You can achieve this also with rdiff-backup:
[ ]
rdiff-backup is a script, written in python(1) that backs up one direc‐
tory to another. The target directory ends up a copy (mirror) of the
source directory, but extra reverse diffs are stored in a special sub‐
directory of that target directory, so you can still recover files lost
some time ago. The idea is to combine the best features of a mirror
and an incremental backup. rdiff-backup also preserves symlinks, spe‐
cial files, hardlinks, permissions, uid/gid ownership, and modification
times.
[ ]
Well, you have to read and study the manpage thoroughly for the right setup, but then it runs flawlessly as a cronjob. Only be aware of the size all those diffs consume disk-space! Limit them to, let's say, 30 or 60 days.

Good luck.

I prefer to write my own scripts rather than using ones other people make. That way I know how my script works, and it does exactly what I want. But that is just me.

I am also a big fan of clonezilla. I have been able to successfully image and restore both windows and red hat operating systems.
I was even able to restore to a completely different hardware setup!
This is great if you want to keep your current OS, but need to upgrade your hardware. The key was installing ALL of the required drivers for the new hardware, as many as you can prior to the restore.
red hat 5 takes 20-30 minutes to image and/or restore, but windows can take an hour or two, for even a small image.
The other key is to ALWAYS restore to something that is at least as big as the original configuration, ie 500GB will not restore to 200GB even though the image itself is really small.
I can live with that!

I have one cd/dvd r/w drive. I have my / on sda2, swap on sda3, and vista on sda1 ntfs. I have a quad core phenom with 2GB Ram. I was wondering if I use clonezilla and load it to ram when it boots can I then remove the disk and put a blank dvd in the drive and then store the image of sda2 on the blank dvd? Where would the temporary files be placed while the image was being made? Something during the process of using clonezilla scared me off. It said something about the data on the drive being cloned getting destroyed? Thanks for any help.

I have never used clonizilla... but I assume it said that all the data on the backup drive will be destroyed. You can't backup to a full drive

I don't recommend this method. Even Clonezilla warns of possible issues.
It is very easy to back up to an external USB device. I use 500GB SATA hard drives to store my users systems on. They are on a 3 month rotating schedule for cloning, some do tape back ups in between.
I just got a few USB 2.0 to IDE or SATA adapters (about $20) and ANY hard drive becomes an external USB device.
Thumb drives are pretty big and cheap these days as well, just make sure you will have room for the image.

Let me give you guys a little more background on what I was thinking. I have installed Debian numerous times and I keep fixing it until it breaks. I get my multimedia keyring going. I get my splashy working. I get the flash player working and about the time I put my ati drivers on I end up hosing it up so badly that I can't fix it. So I wanted to be able to restore it to what it was when I had all of it installed and all of the other things working so I wouldn't have to re-install and then get everything working the way I want it again. I'm not even sure what directories I should back up so I was just going to clone the drive. Thanks for your help.

but would i be able to do the following:
backup the system with rsync (or clonezilla) in say /home/user/backup and save that on a dvd? (its still cheaper than a stick)

@xigtem: have a look on what 987687 describes to be excluded when backing up with rsync. i did it on the fly and had a backup of say ~5GB. it could be much less (if you only wanna backup the system, exclude
the directories from home which store private data, but keep the .config files. -> i guess :-) )
else - by what you described set-up->screw-up- the option creating your own live-install-cd with live_helper or live-magic sound not too bad
(it would take a bit of time but its also a bit of fun).

greetings