thank you for your response; what i want the result to be is that i have an internal backup of my entire drive , in case hda fails someday. what i would like to do is, once the whole drive (hda) is copied to hdb, to periodically just do updates so that it stays a mirror of hda. is that possible? i don't plan on ever using hdb, and hdb is a large as hda. so if i do ; # dd if=/dev/hda of=/dev/hdc bs=4k as you suggested (changing hdc to hdb, of course) would i need to partition the drive (hdb) first??? or just format it? i have never booted from a live CD so i guess i have to dig one out of the drawer of software, i know i have at least one, i think knoppix and maybe mepis??. betty i > : Sat, 18 Nov 2006 10:05:53 -0700 > From: "Eric \"Shubes\"" > Subject: Re: dump on to hdb > > > I think that dd would be better suited. > > > > What do you want the result to be? How do you plan to use the new and old > drives? > > If you want your new drive to look exactly like the old one, and the new one > is at least as large as the old one, you can easily do this with dd (new > drive is hdc in this example): > > # dd if=/dev/hda of=/dev/hdc bs=4k > > Be sure that you boot from a Live CD before doing this, as both drive should > not be mounted when doing this command. > > --------------------------------------------------- PLUG-discuss mailing list - PLUG-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us To subscribe, unsubscribe, or to change you mail settings: http://lists.PLUG.phoenix.az.us/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss