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The time for betas is over! High Sierra is here. APFS is here. We're ready for both, and we've got you covered. APFS, HFS, encrypted, not encrypted, FileVault – whatever your source or destination, we support all of these combinations in CCC 5. We've tested so many different scenarios, we put the results into a chart to keep track of them.

"Can I continue to back up to an HFS+ volume, or do I have to erase the backup disk as APFS?"

Over the last day or so, we've been getting this question a lot from folks that have upgraded to High Sierra. This new filesystem has generated so much confusion, we even got the question, "Can I still back up to an HD platter-based disk?" We expected some concern about what's supported on each end, but the lack of support and readiness for all of these combinations from other products is causing even more confusion than we anticipated.

My answer is that all of these configurations work with CCC 5, and that you don't have to change how your destination is formatted. CCC 5 automatically archives the special boot volumes associated with an APFS source, and automatically populates them, as necessary, if you have an APFS destination (even if the source is HFS!). We specifically tested all of these scenarios and set up a "command central" for our testing and for reporting issues that we're seeing that are specific to macOS High Sierra:

High Sierra Testing and Known Issues [Link removed, out of date]

I hope that chart goes a long way toward relieving concerns about what is an acceptable source and destination format for your High Sierra backups. But just to reiterate:

• CCC can clone your High Sierra SSD to an SSD or an HDD that is formatted as either HFS or APFS.
• CCC can restore an HFS-formatted High Sierra backup to an APFS or HFS volume.
• CCC can make bootable APFS backups.
• CCC can make bootable HFS backups.
• You can mix and match APFS and HFS sources and destinations – CCC will make the destination bootable.

CCC handles the special APFS "helper" volumes seamlessly, and quietly

Only CCC has supported Recovery HD archiving and cloning since Apple introduced that special volume in OS X Lion five years ago. The semantics for creating and populating those volumes are a bit different for APFS, but these special APFS helper volumes are very similar to the HFS Recovery HD volume. As a result, our intellectual and technical investment that we made in recovery volume support over the last five years has paid off. We were able to add support for APFS helper volume archiving and creation fairly quickly, and we spent the bulk of the summer on testing this functionality between filesystem types. Support for APFS helper... Read More

I introduced CCC to the world over 15 years ago. With the debut of CCC 5 within reach, I thought it would be neat to see how CCC has changed over the years. I still remember the day that I published a description on VersionTracker and anticipated the response. Would people like it? Would someone else beat me to the solution? I've been thrilled with the response I've gotten from users over the years, and I'm happy to say that I've grown this little seed into a successful company that produces and supports a great product.

Conception: November, 2001

Before CCC, I wrote an AppleScript that performed the very basic tasks of copying files from one volume to another while retaining Unix permissions and ownership. The Mac OS X bootable backup was born! This little script never saw the light of day, though. Instead, I made the extra push to turn it into an application that would be accessible to more people.

CCC 1.0: January 18, 2002

This was the quintessential "1.0" release. All of the basic features were there for a simple clone from the startup disk to a backup disk.

CCC 2.0: November 2002

2.0 allowed you to choose any volume as the source. Look at those fancy buttons! And a scheduler! Documentation!

CCC 3.0: September 2007

The long gap between 2.0 and 3.0 was not a break. I spent those years diving deeper into the startup procedure of Mac OS X and I learned a lot. I wrote other applications too, including one that was used to clone hundreds of Macs all at the same time. I was also having kids :-). I remember bouncing my son in his baby bouncer while writing code at 3AM for CCC 3.0. It's amazing that I can look at sections of code and remember those moments so clearly, like a smell can remind you of a childhood memory.

CCC 3.4: July 2011

There were several dozen releases of CCC between 3.0 and 3.4, but this was the first big one after I left Apple.

CCC 4.0: October 2014

Not long after Lion was introduced I completely stripped CCC down and rebuilt it. The result was spectacular – a refreshing new task-centric interface and scheduling that felt built-in, not added as an afterthought.

... Read More