replacement internal drive to be repaired/replaced, TM will do fine. If you want to be able to boot from the external backup and get going immediately after the internal drive fails, you'll need CCC or another cloner (Super Duper is one).

I use both. I have had drives fail, both internal and external, including one time when my internal drive AND backup drive both failed at the same time. Because of that harsh lesson, I have two separate backup systems, one a clone to one drive and the other TM to another drive. Then my really critical stuff I don't want to lose is also replicated on a network drive and on a separate RAID drive. I lost too many family pictures in the double failure to ever be comfortable with just one, or even two, copies in different locations. But, your needs and desires may be different, so that makes it a very personal decision. There is no single "Best" solution, just what makes you feel secure.

 

[RadDave]

1+ for Jake's excellent and concise summary - approve completely! I own 3 Mac computers (two laptops + an iMac) - on each I use duplicate TM and CCC backups, i.e. 4 external drives/machine + yet another drive set to backup our 'personal' folders (e.g. pics, docs, and a few others). Since 2013, I've had 4 external drives fail on me, including one SSD - as is evident, I'm a BIG fan of redundant backups - now I'm not doing 'cloud backup' nor do I keep any drives 'off premises', e.g. in a bank vault, but other considerations. Bottom line suggestion David is that you need a better plan. Dave

 

[krs]

@RadDave-
Re your drive failures...with the SSD failure, were you able to retrieve any data from the failed SSD?
Same question re the external spinner drives.

To date, I only own two SSD which are both running fine.

But I had a few external hard drives fail, 4 aswellI think.
But in each case it was actually the electronics that failed - either the SATA -USB bridge in the enclosure or the board on the 3.5" WD drive.
So by replacing the board or using a different enclosure absolutely nothing was lost.
Seems the mechanical portion of the spinners is more reliable than the associated electronics.
An SSD is all electronics - makes me wonder about their reliability and possible recovery of the data should they fail.

 

[RadDave]

@RadDave-
Re your drive failures...with the SSD failure, were you able to retrieve any data from the failed SSD?
Same question re the external spinner drives.

To date, I only own two SSD which are both running fine.

But I had a few external hard drives fail, 4 aswellI think.
But in each case it was actually the electronics that failed - either the SATA -USB bridge in the enclosure or the board on the 3.5" WD drive.
So by replacing the board or using a different enclosure absolutely nothing was lost.
Seems the mechanical portion of the spinners is more reliable than the associated electronics.
An SSD is all electronics - makes me wonder about their reliability and possible recovery of the data should they fail.

Hi krs - in all honesty, I've not tried to recover any data from my 'failed drives' - had other backups and not much important to lose (except wife's iMac w/ our banking/financial records) - I just replaced them w/ other drives; now have 4/15 SSDs and likely will continue to add SSDs (mainly buying the Samsung T5s); the failed SSD was a LaCie keeping personal info on one of my laptops (again had all of that stuff on TM & CCC backups). Another HDD failure was an 1TB OWC Mercury On-The-Go - kept the enclosure and replaced the HD cheaply and works fine. Sorry not to be any more helpful. Dave

 

[krs]

Thanks Dave, appreciate the quick reply.

 

[chscag]

But when I downloaded the CC it tells me that the 30 dat trial has expired.
to all you experts would I benefit a great deal by getting the full license for £32.00. Or stick to the time mac as that does similar to the cc.
many thanks.

Why don't you download and use the free version of SuperDuper! instead? It basically does the same thing that CCC does less some of the convenience things that CCC provides.

SuperDuper!

 

[pm-r]

1+ for Jake's excellent and concise summary - approve completely!

+2 for Jake's excellent and concise summary - and I also approve completely!

Especially if you want to avoid any Mac file loss hassles and have some peace of mind. And probably for less than you would spend at your local pub in an evening.


- Patrick
=======

 

[Rod]

@Jake, you nailed this one. Great summary of the differences.

 

[MacInWin]

You guys keep flattering me like that and I'll start needing bigger hats like Sly!

 

[Tomos]

Well here we are another day.
just installed the superduper. Free trial.
just one point recommendation for which one I know the cc is £10 more than the super. Looking for the best and easiest or me getting older by the day.
is it CC or super duper paid for versions?
Thanks.
David.

 

[Rod]

I was faced with the same decision about 10 years ago. After trying both I decided on CCC and I have never regretted that decision.

 

[krs]

I also tried both CCC and SD initially years ago and I decided to keep using SuperDuper.

Had nothing to do with any cost since way back they were both free.
I just liked the interface of SD better ans I found out recently that SD also backs up anything in the trash whereas CCC does not.
Not that this is really a big deal, although I do recover items from the trash the odd time.

 

[MacInWin]

I prefer CCC, but that's because it's the one I started with. Either should do. Recently, the CCC developer seemed more quick to respond to changes from Apple than the SD developer, but that is from reports, not personal experience.

 

[IWT]

I have both SuperDuper! and Carbon Copy Cloner for historical reasons.

Frankly, there's not much difference between them. They are both well supported by their owners and you get great advice, promptly, from both.

Unless it's changed recently, SD! does not clone your Recovery Partition whereas CCC does. If that really matters, there is a simple way of re-establishing the Recovery Partition.

Ian

 

[krs]

Unless it's changed recently, SD! does not clone your Recovery Partition whereas CCC does. If that really matters, there is a simple way of re-establishing the Recovery Partition.

I have never used the Recovery Partition myself, but in certain situations availability of that can be pretty important.
Using the Recovery Partition certainly comes up often enough in this forum as a means to address certain problems.

I'm really surprised that SD! would not clone that since the Recovery Partition was initially meant to replace the macOS install disks.
Seems Apple now expects everyone to create their own USB installers.

 

[MacInWin]

I'm really surprised that SD! would not clone that since the Recovery Partition was initially meant to replace the macOS install disks.
Seems Apple now expects everyone to create their own USB installers.

I also was surprised to hear SD didn't build the Recovery Volume. But I would disagree that Apple expects everyone to create USB installers. Apple expects users to use Recovery to reinstall, including the option for Internet Recovery if the drive is damaged and needs to be replaced. You can boot from the Internet with a totally bare drive and reinstall macOS. The only reason for USB installers are for the occasion where the Internet may be unavailable or horrendously slow, so building a bootable installer makes sense to be able to boot and install to a bare drive. So, it's insurance, but not the "expected" approach.

 

[Slydude]

I used to be bothered by the fact that SuperDuper didn't clone the Recovery partition -- hence my decid=sion to go with CCC as my cloning tool. When you think about it though that's not a major drawback. The Recovery partition is a good troubleshooting tool but I'm more likely to just boot from the clone and do whatever needs to be done.

 

[chscag]

Without a Recovery partition certain things can't be done: Running Disk Utility, setting a new password, turning SIP off and then back on. I'm sure there are others.

Yes, all the above can be run from the command line by booting to verbose mode, but do you really want to use that method? I don't.

 

[Slydude]

Yes, all the above can be run from the command line by booting to verbose mode, but do you really want to use that method? I don't.

Come on, Charlie. Where's your sense of computing adventure?

That's all true. That's why I still make sure to clone the Recovery partition.