Qustions before my first backup

[jwravin]

Ok....novice Mac user and very recent SD user, just purchased today. I have read the web site and browsed the discussion forums and still have a couple of questions before I create my initial Full Bootable Backup. The read-me document that came with the download has raised these questions for me. First, I thought I would be able to create the boot backup on my existing firewire external drive that is currently being used with Time Machine, however the read-me doc states that the drive should be partitioned or it could overwrite current data that is on the drive. I do not want to do any partitioning and certainly do not want to overwrite my Time Machine backups, so should I get another external drive or will it do its thing without harming my Time Machine backups? Second, the read-me doc also states that it is best to have nothing running during the backup. It even recommends that I log out and back in with the Shift key held down to prevent apps from starting up. This is ok I guess for the initial backup, but I had intended to “refresh” the back up using Smart Backup to schedule weekly updates. Does this mean that I would need to log out and back in every-time I want to do a Smart Backup? If so, then I should not set up a scheduled backup but do I manually, correct?
Thanks in advance for any insight that can be given here.
John

[dnanian]

As explained in the FAQ, you can store the backup directly to the same volume as your Time Machine information is on. You just need enough space, and use "Backup - all files" with "Smart Update".

But, if you don't have a lot of space, you'd be better off with a separate drive.

And, in general, you don't have to quit everything. Just don't run programs with big data files (e.g. Entourage, VMWare, Parallels) or download/record things (e.g. BitTorrent, EyeTV).

[jwravin]

Thanks dnanian, I thought that was the case as I did read the FAQ, but the wording in the read-me was unclear. Thanks again for the very fast response!

[dnanian]

Yes: I haven't yet updated the User's Guide...