Making a startup disk for dual OS G4
 

I intend to buy an additional external drive to make into a startup drive for my G4 running OS9 and OS 10.2.8.

I use this computer in a small business, and although it is behind the times, it works well for me. Yes, at some point I will be buying a new Intel Mac, but our economic times need to be better before that occurs.

I am interested in comments on how best to create that startup disk, what hazards there may be, and how to use it to startup once completed.

My reason for wanting to do this is that if my current G4 fails, it seems I could pick up another G4 to continue on with, but I want to have my OS and all software mirrored on this other drive so I can just continue with it after installing the software on the new G4.

I welcome any suggestions from the knowledgeable.

Thank you....

Well, you should be able to use SuperDuper! 1.5.5, available from the sidebar on the SuperDuper! page of the web site, to make a full "Backup - all files" to a high quality FireWire drive (do not get a MyBook drive), properly erased/partitioned. No real tricks.

Thank you for the version alert, as I had downloaded 2.6.2. I will download the correct version.

Once that is made, how do you startup a machine with the external drive? ....and is adding this clone to the new machine as simple as dragging it to the hard drive?

No, you can't just drag things - the Frequently Asked Questions and User's Guide explain how to restore a copy.

You can start up from it using the Startup Disk Preference Pane in System Preferences.

I am revealing how little I know about this stuff, but I had the idea that the bootable, external drive could start the machine if its native OS was not working right. Is that wrong?

So, if I am understanding this correctly, the computer has to be able to start on its own first, with its own operating system, so you could make this choice, is that correct?

No, you can also hold down Option during startup to get a boot menu choice -- see the User's Guide... :)

Great; thank you for your help.