Restore external hard drive from backup drive?

[gcoghill]

I have an external drive that is backed up to an identical drive. The main external seems to be failing (very slow file access).

I'd like to "restore" (not sure if the right term) the failing drive to the backup drive, so all my symlinks and iTunes Media are located properly by OS X.

How do I go about doing this?

[dnanian]

If it's already backed up, why would you restore to the backup? I'm confused about what you want to do here.

[gcoghill]

I want OS X to "see" the backup drive as the source drive. I have symlinks on the external drive that will break, as well as media libraries (iTunes) all stored here that are pointed to from various application preferences.

I'm trying to avoid having to update those things manually.

I want the backup drive to replace the current source drive. I'm just assuming that I would need to do some sort of "restore" or clone process to get the system to see the backup drive as the source drive? Perhaps not.

[dnanian]

OK, so, you want to rename the backup to the name of the original.

Basically, with NOTHING else running, eject the original drive. Disconnect it. Rename the backup to the original name. (Make sure you have a backup of it, too!)

Then restart your Mac.

[gcoghill]

Oh OK, I wasn't expecting it to be that simple!

I assume by "nothing else running", that includes menubar utilities, background processes, and so on? Will have to dig into best practices for doing this.

Thanks!

[dnanian]

I mean no apps, basically nothing that might be referencing that drive.

[gcoghill]

Aha, thanks Dave!