SuperDuper for Mac

Pros

Easy to set-up and works like a charm. Set-up a schedule for the program and it will execute at your desired convenience, out of the way whenever your Mac may be busy. There are options that keep the repeated backup runs to a minimum of time; usually a fraction of the time than for the first complete backup. A great companion to the Time Machine application.

Cons

Your should read the manual, as always.

Summary

One of the Best Backup Programs Available.

Pros

Simple interface. Upgrades. Makes bootable backups (clone). Can make incremental backups to existing backup, which is faster than backing up the entire work drive again and again. Send in a Log with a problem description and you will probably have a response before you can even think, "Oh, I should have added ...."

Cons

Too easy. I would like a little more verbiage about some of it. But you don't need that to use this product, just curious.

Summary

Has more features than I can even use for my small business. Either part or all of your backup solution is here. He has versions that work for older systems also.

Pros

I have Time Machine, which has saved me twice from HD failure. However, there are issues with Time Machine:

1. Time Machine backup is purposely designed to be NOT BOOTABLE. Therefore, if you have a failure, and your TM backup is good, you are still out of business until your failed hard drive is replaced and the data restored.

2. That being said, TM files are retrievable incrementally by looking back over time for older versions... once you are back up and running.

3. TM is also complex. It creates incremental backups... and can become confused. I have had to wipe backup HD's when TM had so many data layers that it became confused.

This product, Super Duper, is pretty simple. Give it an external drive or external drive partition and it will make a BOOTABLE backup of your Mac hard drive. This is incredibly important because, if your HD fails, you can just boot from the backup and your back in business, regardless of the condition of your original drive.

Cons

Little snitch firewall had to be reset when booting and running from the backup.

Summary

If you are not comfortable with disassembling your mac to replace the HD, this program will save you time and possibly money. You can still function from the bootable backup, even with a dead main HD. Time Machine will not do that for you.

This alone makes the program worth having.

Pros

Worked first try no issues.

Cons

MINOR CON it takes a while, but I didn't expect 320GB to clone in minutes either. I don't think that's a software issue, I think it just depends on the amount of data you have.

Summary

Used it to clone and upgrade from 320GB to 1 TB hard drive. It is fantastic and you don't have to buy it, the free version will clone your drive easily

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Pros

Simple to use and configure.
Complete or incremental backups.
Bootable backups make restores easy.
Uses minimal resources. I generally don't notice when it's running.
Excellent tech support.
Inexpensive.

Cons

No folder or file backups. It just backs up the whole volume.
Doesn't backup the recovery partition.

Summary

I've been using SuperDuper for years and it's never failed me. It's simple to configure, runs automatically (if you want) and generates bootable backups. If you have a problem, restoring from a backup couldn't be easier. I have found it to be more reliable than Time Machine.

If you're looking for backup software that will backup specific files or directories, this isn't for you. However if you want to schedule a regular full or incremental backup that runs in the background without using too many system resources, this is it.

I've tried a number of backup software packages over the years and SuperDuper is the most trouble free. It also doesn't hurt that it has excellent tech support and costs less than $30.

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Pros

I saw the negative reviews and all I can say is that those people are dummies. I've been using SuperDuper on several computers maintaining secondary and sometimes tertiary backups of many drives containing thousands of photo and video files. Every drive has a clone drive updated daily by SuperDuper. I've been doing this for about 4 years and have never had a problem. The software works exactly as it should. And it has saved my ass in a major way on 2 occasions. The price is nothing compared to the value you get should you need to go back to a backup.

Cons

No real cons if you understand how it works. it's no "Timemachine". If you accidently delete a file and the, Superduper does a back up, it also deletes the file from the back up. This is why I also do a 3rd back up of very important drives on a weekly basis.

Also I don't like the way windows keep popping up every time the software goes to start a scheduled backup. I have a lot of drives so these windows pop up all day long. A minor inconvenience though.

Summary

I think I've said everything above. Lots of people I know use SuperDuper. it's a cornerstone app I think. Don't judge the free version for not doing what you want it to do. Pay the money so the programmers can pay their rent!

Pros

I have to write 10 characters, so I will. This product can sometimes be used for a full backup of a hard drive. Users of Time Machine, beware!! If it doesn't work, sucks to be you is what Shirt Pocket Support has to say about that.

Cons

The actual product is very limited and poorly made, especially for the incredibly high price of $27.95... Might be worth $5.00... but even that's a stretch.. For what this product can do, just use the Disk Utility built into your Mac....

While it will make a backup of a hard drive, it apparently is prone to not work with Time Machine, at which time the people at Shirt Pocket, the company that makes the software, will just tell you that Time Machine backups are poorly made error prone pieces of garbage. Which is funny, because there was no problem with my Time Machine backup, I used Carbon Copy Cloner and it did a perfect job.

Summary

Unless you enjoy being spoken down to by the Shirt Pocket Support, have $27.95 that you want to flush down the nearest toilet, and want to have to go spend the time and money to buy a different software that will work, I would avoid purchasing this software, and just go buy Carbon Copy Cloner instead which has much better software and support!

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Pros

ease of use, simple instructions, amazing software support, rapid backup, can logon from the backup, the software has saved me from two Apple computer crashes and a time machine failure

Cons

only if one does not follow the simple instructions

Summary

some complain that the software only backups a full partition, not a portion of a partition. If this is a problem than simply create a separate partition for the data requiring backup.

Pros

Allows separate backups of disks to other disks. I couldn't figure out how to do this with time machine.

It will keep track of changes on the original drive and only back up changes.

The interface is very clear with a dialog box that tells you exactly what is supposed to happen if you choose certain options.

Your backup is not an unreadable obscure proprietary huge file. It's a copy of the original disk that you can look at with finder if you need to.

Cons

Haven't found any yet.

Summary

I just bought a MacPro with a 500 GB SSD drive. Not great for storage, but very fast. I do a lot of photography and also need a big storage drive for my photo archives. I had some hard drives from my previous computer that weren't very old and I wanted to set up an internal and external backup system that would work with multiple drives. This lets me schedule a bootable backup of the SSD to a 1TB drive and another backup of the storage drive to a separate 2TB drive. I can also back these up to a set of portable drives that I keep in a separate location.