Starting up from a cloned disk

13 Oct 2021 10:25:58

Richard I

I feel the need for some reassurance on this...

I have created a cloned image of my hard disk using Carbon Copy Cloner onto a USB SSD.
I would like to check that I can boot from it. I understand that all I have to do is plug it into the USB port, then start up the mac holding the option/alt key. This will result in a choice of disks (USB and built in) and I just select the USB one.
Questions:
Is this right?
Will it mess up anything on my Mac?
Thanks,
Richard

Re: Starting up from a cloned disk

13 Oct 2021 11:41:14

Euan Williams

Q. 1 yes. Q2 no. You don't say what macOS you have cloned, and there are complexities (as you know) with the introduction of APFS after HFS+, but CCC handles these well. Starting up from the clone won't harm anything, but make sure you use the appropriate version of CCC to make the clone.

You can find all sorts of technical info on CCC's website: https://bombich.com/blog.

Re: Starting up from a cloned disk

13 Oct 2021 11:44:13

Richard I

Thanks Euan. I have cloned Catalina prior to moving to Big Sur. I used CCC version 6

Feed