Backup to a second hard drive - what software?

FWIW, Seagate's SEATOOLS (Windows version) has the ability to image Windows
partitions. Even though it tells you that the target drive is not a Seagate, it
still goes ahead and copies the source partition and sets the target partition
as bootable if you want. I've used it several times to bail out client
situations successfully. AFAIK, no support for Linux partitions in SEATOOLS.

Also, for those who still remember the DOS prompt, LFNTOOLS is an open source
collection of DOS-like commands which do much the same thing as CD, MD, COPY,
RD, etc. (all your favorite old DOS commands) EXCEPT that they operate on and
preserve long file names while running on a system booted up to the command
prompt. These are indispensible if you find yourself in a situation with a
Windows system that will not boot (NO! Never happens!), and you need to recoup
data and/or programs from a drive. And, of course, there are open source tools
which allow reading (not writing yet) an NTFS partition from the DOS command
prompt... Ben Myers

On Sun, 19 Oct 2003 14:18:33 -0400, "Saml" wrote:

I'm considering getting a second 80 gb hard drive just for backup. (Circuit
City has a WD today for $69.99.)

Currently all I have is Win XP, but I may create a Linux partition one of
these days.

PowerQuest's Drive Image 7 and Symantec's Ghost are two names I'm familar
with, though not the details of their products. I used PowerQuest's
Partition Magic a couple of years ago on Win 98 and was happy with what it
did.

Anyone got a recommendation for software to use?

Not so strange that different drives from different manufacturers have different
performance. Check the specs on the drives, including RPM, on-board drive cache
size; minimum, average and maximum seek time; ATA interface type (ATA100 or
ATA133?). Check the cabling and the setup of the channel(s) to which the drives
are connected. Are there other devices sharing the same IDE cable as one drive
or the other?

There's a real difference between the drives somewhere, reflected in the
throughput numbers you are seeing... Ben Myers

On Tue, 21 Oct 2003 22:27:28 -0400, "Saml" wrote:

This is intriguing. Where would I look to get info on this? I'm running XP
Pro.

Of course, I now seem to have mismatched HDs. The primary is an 80gb
Hitachi which PCPitstop show as having about 2.3mb uncached throughput and I
just added an 80gb WD which is showing 6.1 gb uncached throughput.
Strange...

Sam

"Edward J. Neth" wrote in message
om...
You don't even need a RAID card - you can mirror drives under Windows
NT/2000/XP without any hardware controller.

ben_myers_spam_me_not @ charter.net (Ben Myers) wrote in message
...
Are there other devices sharing the same IDE cable as one drive
or the other?

Hmmm. C:, and the second drive which shows up as E: in Win XP, are on the
same cable. D: is the CD/DVD drive which is also IDE (I believe) but is
connected to a different slot on the motherboard.

If I connect the primary drive and the CD/DVD to the same cable, and the
second hard drive to a second cable, would that make a difference? And
jumpering as "cable select" should work?

Sam

ben_myers_spam_me_not @ charter.net (Ben Myers) wrote in message
...
FWIW, Seagate's SEATOOLS (Windows version) has the ability to image
Windows
partitions. Even though it tells you that the target drive is not a
Seagate, it
still goes ahead and copies the source partition and sets the target
partition
as bootable if you want.

I tried using WDs Data Lifeguard for Windows. The resulting drive was
bootable, but Word and Outlook wouldn't run correctly and a desktop shortcut
got corrupted. I've switched the drives back since I don't trust the copy.
WD suggest shutting down "all unecessary" services while the copy take
place. Defining "unnecessary" is easier said than done, at least for me.

They also suggested downloading the DOS version and using that. (The DOS
version they supplied with the disk consistently came up with Abort, Retry,
etc. when I tried it.)

I'm a bit sceptical about "free" software right now, though it seems that it
may be equally difficult to find a commercial product with the
Symantec/Powerquest consolidation.

Sam

Running anything under DOS, unless you use special tools to handle long file and
folder names (LFNs), would be problematic. Not sure what WD's Data Lifeguard
Tools provide for correct handling of LFNs.

Windows XPee will get in the way of a successful cloning of a drive, too,
because registration of it with Microsoft adds a special code to the hard drive,
and the code is generated from the hardware configuration. Changing the drive
may well change the code.

If Word and Outlook did not operate properly on the cloned drive, this may
indicate a problem copying the Windows registry.

Bottom line is that a drive cloning tool (or bundle of tools) running at the DOS
prompt and able to copy LFNs properly will get you about 99% there. The other
one percent is the Windows registration hash. Running a drive cloning tool
under Windows, even in a DOS box, requires that the tool be able to copy the
Windows registry, even though the registry is constantly and perpetually in use,
and marked as such by the Windows file system. A Windows-based drive cloning
tool has a much greater chance of success if the system is booted up in safe
mode, which implies minimal usage of the Windows Achilles heel, more commonly
called the registry.

Give SEATOOLS a try, running in Windows safe mode... Ben Myers

On Fri, 24 Oct 2003 18:36:50 -0400, "Saml" wrote:

ben_myers_spam_me_not @ charter.net (Ben Myers) wrote in message
...
FWIW, Seagate's SEATOOLS (Windows version) has the ability to image
Windows
partitions. Even though it tells you that the target drive is not a
Seagate, it
still goes ahead and copies the source partition and sets the target
partition
as bootable if you want.

I tried using WDs Data Lifeguard for Windows. The resulting drive was
bootable, but Word and Outlook wouldn't run correctly and a desktop shortcut
got corrupted. I've switched the drives back since I don't trust the copy.
WD suggest shutting down "all unecessary" services while the copy take
place. Defining "unnecessary" is easier said than done, at least for me.

They also suggested downloading the DOS version and using that. (The DOS
version they supplied with the disk consistently came up with Abort, Retry,
etc. when I tried it.)

I'm a bit sceptical about "free" software right now, though it seems that it
may be equally difficult to find a commercial product with the
Symantec/Powerquest consolidation.

Sam

Cable select jumpers work if and only if the cable is a cable select type of
cable. You can tell if it is a cable select cable by holding it up to the
light. If all strands of the cable are complete and unbroken, it is a cable
which meets the master-slave standard. If one cable strand is broken such that
you can see light through the cable, it is a cable select cable. Why two cable
standards? To confuse us? Because the standards committee couldn't agree on
one standard cable type?

If the two drives are attached to the same cable and jumpered correctly for the
type of drive cable, any performance difference is likely due to different
underlying physical specifications (rpm, etc.). Check the specs on the
respective manufacturers' web sites... Ben Myers

On Fri, 24 Oct 2003 18:31:08 -0400, "Saml" wrote:

ben_myers_spam_me_not @ charter.net (Ben Myers) wrote in message
...
Are there other devices sharing the same IDE cable as one drive
or the other?

Hmmm. C:, and the second drive which shows up as E: in Win XP, are on the
same cable. D: is the CD/DVD drive which is also IDE (I believe) but is
connected to a different slot on the motherboard.

If I connect the primary drive and the CD/DVD to the same cable, and the
second hard drive to a second cable, would that make a difference? And
jumpering as "cable select" should work?

Sam

On Fri, 24 Oct 2003 23:19:49 GMT, ben_myers_spam_me_not @ charter.net
(Ben Myers) wrote:

Running anything under DOS, unless you use special tools to handle long file and
folder names (LFNs), would be problematic. Not sure what WD's Data Lifeguard
Tools provide for correct handling of LFNs.

The cloning programs don't run at the file level - but at the byte
level. Hence LFN's or OS are not an issue and should work fine under
DOS.


Albert Alcoceba


http://www.racysrailway.com/
Remove REMOVE