So I wanted to backup my system as I'm at a stable point with sonar and other programs that in the event my system fries I want to be able to restore. I currently have a 250gb ssd and if possible would like to know what the best approach is to either clone or image that drive. I just purchased a 2tb external drive to work with. Thank you

Paragon Backup & Recovery has been pretty painless for me.

I've never had to recover a full disk from a backup (where's some wood to knock on?).  But I have had no pain from using Acronis True Image on a periodic basis.  I did have to recover a single file accidentally trashed on one occasion and it was totally easy.

Macrium Reflect; It’s free and I never had any issues doing full or partial Backups...