My iMac died last week. However, it wasn’t until a few days later when I was telling my parents about it and they asked, worriedly, “Do you have a backup?” that I realized just how confident I was in my backup strategy. The possibility of data loss never even crossed my mind.
The untimely death of my iMac is going to be expensive and it’s annoying to be stuck on my just my MacBook Pro for a couple of weeks but I know my data is safe in the hands of Arq, Backblaze, and Carbon Copy Cloner.
Maybe your MBP is really old and slow, but otherwise doesn’t sound like the end of the world. 
I recommend the Spaces feature to get around the smaller screen!
It’s a 14” with an M1 Pro, so not exactly old and slow. 
Probably quite a bit faster than my 2017 iMac (definitely quieter). Main thing I’m missing at the moment is that nice big, beautiful 27” display. The 24” Dell 4K I’m using as my main monitor with the MacBook Pro is just enough smaller to be annoying, especially when tiling windows left and right. So I’m eagerly waiting for my Studio Display order.
Why not invest in a good 4k/5k screen and do the laptop only lifestyle? You can always add a Mac Studio later if you want to return to a desktop.
Hahahaha … you missed the previous thread where Chris bought a Studio and three Studio monitors. 
Whooa… my kind of setup, though my 3 screens are 4K. Can’t wait for the Studio to arrive.
Good to know about the real world experience, because that’s similar to my own backup approaches.
I’m curious to know just what data sets will you retrieve from your backup stores? Just the contents of “Documents”? How are you going to handle applications?
Last week I used Migration Assistant to transfer everything from a MBP (cracked screen) to a new MBA, and I was pleased by how well the process went.
…and feels limited on a 24-inch monitor!
When it comes to new Macs I’m a “fresh setup” person. So apps will get downloaded from the app store/developer websites. Anything that will cloud sync will get downloaded that way. Sensitive documents that I don’t sync to the cloud and stuff that applications store locally will get moved directly from the clone backup.
@ChrisUpchurch just reading your other post. Agree a 3 screen setup is ideal. I could not wait until Apple finally would give us 5K displays and got three 32" 4K LG Thunderbolt displays last year and it is bliss. Can only imagine what 3 5K displays will be.
I have one for active work, one for reference and one for comms and messaging. At the moment I need HDMI and a DisplayLink adapter to connect to the M1 Mini, but soon they will be full HDR and Thunderbolt again when connected to the Mac Studio.
Fresh setup here too. I like the feeling of a fresh computer. I actually wipe each machine every 12 months or so and start rebuilding with essentials. Then add apps when needed. Most settings sync via iCloud.
I have restored folders from Backblaze, but never full drives. No problems. Most of time either the clone or time machine, together with iCloud and Dropbox were enough to bring a computer back quickly. It takes me under 2 hours to have an operational computer.