I definitely want a bootable disk. The only reason I am talking to you now is because I had a bootable external HD of my OS for my older MBP. Otherwise I would have really been up a creek.


Originally Posted By: joemikeb
Originally Posted By: Plantsower
I don't know the difference between bootable backup image and cloning, but I use SuperDuper and assume I can use that on both machines with one external drive as with CCC.

I haven't used SuperDuper since the advent of the Recovery Drive but I would assume it can clone to a sparseimage or preferably sparseimage bundle as CCC does and so you could "clone" multiple computers to a single drive. However just as with CCC, a SuperDuper clone to a sparseimage bundle would not be bootable.

A sparseimage bundle is a superset of sparseimage files and a sparseimage file is a variant type of .dmg file. You have to have MacOS running in order to open and read a .dmg/sparseimage/sparseimage bundle therefore you cannot boot from it.

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