Miroslav Skoric wrote: > Mikkel L. Ellertson wrote: > >> >> >> One thing to be carefull of - you may need a BIOS update before the >> system will see the 80 GB drive. I don't know if your version of Ghost >> will handle the Linux partitions. You may need to use something like >> Ghost for Linux or partimage to transfere them. >> > Well, I haven't tried 'cloning' Linux partitions with that version of > Ghost yet (it is a part of Norton System Works 2001 - you just make a > bootable floppy of it and follow the instructions). Two weeks ago, I > used it to clone some older Compaq Deskpro boxes, having 2.4 GB disks, > running a Compaq diag utility on its own app 15 MB partition and W2k in > the remaining space. Those boxes were the members of a W2k domain system > and there I also had some 25+ user roaming profiles on them. The problem > was I got almost without free space on those 2.4 gig disks. You bet, > what I wanted to do was to preserve all existing data - without spending > much time with re-installing the boxes from scratch etc. > If I remember right, the version you have will do a bit for bit copy of a Linux partition, but it will not expand a Linux partition. Because it doesn't understand the file system, it has to copy everything, and not just the part actualy in use. > > Well, it took app 1/2 hour per box to transfer all data to a new 40 GB > disk (including both diag and W2k part). When finished, I noticed that > Compaq diag partition remained fully functional (it remained of the very > similar size as it was on the old HD, and amazingly the W2k's partition > managed to widen itself to the whole remaining HD space) - completely > what I wanted to have. > > Since then, I haven't noticed any problem with the new cloned disks > (they remained the members of the old domain and now they have enough > room for more users' data etc). They even seem to be speedier than the > old disks. That is why I have been thinking of doing something similar > with my Win/Lin combo disks (I also have a couple of computers running > such combinations). I suppose that Ghost 2001 cloning process is somehow > forcing W2k to use all the free space it finds on the new disk, but I am > not sure if Linux would be capable to do the same or similar - say to > enlarge the existing /, /swap, /boot etc. Anyway, I will try to look for > newer version of Ghost. > >> You may want to split your Linux install into more partitions on the new >> drive. I would definitly split /home off into its own partition. > > > In that case, wouldn't be enough to copy the old /home content to the > new created one? And, btw - is there a tool to make a separate /home > from an existing Linux system? I mean, is it possible to make a separate > /home partition from some free space within an existing / one? > diskdrake
>> when creating your new /boot partition, make sure it is in the part of >> the drive that the BIOS can read. > > > How to be sure about that? I am familiar with using LILO and always put > it into the MBR and never had problems with booting either Win/Lin. > What you are putting on the MBR is the first stage loader. This loads the second stage loader, and that loads the kernel and initrd. The thing is, both the first stage and second stage loader use the BIOS to read the drive. So the files in /boot have to be accessable by the BIOS. The tricky part here is that there is no set rule here. It depends on the BIOS in your machine. It used to be that cylinder 1024 was the limit. With some, it is 32Gb. I forget the other breakpoints, but the newer BIOS can access more of the drive. (LILO and Grub also changed to be able to use the features of the newer BIOS.) >> If you go this route, you may want to >> create and format the Linux partitions using a live CD, mount the entire >> new tree, and then copy all the files over. There are several different >> copy commands that will copy the files while preserving the ownership >> and permissions. >> > In particular, I might be interested in preserving my Mozilla's 1.7 > email messages content and, if possible, the parts of some software > running now (to avoid re-installing the software and setting all > parameters again :-) ). Btw, somewhere earlier I used to copy the entire > mailbox content to the other Win (fat) partition, that I used a s a > storage part of the disk. After a new Linux installation, I used to > restore that content back (sometimes it used to be a painful procedure > and that is also why I would like to clone the system without much > turbulences). > A direct copy - Linux to Linux usualy avoids this problem. Another way is to use tar to archive the files, and then restore them. This preserves the permissions, while a direct copy to a Windows partition does not. >> What I usualy do is put the /boot partition first, then the Windows >> partitions, and then the Linux partitions. It is usualy a good idea to >> use windows fdisk to create the windows partitions, leaving enough room >> for the /boot partition before the first Windows partitions. this way, > > > Which way do you make your /boot partition at first? If you do that with > some Linux setup disk, are you sure that, a bit later, W2k would allow > you to install it? > The easy way it to use Windows fdisk to create the first Windows partition, and leave a blank space before the first partition. That way, Windows is happy, and you can later turn this blank space into a ext2 partition for /boot. Mikkel -- Registered Linux User #16148 (http://counter.li.org/)
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