11. Booting Your Mac from a Duplicate

Pro tip: Label your clone with a pink bow so you know which is which.
Pro tip: Label your clone with a pink bow so you know which is which.

In this chapter—just for Mac users—I want to look at what happens when you boot your Mac from a duplicate (or “clone”) of your startup disk, which enables you to get back to work immediately if anything goes wrong with your main disk. In doing so, I hope to clear up several common points of confusion, particularly regarding backups and syncing various types of data.

It’s simple enough to make a duplicate using a tool such as Carbon Copy Cloner or SuperDuper; having done that, you can use the duplicate to boot your Mac either by selecting ...

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