Restoring to an erased internal HD

[mkraft]

I have to restore (full restore) from an external USB backup drive to my internal Mac drive following a computer repair that erased the hard drive.

(I guess Apple restores the OS and not much of anything else in situations like that?)

Is doing the 'restore' just a matter of running SuperDuper and choosing the Restore tab? One reason I ask is because the section of the SD user guide that deals with restoring continually refers to Firewire drives and the ability of the Mac to restart from a bootable Firewire drive, even though elsewhere it states that backups (including bootable ones) to USB drives are apparently also okay even though FW is always preferred.

Are there any procedural differences in restoring from a USB drive v. a FW drive?

Also, having already downloaded a Firefox update (i.e., since getting my computer back), I assume that to keep it from being overwritten (by the older version of Firefox included in the backup) I should rename it before doing the 'restore'?

Thanks.

[dnanian]

The steps are the same: you start up from the backup and use "Backup - all files" to copy from the backup back to the internal drive.

[mkraft]

Originally Posted by dnanian

The steps are the same: you start up from the backup and use "Backup - all files" to copy from the backup back to the internal drive.

Thanks. I'm not sure how to start from the backup. Is it just: hold down 'Option' key during or after restarting, and then there's a menu that allows the user to choose which drive to start from?

Also, does "Backup - all files" mean that anything new on the internal drive will be overwritten? Or is it only files with the same name as those on the backup drive that will be overwritten?

Can the new version of Firefox I now have be prevented from being overwritten just by temporarily renaming it?

In other words, is it possible to selectively preserve some files on the internal drive (other than copying them to a different hard drive, etc.) so that they're not lost when I restore from the external drive?

Thanks again.

[dnanian]

Yes, you hold down Option and select the backup drive, and everything on the internal will be overwritten. Renaming it won't help. You'll have to re-download/reinstall Firefox again. Individual files you could copy to the backup drive before you restore, of course.

[mkraft]

Originally Posted by dnanian

Yes, you hold down Option and select the backup drive, and everything on the internal will be overwritten. Renaming it won't help. You'll have to re-download/reinstall Firefox again. Individual files you could copy to the backup drive before you restore, of course.

OK thanks again. One last pre-restore question: I've been hesitant to do the restore because I've been finding that when navigating online to web-based portals (i.e., Yahoo! and Google), I'm not seeing https:// in the URL line when I log into my accounts. Instead, I'm seeing just http://.

Any idea what might be causing this and whether I need to worry about it in relation to doing the 'restore'? (Might Apple have tweaked something on my computer while it was with them being repaired?)

[dnanian]

That's not a 'restorable offense'. It sounds like they might be doing the secure login in the field (via a certain type of submission), not necessarily showing it to you on the URL line.

[mkraft]

Originally Posted by dnanian

That's not a 'restorable offense'. It sounds like they might be doing the secure login in the field (via a certain type of submission), not necessarily showing it to you on the URL line.

That would be a change from the way things were before I brought my computer in for the repair. Moreover, it's happening both in Firefox and Safari.

Shouldn't I at least be seeing a 'lock' icon in the status bar when I'm signed into my accounts with the mentioned services (Yahoo!, Google, etc.)? I thought that -- and/or the https: a/o/t http: -- was the indicator for determining whether a connection is secure or not.

(By "not a 'restorable offense'" do you mean that even if a 'security-related' issue is involved, it shouldn't have any effect on restoring the internal drive to its prior state from the backup?)

Thanks.

[dnanian]

Well, if you boot from the backup and do the same thing, does it work properly? I just don't quite understand what they could have done to prevent your system from going to a secure site (if it's available) during a 'repair'.

[mkraft]

Originally Posted by dnanian

I just don't quite understand what they could have done to prevent your system from going to a secure site (if it's available) during a 'repair'.

Actually, I'm not being prevented from going to any website. I'm just not seeing either https:// on the URL line or a lock icon on the status bar when I'm at those web portal sites (after logging in to one of their services).

At high-level security websites, e.g. banks, I do see the https:// -- but no lock icon. My status bar is completely empty.

Is the 'lock icon' an option that has to be 'turned on' in a browser 'preferences pane'? If not, what would explain not seeing it at websites where it should appear?

Thanks.

[dnanian]

Well, the lock icon in Safari is at the top right side of the main window, not in the status bar. Do you see that, in Safari (as opposed to Firefox)?

[mkraft]

Originally Posted by dnanian

Well, the lock icon in Safari is at the top right side of the main window, not in the status bar. Do you see that, in Safari (as opposed to Firefox)?

I see it in Safari for the 'high-level security' sites but not when I'm logged into one of the portal services.

I don't see any difference booting from the backup drive (boy did that ever take a while), so I guess it probably has nothing to do with the state of my internal hard drive.

Given that, I suppose I should pursue the matter elsewhere.

Thanks for your comments.

[dnanian]

Right, that's what I was trying to get at: I'm not sure you're actually seeing something different than how it's supposed to be...

[Steve Kir]

Originally Posted by mkraft

I have to restore (full restore) from an external USB backup drive to my internal Mac drive following a computer repair that erased the hard drive.

Please tell us if your Restore from an SD clone worked.

Thanks

[mkraft]

Originally Posted by Steve Kir

Please tell us if your Restore from an SD clone worked.

The Restore is only around 12 hours old, and I'm only now using the computer for the first time since, but so far so good.

Some things about it were a bit unexpected:

1. Although there's a Restore tab, it's apparently not functional in the unregistered version of SD. Yet doesn't it do exactly the same thing that a 'full backup' (i.e., in reverse, from clone to internal HD) does?

2. Following the Restore, I wasn't able to remove the drive icon for the clone drive's boot partition from the Desktop. I took a guess and restarted (w- <Option> key held down) selecting the internal drive as the boot drive. I was then able to remove the clone drive's icon. I don't follow the logic of why that happened, though -- since the booting was already over and done with. Is the boot volume simply not able to be ejected?

Thanks.

[dnanian]

The inability to use the "Restore - all files" script is an oversight in the released version that we've corrected in the next. But, "Backup - all files" is basically the same unless you have a side-by-side Time Machine backup, which you can't do without registering anyway.

And that's right: you can't eject the startup drive.