Backing up multiple users under OS X.1?

[smilinggoat]

hey i'm gonna reformat my disk with one partition 5gig 9.2.1 and the other 5gig OS X (i'm stuck on a 10gig iMac drive). i have to back up all the user info for each user. when i try to copy each user file over, Mail won't let me, giving me error -43, "The file cannot be found." if i back up by simply copying the user files, will everything function fine when i install clean to X.1 and reinstall my software?

thanks,
the smiling goat

 

[fryke]

for the best results, activate the root account in a terminal:

sudo passwd

(this lets you give a password to the user 'root', which is the omnipotent superuser that can destroy everything.)

then you log in as root and copy all homefolders needed to a backup medium. after reinstallation do the same backwards. but you first will have to *make* the users again, before copying.

i do so for my one user everytime i reinstall os x (not often, but i do).

it shall work.