Re: Booting my Firewire backup disk on another machine
- From: neillmassello@xxxxxxxxxxxxx (Neill Massello)
- Date: Thu, 09 Mar 2006 11:03:17 GMT
Kurt L. <e1-qcpq-kt69-cbtm@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Recently, I noticed a claim made on Macintouch with regard to booting
from Firewire disks: supposedly, prior to the Intel Mac series, a
bootable clone of one OSX install can be booted on any other Mac that
supports Firewire booting. That is to say, an install of Mac OS X is
apparently not model-specific. To test this theory, I used Carbon Copy
Cloner to make an exact copy of my Powerbook Titanium's internal disk
(10.3.9) onto an external Firewire hard disk. I then plugged the
Firewire disk into a Powermac desktop (Sawtooth), and booted it... and
it came up looking like my Powerbook.
Question: was this a fluke? Or is this really possible? Even if it is
possible, is it a good idea, or will the fact that the Powerbook image
expects to manage Powerbook-specific items (like an airport card,
missing in the Sawtooth) mean that I risk corruption of the original
image? Are there programs that I should avoid using, like Toast, that
talk to external hardware? I need to send my Powerbook in for
service, and it would be oh-so-nice to simply boot the backup disk on
the Sawtooth until the Powerbook comes back, then re-copy the image
back to the Powerbook.
There is no simple, categorical answer that covers all the permutations,
but OS X installations are generally "universal": they'll work on any
Mac officially supported by the OS version.
Unlike the pre-X installers, OS X retail ("reference") installers do not
create systems customized for a particular hardware configuration. All
components needed by any supported model will be installed. Hardware
customization of OS X is essentially done at startup, when extensions
are loaded according to the hardware components detected. (Some
extensions load "dynamically" as needed later on.) The system does
create a cache to speed up normal booting; but if it finds itself
running on different hardware at startup, it goes through the full
process of selecting the proper extensions and rebuilding the cache.
There is no guarantee that a system from an OEM installer disc (bundled
with a Mac) will run correctly on a different model: if you want to
create a universal boot system, it's best to use one created by a retail
installer. Consult Mactracker for the range of OS versions that
particular Mac models can boot.
FireWire bootability depends on the Mac model and its firmware, the FW
controller, the FW bridge chip and its firmware, and (occasionally) on
the drive. Generally, most Macs can boot most versions of OS X from most
drives (hard or optical) through most bridge chips. The exceptions to
this rule usually involve incompatible bridge chips or third-party
FireWire adapters.
.
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