How do I restore my 27" mid-2011 iMac EXACTLY the way it was after hard disk replacement?

Hi all.
Recently received an email from Apple saying that the 1TB Seagate hard drive in my 27" mid-2011 iMac is apt to fail anytime. Apparently they used some bad hard drives in the mid-2011 27" iMacs which are problematic so they're offering me a free replacement to a brand new hard drive. I'll be sending in my iMac for the replacement sometime in the next few days.
In preparation for it, I've backed up my entire system using Time Machine into an external harddrive. The backup is up to date & includes all system files. I've also made a Lion install disk on an 8GB USB flash/pen drive using Carbon Copy Cloner.
My question is: When I get my iMac back after the hard disk replacement, will I be able to restore my iMac to EXACTLY the way it was before the replacement using the Time Machine backup & the Lion install disk that I've prepared? When I mean EXACTLY, I do mean EXACTLY, e.g I don't have to re-install all the programs I have, my settings for the programs I have will stay intact, everything is where it should be etc...i.e EXACTLY the way my iMac is right now.
If yes, how do I do it? I've read Pondini's guide: http://pondini.org/TM/14.html
However it is less than clear on certain points, e.g in my case, which one do I have to use to restore my system to the way it was...the Time Machine backups I have on the external HDD or the Lion install disk that I made using Carbon Copy Cloner? And how do I go about doing the restore?
I'd appreciate any & all help given. Thanks in advance!

daniirwan wrote:
baltwo: Thanks for your input! I didn't think of wiping the old HDD before sending it in for the replacement..all those sensitive user data! One question: What's a FWHD?
Already answered. Just note that FW is much faster than USB. See http://help.bombich.com/kb/troubleshooting/how-long-should-the-clone-or-backup-t ake for details.
I already have CCC installed so I'll probably try it out. Are the steps outline here the one that I should do to restore the CCC clone when I get my Mac with the new HDD back? See: http://help.bombich.com/kb/overview/restoring-data-from-your-backup#full_volume_ restore
Yes.
Another question: while I'm booted on the backup/clone, and just after I've wiped the old HDD, how do I reinstall the OS to create a generic user account? Will I have to use a Lion install USB disk?
No. IIRC (if I remember correctly), you can either use a saved Lion installer (hopefully it exists on your backup/clone) or use the Recovery HD. If you have the USB stick w/Lion installer on it, use that.

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