Is it possible to clone macOS Monterey from a fusion drive to an external hard drive using Disk Utility?
If so, what is the procedure?
I have tried to do so and it will not, so I am probably doing it incorrectly.
As others have pointed out, CCC can do this. SuperDuper can also do it, with some limitations similar to CCC, but the clones are bootable and contain exact copies of all your user files and data. I believe there may be a free version of SuperDuper, the paid up version has additional features, including a very fast "incremental" copy/update to an existing clone.
Not sure that can be done because the OS is now in a " Sealed Read Only Volume" that can not be accessed by normal methods.
Even Special Cloning Software can only replicate the Filing System with some success.
I have used CarbonCopyCloner (bombich.com, $40) to create a bootable clone of Catalina from soldered-SSD-chips to external 2.5 in SSD and it does boot. As P. Phillips pointed out there is a "sealed system only" volume, but CCC did ask for access to special system spaces when I installed so that probably passes for sufficient access.
BUT ...
Programs do need to be trusted to access the special system-only to do this, and you do not allow every application this much access.
Thanks for saving the OP from incomplete advice. I will defer CCC advice until I have learned more.
Apparently Apple is making it extremely annoying to modify critical system files, which is all to our benefit of course. Windows is at a comparative disadvantage if its special-system space is open to modification by anyone ... I do not know if Windows 11 has made this adjustment.
After selecting the destination volume in CCC (at least with v5.x and Big Sur) you need to right-click or control-click on the destination within CCC and select the "Legacy" option. This will make sure the CCC clone is bootable, otherwise, the clone will only contain files and will not be bootable. I have not yet used CCC v6.x, nor have I used CCC with Monterey.
FYI used V5 CCC on Big Sur and V6 on Monterey using the " Legacy Method " with some success.
This discusses the limitations of the bootable CCC "clone" in Big Sur.
https://bombich.com/kb/ccc6/frequently-asked-questions-about-ccc-and-macos-11
Clone Monterey using Disk Utility
