From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Fri Oct 31 09:50:12 2008 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 2E6E3106567F for ; Fri, 31 Oct 2008 09:50:12 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from kuku@kukulies.org) Received: from werkwelt.de (post.werkwelt.de [91.194.85.74]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id C1D798FC0C for ; Fri, 31 Oct 2008 09:50:11 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from kuku@kukulies.org) Received: from [87.79.34.228] (account kuku@kukulies.org HELO [192.168.1.114]) by werkwelt.de (CommuniGate Pro SMTP 5.0.13) with ESMTPA id 6452737 for freebsd-questions@freebsd.org; Fri, 31 Oct 2008 09:49:53 +0100 Message-ID: <490AC650.3000904@kukulies.org> Date: Fri, 31 Oct 2008 09:48:16 +0100 From: Christoph Kukulies User-Agent: Thunderbird 2.0.0.17 (Windows/20080914) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-15; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Subject: fastest raw device copy? X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Fri, 31 Oct 2008 09:50:12 -0000 Hi list, I'm considering using a bootable USB stick with FreeBSD to perform a backup of my notebooks' 500 GB hard disk to a physically identical (same make, same type, same size) hard disk attached to USB. What would be the fastest way to do that sector by sector copy? I'm using dd right now, dd if=/dev/ad0 of=/dev/da0 bs=10000000 but maybe there is a utility which does this faster or a larger buffer size? Probably the limit will be the USB 2.0 bus speed anyway? -- Christoph