Superduper failed me!

[MarkHolbrook]

I religiously "clone" my MBP drive to a Lacie drive weekly figuring that at some point I would need to clone back after some strange failure.

Well it finally happened. Something went ary and my MBP refused to boot past the blue screen with a cursor. The problem lays in some kernel item. I have tried every tip I could find including disk utility, ram reset, the whole works.

So I plugged in my trusty fireware Lacie drive, started up with CMD-Option-Shift-Delete and I cannot even see the Lacie as a valid startup disk!!!

I even switched over to a USB cable. Still no luck.

This really sucks and I have to say that after following every instruction carefully I'm deeply disappointed that when I needed it most I was unable to use the "clone" SuperDuper promised me it was making.

Mark

[dnanian]

I don't know if you've ever tested your backup, Mark, but it sounds like it might not be partitioned properly.

Regardless, though, there are alternate methods you can use to restore. Check the "Recovering from a disaster" section of the User's Guide. It has the technique listed, and should work even if you can't boot from the backup -- as long as it's a "Backup - all files" that you made with "Erase, then copy" or "Smart Update".

Hope that helps, and sorry that it took me a while to return your message -- this is a travel day for me and I've been on planes until about five minutes ago.

[MarkHolbrook]

Hi Dave,

I carefully followed the partitioning directions and when I first cloned the drive I did a test boot to it and it booted fine. Since then I've done smart copies and have not tested it.

Of course I should have been testing it but I figured it worked ok the first time.

I'll check out the users guide for but now I have to get my MBP running for tomorrow so I've just installed from scratch. Even that is not going as well as I had hoped. Seemed to be one of those days when nothing will work right.

[MarkHolbrook]

Ok, I reloaded my MBP and am about to start my SuperDuper backups again. Can some one point me to detailed instructions on correct partitioning and formatting of my Lacie drive?

I want to make sure I get it right this time.

Thanks

Mark

[dnanian]

Since this is an Intel Mac, select the LaCie and use the options button of the "Partition" tab to select the "GUID" partition format. Partition as appropriate, with "Mac OS Extended" as the format type.

Then, make sure you're doing "Backup - all files" with either Smart Update or Erase, then copy.

[MarkHolbrook]

Thanks... I'll try that tonight!