From owner-freebsd-questions Mon Dec 2 15:25:52 2002 Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id EBD8037B401 for ; Mon, 2 Dec 2002 15:25:50 -0800 (PST) Received: from lakemtao01.cox.net (lakemtao01.cox.net [68.1.17.244]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 32A8343EC2 for ; Mon, 2 Dec 2002 15:25:50 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from ataraxia@cox.net) Received: from arkadia.nv.cox.net ([68.98.181.29]) by lakemtao01.cox.net (InterMail vM.5.01.04.05 201-253-122-122-105-20011231) with ESMTP id <20021202232548.VXED2199.lakemtao01.cox.net@arkadia.nv.cox.net> for ; Mon, 2 Dec 2002 18:25:48 -0500 Received: from arkadia.nv.cox.net (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by arkadia.nv.cox.net (8.12.6/8.12.6) with ESMTP id gB2NPnpB098648 for ; Mon, 2 Dec 2002 18:25:49 -0500 (EST) (envelope-from ataraxia@arkadia.nv.cox.net) Received: (from ataraxia@localhost) by arkadia.nv.cox.net (8.12.6/8.12.6/Submit) id gB2NPmux098637 for freebsd-questions@freebsd.org; Mon, 2 Dec 2002 18:25:48 -0500 (EST) (envelope-from ataraxia) Date: Mon, 2 Dec 2002 18:25:48 -0500 From: Ray Kohler To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: best way to back up entire disk? Message-ID: <20021202232548.GA71444@arkadia.nv.cox.net> Mail-Followup-To: Ray Kohler , freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline User-Agent: Mutt/1.4i Sender: owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk List-ID: List-Archive: (Web Archive) List-Help: (List Instructions) List-Subscribe: List-Unsubscribe: X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG [please CC me, I'm not subscribed] I'm looking for a way to back up my entire system in such a manner that if it fails and I need to restore it, I would be able to do it to any arbitrary disk without having to first install the base OS before restoring. I'm running -CURRENT. What I have at my disposal is a CD-RW drive (ATAPI, but that really doesn't matter so much with ATAPI-CAM in the tree), one disk (ad0) with only FreeBSD on it, and no other machines to do network backup to. Ideally, I want something that can automatically span multiple CD-RW's when writing and can be restored using only the tools on the CD-2 live fs. Just boot from CD-2, swap CD's, restore to a totally blank disk, reboot, and it's all as good as new. Dump/restore and tar (both using cdrecord to write) are the only things I can think of, but neither of these seems ideal to me. -- Ray Kohler While anyone can admit to themselves they were wrong, the true test is admission to someone else. To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message