I would like to make a backup image of my Mepis setup now I have got it running just the way I would like.

I have K3B and Arson installed as burning software (I only have a CD burner on this machine, not DVD.

Can anyone walk me through the process of making this backup so that if I have a serious system screwup, I can reload it without having to do a fresh install and all the consequent package updates and installations all over again?

Could such a thing be a bootable CD? I am not familiar with this procedure, so will need simple explanations please.

Here is a link that I googled that should help. Woob http://www.faqs.org/docs/gazette/backup.html

Thanks for that. I will have to take some time to read that closely - it looks rather confusing at first glance.

I have a Linux only setup and want to create a bootable backup of my whole system on CDs (only have a CD burner, not DVD).

I installed Bootcd from Synaptic and it installed OK but even after rebooting my computer, I could not find it and could not get it to run with the 'Run' command box.

Bootcd looked like just the thing I needed, described in Synaptic as doing just that,creating an image of the whole system to put on CD and run the whole thing from the CD if necessary.

Does anyone know about this app and how to get it to run?

I tried KDar but whenever I chose the full backup option, the program crashed.

I am still trying to find an application that will run this for me as I am not accustomed to command line stuff (I have a GUI and I want to use it !)

You can use K3B to create and burn an .iso image of anything on your hd. Open K3B>select "new data cd project">drag-n-drop whatever directories you want to burn to the bottom right box>then select "burn"> check "only create image"> then select "burn". This will create an .iso in a temporary file and then burn the image to your cd. I hope this helps as I just did it and it worked fine. Good Luck, Woob

You can't really directly make an ISO of your system (aside from what woob said). You can create a partition image using partimge (it's similar to Symantec/Norton Ghost or Drive Image) and save that to a CD or DVD, network drive, or wherever.

Or, you could just create a tarball of a system and burn that to a CD or DVD.

Thanks a lot Woob. It sounds like what I am after.

It took quite a while to get it set up with extras and updates, and I would hate to have to go through all that again, if I had to swap machines or hard drives.

I will give it a go right away!

Well,Woob, I followed your instructions to the letter but K3B gets part way along the image creation and then skips a lot of files, tells me it cannot access other files (even though I am doing this as root) then stops altogether with an error code 2, whatever that is.

Am I trying to copy the wrong files?

In KDar I select the default settings and Full backup option and it just crashes with a SIGSEV error (error 11, I think). When i click on the report details button, it tells me debugger cannot be found.

Hmmm...

Try running k3b with root privileges.

However you are FAR better off using partimage to create a partition image file then burn THAT to DVD

OR, if this is just for a backup and not disk imaging, why not just use kdar/dar?

Thanks Kim, but I have been logged in as root for this whole process and K3B still has trouble, "do not have permission".....etc. I don't know how much more permission I could have!

I did mention that I have tried KDar too but when I choose the full backup option, KDar shuts down with a SIGSEV error,whatever that means.

I may have to create another partition, but I didn't realise it would be so hard to just back up an image to a few CDs, by creating an image in a folder (I have plenty of space) then burning it.

I am not interested in buying Ghost or indeed buying anything else - there is a lot of great stuff to be had through Synaptic and I would rather make use of some of them, as soon as I find out which one.

Thanks again. :-)

Tried to run Part Image, however I get error messages saying inability to read many files, so process does not complete.

I have been logged in as root all the time for these efforts so don't know how to get more permission than that!

Just a thought. Cant you boot in using knoppix so that your harddrive isnt being accessed and then try using K3B in Knoppix to make an ISO of your hard drive? I dont know if you could restore using this procedure.

Actually, I had tried just that later today.

Ran the Knoppix CD and wanted to burn through K3B, but it asked me for the root password, (isn't it "toor"?) anyway it didn't like my password attempts so I couldn't do that.

Just what is the root password for Knoppix Live?

just use your mepis disk as a live cd. i used it yesterday to burn a new suse 9.3 dvd, all live, and the burn worked fine.

but no you can't use partimage or kdar or any of those to backup files that are being used, i.e. system files. you cannot copy the partition over to another one either if the orig. partitions files are being used. so its gotta be live.

i too was looking for a good way to remaster "the perfect mepis" setup, so that i never had to do it again. never figured it out though

Hi Lefty,

I finally sorted it out using Mondo Rescue. This will make a series of CDs of an active running system, so I have done that now.

In the end, for other reasons, I have changed distros and now run Mandriva 2005LE, but I have now got a backup of my Mepis setup for later.

Thanks to all for your help.

Charos,

Can you tell me more about your experience with Mondo? Did you actually run it on Mandriva as well. I have been trying to do this and have come up against numerous issues and errors. My last attmepts have resulted in the expected iso images, but they will not boot to the restore procedure correctly. Have you had success in this?

Thanks for any information you can share.