Re: [PLUG] Moving system between drives

[Toby DiPasquale <toby@cbcg.net>]

On Thu, May 11, 2006 at 10:23:36PM -0400, jazzman@exdomain.org wrote:
> I know I should know this, but it's been a while since I've done it. I've 
> got a RH9 box running on a system with a 10gig drive. I just got my hands 
> on a 40gig drive and I'd like to upgrade. I know you can use dd to make a 
> perfect clone of the system onto another drive, but I seem to recall you 
> can only do that if the two drives are the same geometry. 
> 
> Is there an easy way to take the system as is, clone the system onto the 
> bigger drive (adjusting partition sizes to account for the new drive size 
> of course) and then just swap drives and merrily go on my way?

First build the partition table on the new disk to your liking. If you
have only one partition on the first disk, all the easier. You can make
any partition on the second disk bigger than the first, but you probably
shouldn't make any of them smaller.

Assuming the first disk is /dev/hda and the second disk is /dev/hdc, then
for each partition ($X) that you just created:

# mount /dev/hdc$X /mnt
# cd /mnt
# dump -0 -f - /dev/hda$X | restore -r -f -
# cd ..
# umount /mnt

Do this all as root.

dump(8) and restore(8) make full _filesystem_ copies, which is what you
want. dd(1) will make a perfect disk copy, which is probably not what you
want given that the two disks will likely have different geometry, as
you've correctly pointed out above.

HTH

P.S. On RedHat the package containing dump(8) and restore(8) is called
'dump', in case you don't already have it. On Debian/Ubuntu its also
called 'dump'. Don't know what Slack calls it.

P.P.S. It appears that Linux dump(8) and restore(8) only work on ext2
filesystems. This should also translate to ext3, since the only difference
is the hidden .journal file in the root of the FS which will also be
copied, but if you're using Reiser or XFS or something, you may have to
see if there is a dump(8)/restore(8) combo or similar utility for whatever
FS you're using.

-- 
Toby DiPasquale
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