I was doing some tech work on a system and even tho the hard drive will not boot, when I use the knoppix live cd, I can see all the files.

The idea I have to save the hassle of removing the drive and setting it up as a slave in my main system to burn the files is....

to use cdrecord to burn the files that need to be backed up on the faulty drive before I format it.

I can burn files with cdrecord but haven't see any docs on how to burn directories.

Is this even possible and if so, what is the command?

Thanks in advance.

Try creating images of directories trees: mkisofs and then burn this image. Simple. In manual of cdrecord should be example.
bla

yeah, i know but i am using knoppix live like i said which doesn't allow me write access to anything so that is completely useless, thanks anyway.

anyone else?

Yet: mkisofs; You can create iso live and then pipe it to cdrecord;
Examples as I said are in manual. (;

Heh, i've installed cdrecord for You:
cdrecord(1):
"
If the overall speed of the system is sufficient and the structure of the filesystem is not too complex, cdrecord will run without creating an image of the ISO 9660 filesystem. Simply run the pipeline:
mkisofs -R /master/tree | cdrecord -v fs=6m speed=2 dev=2,0 -
"
bla

Why? I mean, if it was a Windows machine use a rescue disk and type fdisk /mbr, if it was Linux, restore LILO or GRUB in the boot sector ... nothing against backups, but if you can see all files with KNOPPIX, it is only the boot loader which is faulty, so why don't you just repair the master boot record?

thanks for the further info bla, it's just that there are lots of directories so it might get complicated and extremely tedious. I might just connect it as a slave drive to my main system after and see if I can get it to see the drive that way.

JZL240I-U: I don't blame you for asking I guess, but if it were that easy, I wouldn't be asking about using cdrecord and the service call would have been done in 5 minutes. Just because I can see the files while using Knoppix doesn't mean the drive is in perfect shape. In fact when I loaded partiton magic via floppy, it just plain errored without showing me anything. Believe me, if it was an easy fix, I very likely would have found it by now.

Btw, you shouldn't use fdisk /mbr if it is windass xp, you should use the repair mode and use the "fixmbr" command instead. (and yes, I did try that, within the first 10 minutes I was at the customer's location)

Hmm, one suggestion more. It is possible to create tar; tar -cf - / | cdrecord - <blah> but it is for sure not the best way to do it... (; Do as You want to. Good luck.
bla

You hadn't told what you had already done ... so I just wanted to give an oblique reminder, no patronizing intended.

Doesn't cdrecord take -r or -R as an option? I have no Linux machine here, can't look.

Btw. thanks for the clarification on Windows, I use only NT, not the more "modern" versions, I'm migrating to Linux .