Clonezilla - I am confused

[Richard Chapman]

I am attempting to restore an image to a ssd hd and having some difficulty. I am a new user to the product. I boot the target with a parted magic USB and start clonezilla. when I attempt to restore the image to the drive the software shows the root of the drive. The dialog states the image should not appear in the list, if I am reading right. I select the root and when it runs the commands it has built, it does not "see" the image and shuts down. When I use the test the partition utility, it finds the image immediately. What am II missing here? Any help is appreciated. This machine is nes and the drive is wiped except for the restore I am trying to use. Thanks
Richard

 

[Markverhyden]

Why don't you just make a clonezilla bootable disk? And how was the image created?

 

[Richard Chapman]

the image was created as a copy of the drive with clonezilla.. It was stored in a directory on a HD and the folder it was stored in was copied to my fileserver. I have copied the folder back to a hard drive in the root directory so I can restore it locally. I am not understanding your remark about making a bootable disk. Would that just boot clonezilla?

 

[Markverhyden]

While I use partedmagic as well I only use clonezilla all by itself. Create bootable media from their website. If you have the image stored in a folder you have to tell CZ what folder. It does not "just look around until it finds something". So I'd move the image file to the root of the source drive. I'm guessing the source drive is showing up as well?

 

[Richard Chapman]

There is the interesting part. The are files, not just one in the image folder. When I use the check image for integrity, it sees the folder and runs and states the image is OK, but does not recognize the folder for a restore

 

[Rayspcsolutions]

I am not a cz expert and only used it a few times but i think you have to actually select the image file if I am not the mistaken not just root folder where the file is located.

 

[Richard Chapman]

The thing I find interesting is the software finds the "image" for a verify, but not for a restore. I have not found the reason yet, but I am wondering if I go command line what will happen.

 

[Altster]

Generally when you use Clonezilla to image a drive Clonezilla (herein called cz) will pick up all existing partitions (if there are more than one) and add them to to image. When I use cz I boot to it (I use the downloadable image from cz's website and created an USB bootable with cz.) I do not save anything - ie; images to this device. I use an USB external drive for image store(s).

Once I have the image and it is time to restore it to another device (needs to be the same size (capacity) or larger (capacity)) I boot to the cz usb drive and follow the onscreen prompts to restore the image. Make sure your device you are restoring to is clear / does not contain ANY files or partitions as cz will overwrite these files and re-create your partitions for you. If you have files you wish to save, then copy them off before you restore.

Clonezilla is really easy to use - once you get used to it. Just make sure to read the screens / prompts as you use it. It "IS" possible to overwrite your original file if you are not careful so I would suggest that you copy your image that you wish to restore to some other location as a backup in case you overwrite the image to be (restored.)

I have found that restoring to an SSD takes a long time as compared to a mechanical hard drive. Don't know why that is. So once it starts let it finish.

 

[Richard Chapman]

I appreciate the advice. I found that my backupper copies only held a single image when I had backed up the drive that way, and it too was no good. It's a GPT drive, so I suspect I got some things wrong. Anyway, I got the restore media from Lenovo and am now working with a live machine again. I have a drive to test against, so I should be able to figure this out. I will update the thread when I do.

Richard

 

[Altster]

I appreciate the advice. I found that my backupper copies only held a single image when I had backed up the drive that way, and it too was no good. It's a GPT drive, so I suspect I got some things wrong. Anyway, I got the restore media from Lenovo and am now working with a live machine again. I have a drive to test against, so I should be able to figure this out. I will update the thread when I do.

Richard

When you get it all up & running, consider doing an image using Clonezilla - if only to have a good backup and to allow you to learn how to use it.

 

[MDD1963]

Clonezilla definitely takes a bit of practice, compared to the super-easy to use/intuitive AOMEI Backupper or Easeus TODO Backup; however, it works, seems fast enough, and, works well IMO...

If not careful with CZ, you can nuke the wrong drive pretty quickly (It pays to have as few drives connected as possible during this process)

 

[kisk]

... or look into how to use dd and/or ddrescue. Much better tools IMO for imaging. Especially if you're working with failing drives.

 

[fencepost]

ddrescue is a better tool for making a backup image if you have drive issues, but isn't as good for making them for archives - unless there's a compression option I didn't notice. The problem with ddrescue is that if you're imaging a 2TB drive with only 100GB in use, you're going to be storing 2TB not 100GB.

 

[Markverhyden]

ddrescue is a better tool for making a backup image if you have drive issues, but isn't as good for making them for archives - unless there's a compression option I didn't notice. The problem with ddrescue is that if you're imaging a 2TB drive with only 100GB in use, you're going to be storing 2TB not 100GB.

And that's the correct procedure. The 100GB, or whatever it is, is based upon MFT. Of course MFT does not include deleted files. I've run into a few occasions where someone said they "imaged" the drive but it was not the full drive space.

 

[fencepost]

Yeah, I'm just figuring that for the folks who image a drive before working on it then hang onto the image for a week or two once the system is returned, ddrescue-style images could get.... painful and expensive pretty fast.

 

[Richard Chapman]

So, I am back running on the target machine. testing is proving to be a bit more complicated. I have been testing the Paragon product, and while it looks good, I have not been able to boot the machine with the copied drive. Would not boot via USB cable and it turns out the copied drive (standard drive) will not fit in the machines spot for it as the original is SSD. Don't have a cable to jump it, so the test will be delayed untill I get one or another thin SSD drive to complete it. As, yes, the wonderful world of computers!

 

[Markverhyden]

I'm fairly certain you cannot boot a regular windows install/image via a USB2SATA bridge. Only a PE version.

 

[Richard Chapman]

I appreciate the advice.
I was thinking more on the lines of a sata to sata ( as in male to female ) cable, but I haven't looked yet. That or I will get another ssd and clone to that.
I tried my sata (male ) to usb and got nowhere.

 

[NJW]

ddrescue is a better tool for making a backup image if you have drive issues, but isn't as good for making them for archives - unless there's a compression option I didn't notice.

No, you didn't miss anything. You can't write a ddrescue image directly to a compressed file, because that file has to be randomly accessible – the data may not be copied in a linear fashion.

You can, however, compress a complete ddrescue image for archiving, which makes it more practical.