Network backup question from a newbie
 

This may be a stupid question but I was always told that the only stupid question is the one that is never asked! So here goes....

In our house we have an iMac connected to a FireWire 800 RAID1 external hard disk. I also have two MacBooks. All Macs are networked on a wireless network.

My question is if I install SuperDuper! on all three Macs can I create individual bootable backups on the one external drive directly connected to the iMac, and if so, can I boot any of the Macs from their respective backups over the network?

You can't boot over the network. If you partition the drive into (at least) two volumes, one for the bootable backup (for the computer directly attached) and another to store the images files for the other two (see "Backing up over a network" in the User's Guide), you'll be able to back up all three on the drive, but only the "direct" one will be bootable.

You'd be better off with three drives, really: I always prefer a direct backup to an image. But given the above it'll work.

Note, though: SD!'s license is not a "family" license. If three people use those three Macs, you need three licenses.