installing new SSD with no OS disks

[Mr Downtown]

My refurb Mini is here, but I haven't hooked it up yet. It only has a 120 gig HD. And these cheap SSDs are really tempting me. But since it's a refurb (from Powermax) I don't have any OS installation disks. So how do I move Snow Leopard from the existing HD to a new SSD?

[Buzz]

CCC?

[Fritz]

target mode from your old dog, or external drive.

[Mr Downtown]

A little more detail, please. I thought of using CCC to put Snow Leopard (and CCC?) on a big thumb drive . . . but what comes next? I'd have a Mini with an unformatted SSD in it and a thumb drive. How do I even get the Mini to boot up so I can run CCC again?

[Panopticon]

refurb Mini is here, but I haven't hooked it up yet

But you're currently using another Mac running SL?

If so...
Connect the SSD via FW/USB External to that Mac & use DU to properly partition and format said SSD {GUID+Mac OS Extended (Journaled) }.
Use same Mac to CCC to the new SSD.
Install SSD in the refurb mini.

[GGD]

Mr Downtown wrote:
A little more detail, please. I thought of using CCC to put Snow Leopard (and CCC?) on a big thumb drive . . . but what comes next? I'd have a Mini with an unformatted SSD in it and a thumb drive. How do I even get the Mini to boot up so I can run CCC again?

The "big thumb drive" you want to use is your NEW SSD. Put it into an external enclosure, initialize it (GUID partition map), and clone your internal drive to it. Then try booting from it to make sure it works OK, before swapping it into the Mini.

[Mr Downtown]

Panopticon, the only machine I have running Snow Leopard is an MBA, which has no FireWire. What kind of cable do I need to make the Mini a target disk? Or did you mean hook up the SSD somehow before installing it in the Mini?

GGD, if I had an external enclosure for a 2.5-inch drive, the answer would have been pretty obvious.

[GGD]

Best solution involves an external drive enclosure (or drive docking adapter) for either the old or the new drive.

What other systems/OSs do you have around that might help? Do you happen to have Lion anywhere, with it's restore partition saved to a Flash drive?

[modelamac]

Mr Downtown wrote:
Panopticon, the only machine I have running Snow Leopard is an MBA, which has no FireWire. What kind of cable do I need to make the Mini a target disk? Or did you mean hook up the SSD somehow before installing it in the Mini?

GGD, if I had an external enclosure for a 2.5-inch drive, the answer would have been pretty obvious.

If you don't have any of that stuff, what are you using for bootable backup clones and Time Machine?

[Mr Downtown]

No Lion anywhere. The old G5 tower runs Tiger.

An ordinary (closed 3.5-inch) external drive hosts Time Machine backups for the MBA. No bootable backup clones.