Lex is right that you don't need to do anything. Which is what I said in my first reply. If you want to go above and beyond, then Onyx is a good way to go for someone who doesn't really know what they're doing because it can do everything automatically with very little input from the user beyond starting it up, clicking a "go" button, and entering your password.
When you first run Onyx, it will try to check the S.M.A.R.T status of your boot drive. Let it do so.
Next it will ask to verify the startup partition. Let it do so.
When done with verifying, it will ask for your password. Enter it.
Next you'll get a Help screen with "important information" - read it the first time you see it.
Finally, look for AUTOMATION on the toolbar strip which is the main window of the Onyx application. Let it do all its automated tasks. When its done, quit out of the application.
When you have time but only if you're interested, read all the Onyx help and you can learn about more things it can do.
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The backuplist+ application does NOT work like Time Machine. If it did, there'd be no need for it since you're already using Time Machine. Backuplist+ allows you to make bootable backups, and then update them quickly so you don't have to write every single file every time you run a backup process (the first time it has to write everything, of course). Having a bootable backup is REALLY useful if your main drive ever goes completely kaput, or even if you want to take all of your work, settings, files, applications, etc. with you to another computer and have it feel (and in fact, be) almost exactly like working at your own computer.
Use an external hard drive, preferably one with a partition at least as large as the partition you are going to back up. If you can't make such an one available, use one with a partition at least a bit larger than the total data you are going to back up.
Within backuplist+ create a new backup set. Name it anything you want.
Under settings, check USE RSYNC DELETE OPTION.
Under EXCLUDE LIST, leave it all blank, check nothing.
We aren't creating a disk image, so the DISK IMAGE tab doesn't matter - leave it alone.
Under AUTOMATION, leave it all blank, check nothing.
Under ADVANCED, leave it all blank, check nothing.
Drag the partition you want to clone into the SOURCE field. The backuplist+ application will enter the logical path name for you.
Drag the partition you want to clone to into the DESTINATION field. The backuplist+ application will enter the logical path name for you.
Now just click the BACKUP button and have some patience. The first backup will take longer than your subsequent backups of the same drive.
Again, there are lots more options in backuplist+ and there are many more things you can do with it than just make a clone. Go to its HELP menu and read as much as you like, if you're interested.
