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Old 06-08-2008, 06:53 AM
Guy Kuo Guy Kuo is offline
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Join Date: Jun 2008
Posts: 12
Skeletonized, Near Empty Backups Silently Created

I've been a regular user of SuperDuper for some time. It is a tool I regularly use to efficiently create "smart copy" clones on external drives. These I do on a rotating basis so my backups are grandfathered. Tonight I had a shocking discovery post a severe drive failure. When my MacBook drive became corrupted and was irreparable, I wasn't bothered much. I knew I had some recent SuperDuper backups from which to restore my drive.

I was wrong.

My most recent two backups (create under OSX 10.5.2) were both nearly empty despite the smart copy process which created completing successfully. I was shocked to find that my cloned drives were populated by folders but practically no files. It was as if SD had recreated the folder structure, but didn't actually copy any files into the folders. Shocked does not describe the sinking sensation of knowing my last two backup drivess were essentially empty skeletons of only folders.

How this could happen I do not know, but it surely does shake my confidence in SD. I've recommended the program and used it religiously, but it should have NEVER appeared to create a clone when it didn't actually do so. Those three green bars at completion time no longer mean for me that all the files were copied. Apparently, one must now check the clone after it is smart copied to see if anything is actually still on the drive.

Thankfully, I also back up (albeit less frequently that with the SuperDuper routine) by other means. So, my data loss isn't complete, but this really should never be able to happen without warning.
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