I’ve never had any computer crashes or boot issues requiring data recovery. But if it happens, what is the best backup strategy for recovery? Should I use Carbon Copy Cloner or Time Machine? Or do I need both?
Time Machine: Is it easy to set up the computer with Time Machine backups? Will the backups be the same as the original files, or will I have to remember the serial numbers, etc.?
Carbon Copy Cloner: Does CCC copy everything? Is it something that runs in the background like Time Machine or do I need to manually do the backups every time? Also, CCC seems to have more features, so can it replace Time Machine?
Time Machine can back up everything on a Mac, including files, apps, settings, system, photos, etc. It’s a built-in tool on macOS that can automatically run in the background at your set interval: hourly, daily, or weekly, once being set up. One great thing about it is that it creates a folder for every backup it makes, allowing you to go back to a previous version.
Similar to Time Machine, CCC can also back up everything or go back in time with snapshots. One distinguishing feature of it is the ability to create bootable clones. However, it’s no longer working on macOS Big Sur and later versions because Apple introduced the sealed system volume. It’s still possible to clone the OS using the Legacy mode but they don’t recommend it.
Yes, it’s easy to set up Time Machine on a Mac. The backups should be the same as the source files, in the same name.
Yes, CCC copies everything. You don’t need to manually start it if you schedule the backups hourly, daily, weekly, monthly, or when modifications are made. It has more customizations than Time Machine.
Apart from CCC and Time Machine, you can also try the Clone function of iBoysoft DiskGeeker for Mac to back up the whole drive.
It can clone one internal or external drive to another external disk on a Mac, great for transferring data from one disk to another or making identical copies.