Images\Clones\Backups

I take and restore images every week so am well aware what they can
and can't do -
but can someone please advise re. the A-Z of what
Clones and Backups can or can't do - what the diff. is between them - can one boot
an OS with either IF,IF.......

 

A cloned drive can be used as a replacement drive - just physically replace current drive with the cloned drive and boot normally. Of course the state of the drive will be what it was at the exact time the drive was cloned.

One major difference between cloning/backing is that cloning programs, when source and clone disk sizes differ, require you to choose between automatically scaling partition sizes or manually changing partition sizes. This can be a convenient feature, assuming you have an available drive, if you wish to change your partition sizes but don't have a partition management app.

Some prefer disk-cloning to the conventional backup/restore approach. Cloning takes no more time than an image backup (assuming automatic scaling of partition sizes if source/clone disk sizes differ), and the use of a disk-docking station makes this quite convenient.

As to bootable backup images, the only software vendor I've noticed that claims its backup image can be directly bootable is Paragon. I have no experience with Paragon, so I'm ignorant about the details of that claim.

Every backup/restore app I've used (Ghost, Terabyte, Acronis) requires that the backed-up image be restored to be bootable.

Hope this helps!