how do I create a bootable disc image of my hard drive?

You aren't doing the correct thing. Here's what you need to do:

Clone using Restore Option of Disk Utility

1. Open Disk Utility from the Utilities folder.
2. Select the destination volume from the left side list.
3. Click on the Restore tab in the DU main window.
4. Check the box labeled Erase destination.
5. Select the destination volume from the left side list and drag it to the Destination entry field.
6. Select the source volume from the left side list and drag it to the Source entry field.
7. Double-check you got it right, then click on the Restore button.

Destination means the external backup drive. Source means the internal startup drive.

Just use the free Carbon Copy Cloner with a powered external Firewire/USB Disk Utility > HFS+ Journaled formatted drive equal too or greater than your boot drive.

You can then hold option and boot from it and reverse clone onto your old or new drive or to another drive.

It's as easy as that.

It also can be scheduled to self update. It's good to have two clones in rotation.

TimeMachine is not bootable, is prone to problems etc and as a restore image, it's files are not accessible from another Mac or PC with MacDrive installed.

If you need the file backup software, look at the free SyncTwoFolders for Mac on CNET Downloads.

The same will hold true regardless. If you want a bootable clone you need to put it on a clean drive or a clean partition on a drive. If you want to use your 1.5 TB drive then make another, smaller partition large enough to accommodate the clone:

To resize the drive do the following:

1. Open Disk Utility and select the drive entry (mfgr.'s ID and size) from the left side list.

2. Click on the Partition tab in the DU main window. You should see the graphical sizing window showing the existing partitions. A portion may appear as a blue rectangle representing the used space on a partition.

3. In the lower right corner of the sizing rectangle for each partition is a resizing gadget. Select it with the mouse and move the bottom of the rectangle upwards until you have reduced the existing partition enough to create the desired new volume's size. The space below the resized partition will appear gray. Click on the Apply button and wait until the process has completed. (Note: You can only make a partition smaller in order to create new free space.)

4. Click on the [+] button below the sizing window to add a new partition in the gray space you freed up. Give the new volume a name, if you wish, then click on the Apply button. Wait until the process has completed.

You should now have a new volume on the drive.

It would be wise to have a backup of your current system as resizing is not necessarily free of risk for data loss. Your drive must have sufficient contiguous free space for this process to work.

ds_store and I disagree over using CCC or DU to do a full clone. CCC is faster but DU is more reliable because of additional data verification checks that CCC does not do in favor of being faster. DU only performs full volume backups. But you can always use CCC to perform incremental backups to the same volume. But either tool will work. I'm willing to trade speed for reliability. There are many alternatives to CCC such as the following:

Data Backup

Deja Vu

Silver Keeper

Retrospect

Super Flexible File Synchronizer

SuperDuper!

Synchronize Pro! X

Synk Pro

Synk Standard

Tri-Backup

Others may be found at VersionTracker or MacUpdate.

Visit The XLab FAQs and read the FAQ on backup and restore. Also read How to Back Up and Restore Your Files.

I know this is an old thread, but I hope it is still accurate and that someone will see it and answer. FYI, I use SilverKeeper for backup and it works very well.

I read above that CCC was free, I don't see that on their website, but I will use DU regardless. Maybe CCC was free at the time of this posting.

So, I need to make a bootable disk on my external drive. I'd like it to be of my current system since what came with my Mac is old and it takes me a long time with downloads to get back to where I am when I unfortunatly, ill advisedly (by Apple tech), reinstalled my opperating system.

I'm hopeing that if I need to boot from it, I can actually get onto my computer and access my files, unlike booting from the Apple disk. Can anyone tell me if this is the case?

I have an external drive that I'm using for backup, nothing else. It's a 1 TB and currently I have SilverKeeper and Time Machine backing up to it. I'm not sure if it's really necessary to have both, on one drive, or even smart. But it is all I have asside from DVDs for permanent backups of old customer files. So, my question is, how much space do I need to partition for a bootable drive. I have roughly half of the 1 TB available and disapearing since TM adds to it daily.

• FYI, I use SilverKeeper for backup and it works very well.

From that I assume you are running OS 10.7 or earlier. Which one?

• I have an external drive that I'm using for backup, nothing else.

Perhaps this is bootable? SilverKeeper had that capability. With the external drive connected, go to System Preferences and click on Startup Disk. If the external is bootable, it will show up there.

And yes, when you boot from the external drive your internal drive will be mounted and accessible.

I'm on 10.6.8. From your question, I'm guessing that SilverKeeper doesn't work with anything later than 10.7?

No, my external is not bootable. The only system on the external is one that I copied there to have as a backup. It did me no good when I needed to boot from it so really it's just taking up space.

Actually SK does not work with 10.7 or 10.8.

You might want to start a new thread, posing your own set of questions.