Re: Cult of Unix

On Thu, 1/16/2025 12:03 AM, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:

On Tue, 14 Jan 2025 20:05:34 -0600, Hank Rogers wrote:
 

I think people are better off to get some type of imaging software ...

 
On Linux systems, rsync works well. It’s essentially a bulk file-copying
utility. That’s all you need to backup/restore Linux systems.
 

With Macrium, I can back up FAT32, NTFS, ExFAT, and ... EXT4.
This means when I image a dual-boot disk drive here, it is
a *complete* image. I can restore it to a brand new hard drive,
and it boots as if nothing had happened.

As long as my Linux installs use EXT4 for slash, I'm fine
and one imaging tool does everything for me.

The imaging is "smart". in that busy clusters and busy inodes
are backed up, not white space. If I have 20GB of files
on a 1TB EXT4, the backup image is a bit bigger than 20GB
but not by much. Similarly, if I back up 20GB of files
on a 1TB NTFS, the output is not much bigger than 20GB.
And the NTFS and EXT4 can sit in the same MRIMG file,
there is no segregation involved and separate files
for them. It's all in a single file.

Macrium even backs up the 16MB Microsoft Reserved, which
has no file system. It does that using the equivalent of "dd",
but it does not throw a wobbly and complain about what it has
been asked to do. It puts that back on a restore.

Details and automation, are the key to push-button success.

   Paul