Going in for service, need step by step back up to CD instructions, please?

Question

My imac is going in to repair the dreaded vertical lines problem this week. First I am to back up my files, just in case. I'm more or less computer challenged for something this complicated. I want to burn to blank CD's some of my important files. Apple guy at the store, said burn your 'home' folder. I have tried disc utility and got confused. Appeared to make my applications folder and home folder disappear! So, I dragged them back. Starting over, I think those instructions were for OS X 10.5 anyway. Now I'm nervous. Can someone give me step by step instructions for a OS X 10.4.11 please. My computer helper in the house is a PC guy. Thanks so much! ~N

Answer 1

You'll not be able to burn your entire Home folder to one CD. CDs only hold around 610 MBs per disc. That means you will need to span the backup over multiple discs. Disk Utility is not designed to do that. There aren't many backup utilities that can do that either. The likeliest candidate would be Roxio's Toast.
A much better solution is to get an external hard drive at least as large as your computer's hard drive, then clone your computer's drive to the external drive. And, you will now have the means of maintaining backups which is something you should always do.
When you get the external hard drive you must first prep it as follows:
Extended Hard Drive Preparation
1. Open Disk Utility in your Utilities folder.
2. After DU loads select your hard drive (this is the entry with the mfgr.'s ID and size) from the left side list. Click on the Partition tab in the DU main window.
3. Under the Volume Scheme heading set the number of partitions from the drop down menu to one. Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.) Click on the Options button, set the partition scheme to GUID (for Intel Macs) or APM (for PPC Macs) then click on the OK button. Click on the Partition button and wait until the process has completed.
4. Select the volume you just created (this is the sub-entry under the drive entry) from the left side list. Click on the Erase tab in the DU main window.
5. Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (Journaled.) Click on the Options button, check the button for Zero Data and click on OK to return to the Erase window.
6. Click on the Erase button. The format process can take up to several hours depending upon the drive size.
To clone your drive do this:
Clone using Restore Option of Disk Utility
1. Open Disk Utility from the Utilities folder.
2. Select the destination volume from the left side list.
3. Click on the Erase tab in the DU main window. Set the format type to Mac OS Extended (journaled, if available) and click on the Erase button. This step can be skipped if the destination has already been freshly erased.
4. Click on the Restore tab in the DU main window.
5. Select the destination volume from the left side list and drag it to the Destination entry field.
6. Select the source volume from the left side list and drag it to the Source entry field.
7. Double-check you got it right, then click on the Restore button.
Destination means the external backup drive.
Source means the internal startup drive.