User Feedback :: Best Image / Config for simple disk cloning?
I'm interested in using DSL to do a straight sector by sector copy on a computer that's using a drive with a proprietary partition and file structure on an old (PCI / ISA bus) clone. It's very plain, with nothing as fancy as SCSI or USB -- just IDE HDD, CD-ROM, and floppy. It's a 166mhz equivalent system with 16 megs and, VGA/SVGA.
The owners were doing backups with an ancient Wangdat tape drive, which has since died. Even when it was working the backup program only copied particular kinds of documents, and in the event of a crash could only recover by having the original vendor do a scratch install of the original system and then reload the data files from tape. It was bad news all around, and having a complete image backup should be a great improvement.
The computer generally seems happy with DSL and is already booting this (current.iso) image:
System has two identical (same model) IDE drives, just over 1G. I want to create a boot image CD that starts the machine and copies the 1st drive to the 2nd drive. I've been told that part of the process will involve using a command like:
dd if=/dev/hda of=/dev/hdb bs=256K
The computer is set to boot from the CD first and the hard drive 2nd, so that's pretty standard. I want the user to be able to stick in a boot CD and give it the three finger salute and then end up with a nice current backup.
I'd like to have the right isolinux.cfg (whatever) that would boot without spending a lot of time scanning for what is not there (SCSI, sound, USB, etc.), with it creating and loading ramdisks as needed. Simple console would be fine -- no need for xwindows or a window manager. And I NEVER want it to ask about partitioning or installing anything.
If you have tips for me that would be great, as I'd like this tiny organization to escape being pressured into "upgrading" a system that is presently doing everything that's needed.Take a look at the cheat codes (i.e. wiki, press F2/F3 at cd bootsplash). You'll probably be interested in "noscsi nousb dma 3" among others...
You could also have that dd command executed automatically upon startup.
Quote (^thehatsrule^ @ Nov. 15 2007,14:16)
You could also have that dd command executed automatically upon startup.
I've forgotten what little I ever knew about the inittab, etc., processes, and I'd be glad for whatever help was available in this area.Call your script from /opt/bootlocal.sh or even inline there.
Also for maximum efficiency use boot options of
2 base norestore legacy
as well all the noxyz options.
The 2 indicates to run at runlevel 2 which is root cli, which would execute your script in /opt/bootlocal.sh
Your script could shutdown or reboot upon completion so no operator intervention.i think he wants to know how to make a custom cd.Next Page...
original here.