jk2gs stated above:
“That’s because like the title of this thread, people have moved on!!!”
Not true, at least for SuperDuper! (SD). Besides myself, I’ll bet there are plenty of SD users who are as pleased as I am with David Nanian, and that SD can, once again, create bootable clones.
Also, CCC and Chronosync have not been able to create bootable clones for about a year or so. Seems like the developers of those products gave up. But David Nanian did not.
MacWish6,
Regarding your “issue” with SuperDuper! (SD), if you are still running macOS V15.2, then indeed what you wrote is valid. But as I posted in another thread, SD works flawlessly with OS 15.3 in creating bootable backups. I did just that on Monday, and also 2 days ago (my normal Saturday weekly SD backups for each of my Macs).
Also, David Nanian recently posted the same “success” on the Shirt Pocket Software blog. You can check that out yourself.
See my reply on TidBits Talk. My setup seems to be one in which SuperDuper! is not able to make a bootable backup: M1 MacMini, OS 15.3, SuperDuper! 3.9.1.
Your experience with SD sounds similar to mine and it was the same with CCC even with Sonoma. There seems to be some users who have success but very few with either of these products (which is why many have moved on as I already stated because there is only so much time in the day for testing these things).
Then they need to post which computer model, hard drive/SSD and cable they’re using since it appears that only certain combinations work and certain brands of hard drive/SSD.
Since you’re about the only one here who keeps posting the same thing, it appears that SD is not as successful as your persistent proclamations would indicate.
EDIT: This is from SD’s blog page:
“Note that this does not mean boot from the copy will work in all situations (but, again, we have no control over that). But at least the copy can be made without (this) failure occurring.”
So it’s more or less the same as usual since he cannot guarantee it will work.
Also, there is only one post in the discussion section regarding a successful bootable clone which hardly indicates any real improvement with this issue.
As noted earlier, I’ve created bootable clones using SD! and manually installing the latest OS on the external drives. I’m using OS 15.2 for the moment and I haven’t asked SD! to clone the OS because I understand it can’t.
I’m assuming I can’t use the bootable clones to boot any machine other than the one they’re cloned from.
M2 Pro Mini
Western Digital My Book 25EE 4 TB using cable that came with it (a decade old?)
Samsung T5 1TB using the cable that came with it.
That’s not what akent35 is talking about from my understanding. In the past or even now, if you chose the bootable clone option then it is a one step process. This does work for some but not for most with Sequoia or other newer OS. If you’re manually installing the latest OS on top of whatever SD or CCC does, that is two steps. If I’m not understanding your post, please correct me.
“See my reply on TidBits Talk. My setup seems to be one in which SuperDuper! is not able to make a bootable backup: M1 MacMini, OS 15.3, SuperDuper! 3.9.1.”
I have that exact setup. But I keep my Macs “lean, mean, and clean”. Also all the third party software I use does not cause any issues, like Adam is having with ChatGPT and Claude. And my external SSDs for the backups are Samsung 1 TB T7s, using the cable that came with each of them.
Well, since you are still on OS 15,2, versus OS 15.3, that explains it. Of course I do not know how much maintenance/cleanup you do, nor what third party software you use. All I know is prior to, and after OS 15.2, SD always worked/works.
First you said you have an M3, then today it’s an M1. Also, you have no way to know whether any other software causes problems with bootable backups.
M1 Mac Mini, OS 15.3, Samsung T7 1TB External SSDs
M3 MacBook Air, OS 15.3, Samsung T7 1TB External SSDs
I am not making “persistent proclamations”. I am just relaying my positive experiences. Too bad you do not have an open mind about that.
Also, as Adam indicated, he has issues with his M1 MacBook Air, and part of it is due to ChatGPT and Claude. As I have already stated, I use third party software exclusively on my Macs, and make a concerted effort to keep them up to date, along with performing cleanup and maintenance.
So, one needs consider their hardware setup, what software they are using, and one’s maintenance/cleanup efforts.
Finally, need to make this clear, as some folks still are not contemplating it: prior to OS 15.2, and with the arrival of OS 15.3, SD has always, and now, works as expected in creating bootable clones.
If the success was true, you would see more posts here and on SD’s page reporting that but that is not the case so you can go on and on, but it’s not reality for most users. You still have no proof that Adam’s problem is related to certain software.
First of all, Adam is the one that made that post above about ChatGPT and Claude, not me.
Secondly, there have been some other SD users who have made posts here. One of them was still using OS 15.2 (and thus would still have issues). For any others (not that many here), who knows what ttheir hardware/software setup is like, and also what maintenance/cleanup efforts they perform (if any). Regarding that, it seems that most folks do not make such an effort, at least not diligently nor consistently.
Also, even David Nanian mentioned to me previously that folks tend not to relay any success they have with SD to him. Maybe too lazy, or maybe it’s a case of “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”. I just wanted to relay my experiences, both here and to David. And they are not "persistent proclamations”. They are just reports fo my successes. Open up your mind about that!
I have same setup: M1 Mac mini, OS 15.3, SuperDuper! 3.91, lots of up to date third party software, but unable to create external bootable drive on Samsung T7 1 TB drive by cloning with SuperDuper! As Dave commented to me about this failure, it is Apple’s problem.
No, ChatGPT and Claude are completely irrelevant to the discussion and don’t affect backups in any way—they’re both simply websites. What I said was that I fed the kernel panic that resulted from trying to boot from the duplicate to them to learn more about what caused it.
I haven’t been using them over that time, but I’m pretty sure this isn’t generally true. Both apps recommend against it for Macs with Apple silicon because of issues with asr, but they don’t have problems with Intel-based Macs.
As noted in the title and from at least from Mike Bombich…a bootable backup is no longer supported by Apple other than by installing and updating macOS from an installer so it gets properly signed, sealed and delivered as the old song goes…then clone the Data partition over to it (or do this in the opposite order, that also works). David Nanian should be commended a little for his efforts to continue using an unsupported technique…but who knows how long it will last. I own his app…but it is far, far less capable than CCC is which is why I don’t use it much. He is simply not interested in anything other than a full disk duplication program but has failed to move along with Apple approved procedures.
Since the system volume is locked and read only…following the procedure that Apple approves and CCC uses to install and then clone Data seems more prudent.
Strange. One thing I did was to completely erase and format (as APFS) each internal SSD on each of my Macs. I then did a clean, fresh installation of OS 15.3 on each machine. After successfully booting each Mac “into” OS 15.3, I then did a migration of all “items” from an SD backup I had created 2 days earlier. Finally, I ran SD to create bootable backups for each Mac, and it worked. I did all of that 1 week ago. Just this past Saturday, as I normally do, after running Onyx and Disk Utility, I used SD to create bootable backups for each machine. As expected, it worked, and I actually tested those bootable backups.
Let’s wind this discussion down—the same points are being repeated.
David Nathian actually mentioned to me that the kernal panic attack has been a known issue for a while. I suspect he has ben able to develop the code to “program around” that.
And sorry about the misunderstanding with ChatGPT and Claude. But there could still be something else “rogue” on your machine. Just saying. As for myself, after OS 15.3 was released, I downloaded it from the App Store, then proceeded to Erase and Format the internal SSD for each of my Macs. Then did a clean, fresh installation of OS 15.3 (did not want anything left over from OS 15.2). Next I successfully booted each Mac “into” OS 15.3, then did a migration of “items” from an SD backup I had created a couple of days prior. All of that went well.
After running Onyx and Disk Utility, I then ran SD to create bootable backups for each Mac. As expected, it worked. I even tested booting each Mac from its respective SD backup, and again no issues. I did all of that 1 week ago today. Two days ago, I did my normal weekly SD backups for each Mac, and each bootable clone created worked.
I know some folks “believe” in just updating the OS from one version to another, but I typically have always followed the clean installation route. And especially with the issues that happened with OS 15.2 and SD, I knew definitely that what was I was going to do.
There could be, but since Dave Nanian says this is a known problem that happens to some people and @MacWish6 confirmed it, I see no reason to troubleshoot further.
Please quote sparingly in your replies; if you’re using the Web interface to the forum, you can just select the text in another message and click the Quote button that appears to get a properly formatted quote like the one above.