I'm trying to wrap my head around the best backup options and recovery options when things go wrong. Forgive me for asking lots of questions.. some of these may seem stupid, but I'm trying to assess what is needed and the trade-offs. I've been winging it until this point, but decided its time to give myself backup ability and do it right.
Let's assume a working HD and a separate drive used as backup... also assume we all used the install method from post #1
a) I believe that Time Machine, Carbon Copy Cloner, and Disk Utility can all clone the main section of the working drive to the backup drive, but will NOT copy the bootloader?
b) Before even doing the above backup, the backup drive should be prepared (GPT, etc) as described in post #1?
c) once prepared.. you can do the clone.. at this point your data/etc is safe.. but the backup drive would not be bootable
d) let's say you had a failed 10.6.2->10.6.3 upgrade at this point and your machine KPs when trying to boot... can we restore from the backup drive, if so.. how? what I am booting with... will I always be able to get to the Chameleon menu (installed on drive #1) and pick the 2nd drive (even tho it does not have a bootloader on it?)
e) let me re-ask d) assuming I had installed Chameleon after step c .. how does that change things.
f) what did I forget to ask?
many thanks!
PS. I did thread title searches for Time Machine, Carbon Copy Cloner, and backups.. I found surprisingly little and not with much detail.. maybe can get enough info here to make a nice guide.