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TICKET ARCHIVE -> Backup to an external drive

daleslad - Apr 16, 2008 - 5:39 pm

I want to be able to boot from my external drive but I am running into difficulty getting it set up right.
I have an intel MacPro running 10.4.11
I have a 500GB LaCie d2 HD QUADRA external firewire drive.
It came loaded with Retrospect Express which I am not very happy with.

I understand that the hard drive has to be formatted Mac OS Extended Journaled and the Partition Scheme has to be GUID.

My MacPro is partitioned for both Mac OS and Windows XP using Boot Camp.
When I first tried to back up my hard drive using Retrospect I backed up the Mac partition first and then tried to back up the Windows XP partition next.
When I tried this the Windows XP volume erased the Mac OS volume on the external hard drive.
I found the only way I could backup both volumes was to make 2 folders in Retrospect and backup the Mac into one and the Windows into the other one.
With this setup I couldn't boot from my hard drive. I contacted Retrospect but they weren't much help .. LaCie couldn't give me any help either except to say that I couldn't boot from there hard drive.
I feel that I should be able to boot from the hard drive with the right software but I've hit a brick wall.
I'm thinking about trying some other backup software like Super Duper but didn't want to start a long tedious process if erasing etc. until I got a second opinion on whether it's the right way to go.

kerby - Apr 16, 2008 - 7:24 pm

Hi Jim, thanks for using macosx.com

Backing up with a Boot Camp partition is a new experience in the Mac world, but there are a few solutions that have come along.

Because of the differences in how the partitions are setup, I don't know of an application that can clone both systems and partitions at once, so let's break it down into Mac and Windows sides, like you were trying to do.

For the Mac partition I would recommend Carbon Copy Cloner or SuperDuper. Both have free versions you can use to make bootable backups, and they are very well regarded and tested.

http://www.bombich.com/software/ccc.html
http://www.shirt-pocket.com/SuperDup...scription.html

After you have that working on the Mac partition, I would look into using Winclone to make an image of the Windows partition. Winclone will take care of creating an image of your XP system on the external drive as well as restoring from that image should you need to call upon your backup. Below is a link to the Winclone page as well as a Macworld article with an in-depth look at Winclone.

http://www.twocanoes.com/winclone/
http://www.macworld.com/article/1312.../winclone.html

Hopefully that will point you in the right direction, and if not I'll put this back into the pool for further review. Let me know how it goes.

daleslad - Apr 16, 2008 - 8:06 pm

Thanks you have put it all together in a nutshell and it looks very promising. I will give it a try and see if it works, you have been very helpful.

TechSupport - Apr 19, 2008 - 8:10 pm

We apologize for not being able to resolve the issue you asked of us. It is the absolute worst case scenario for us to do this. In our review of why this happens, it generally is related to either the particular issue being addressed or frequently, incomplete or incorrect information provided. We hope by moving your request to the public forums that you will be able to get a solution without leaving you empty handed.

Your ticket has been closed with our support team. Your request has just been posted to Mac OS X System & Mac Software and is available for your viewing at:

http://macosx.com/forums/showthread.php?t=299927

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