For Mac OS X, I use two synchronizing/cloning utility applications: "SuperDuper!" by Shirt Pocket Software - http://www.shirt-pocket.com/SuperDuper/SuperDuperDescription.html "ChronoSync" by Econ Technologies - http://www.econtechnologies.com/pages/cs/chrono_overview.html
Their functions overlap but I find each to be more useful for different kinds of operations. - SuperDuper! is superb at cloning complete drives, making bootable backup system disks, etc. I find it a bit clumsy to work with for backing up files but it can be done. It's what I use to clone startup drives and does it efficiently and quickly. ChronoSync is superb at synchronizing multiple volumes and can make bootable clones too. It includes the notion of synchronizer and container documents so you can put together a 'script' by creating synchronizers to do whatever file copy operation you want, then add them in sequence to a container so that one click of the run button executes them all as a set, in the defined order. Since both write standard files from source to destination, you're not locked into a proprietary archive format when you need to retrieve something from the archive. With ChronoSync, you can create a script to do whatever complexity backup you need to do and then create another script to reverse it if needed. Or you can tell it to synchronize bidirectionally. How I use ChronoSync and SuperDuper! is demonstrated in article #06 - "Backup System Notes" on my articles web page: http://www.gdgphoto.com/articles/ I worked with Carbon Copy Cloner too, once upon a time, but these two applications have superior UI and features as well as better support. They're not expensive, about $30 each. rsync also works but I'd reserve its use for the terminally geeky (people like me and Steve Harley who don't mind using the Terminal and writing shell scripts, etc ;-). -- Godfrey godfreydigiorgi.posterous.com -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
