First Macintosh. Absolute essential apps?

[Spacetime Anomaly]

Spacetime Anomaly, thank you for suggesting this simple, intuitive and effective app.
It is now on my must have list.

No problem. It's a little marvel.

 

[dwig]

Your info is a little outdated. Ever since Lion 10.7.2 you can option key boot to a local Time Machine drive and get to a recovery screen where you can format a new drive then restore everything, including the OS and all your apps and data. No need to install the OS first.

You cannot boot to a TM drive and run the computer, but the TM backup can restore everything like I mentioned.

Thanks for the clarification, but...

... you still need to physically replace the old dead boot drive with a new one before you can use TM to rebuild your new drive. With a true clone, via SD or CCC, you can boot from the clone without doing anything other than connecting the clone and rebooting while holding down the Option key. You are back to a working machine in minutes.

 

[Weaselboy]

Thanks for the clarification, but...

... you still need to physically replace the old dead boot drive with a new one before you can use TM to rebuild your new drive. With a true clone, via SD or CCC, you can boot from the clone without doing anything other than connecting the clone and rebooting while holding down the Option key. You are back to a working machine in minutes.

Understood, and I mentioned that in my comment. If you just need something to use to restore to a new drive though, a Time Machine backup is all you need.