[Udpcast] Image Server

[Ben Dailey]

Diego,


If you backup the partition table and the restore it do your images
work then? I use the dd method described below to backup the partition
table and it has worked great for me.

Backup the Partition Table
To backup the partition table to a file, we can use dd as follows:

 dd if=/dev/hda of=/mnt/hdc1/my-hda.mbr count=1 bs=512


Linux treats a filesystem or a partition as a file, and the syntax
above specifies the input file to be the /dev/hda partition, and the
output file is a file on our target HDD. The other parameters specify
that only a single block should be copied, and we're forcing the
filesize to be 512 bytes.

The output filename is arbitrary, so give it a suitable name that
indicates which HDD it relates to. A ".mbr" file extension indicates it
contains details relating to the master boot record.

Backup Extended Partition Information
If you have any extended partitions on the HDD being imaged, the
details of the extended partitions can be saved as follows:

 sfdisk -d /dev/hda > /mnt/hdc1/my-hda.sf


This will dump the partition table contents into the file we specify,
in a format suitable for easily rebuilding the partition table.
Again, the output filename is arbitrary, so use a suitable filename.

Restoring From Images
Restoring from these images is just the reverse of the process
described above, with the System Rescue CD containing all the utilities
required to do this:

    * use dd to restore the partition table (dd if=/mnt/hdc1/my-hda.mbr
of=/dev/hda)
    * use sfdisk to restore the extended partition information (sfdisk
/dev/hda < /mnt/hdc1/my-hda.sf)
    * create swap structure on the swap partition (mkswap /dev/hda3)
    * reboot
    * restore each partition using Partition Image

This info was copied from: http://martybugs.net/linux/image.cgi

Thank You,
Ben Dailey
bdailey at bhmsd.k12.in.us
Asst. Technology Director
Bluffton-Harrison MSD
www.bhmsd.k12.in.us


>>> "Diego ." <eljedi at gmail.com> 2/15/2007 11:50 AM >>>
Hi,

I'm trying to make some kind of imageserver. I backed up my windows
2000
boot partition to an image file on the server. I restore it, without
problems..everything is ok. But if i change hdd, o if destroy partition
and
create a new one ( same size, same place ), i can restore the image
but
windows won't boot. when i check filesystem y get some errors ( of
course
they weren't when i backup the partition ). I even fixboot and mbr with
the
same result.

Anyone can helpme with some tip?

Thanks!!