# Fastest way to make a exact 320GB copy?



## rmcelwee (Apr 6, 2001)

I have a 320GB series 1 that I want to start backing up every couple of weeks. What is the fastest way to do this? (looking for a command line that will make a duplicate copy - all settings and recordings)

Actually, let me rephrase my question. I have two 320GB drives. Every couple of weeks I want to pull the current drive, backup to another 320GB and put the new drive in the tivo (swapping them out every couple of weeks). I don't need them backed up as a zip file or anything. Must be an identical "large drive" backup with my modified kernal.


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## classicsat (Feb 18, 2004)

Drives on separate ATA133 busses.

Linux with LBA and UDMA enabled

dd_rescue with large blocks the sice of the cache on the drives.


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## rmcelwee (Apr 6, 2001)

Well, I tried a dd_rescue today with no luck at all.

I wasn't sure of the command line for LBA and UDMA so I probably didn't have those turned on.

I tried to use 8M as my block size but I kept getting errors (segmentation fault and floating point exception) on the two different boot cds containing dd_rescue that I had.

I also was not able to use two separate buses today but will try later.

So, the command line I used was one I used before to recover a bad drive (but with a 2M block size):

dd_rescue -B 1b -b 2M -A -v /dev/hdc /dev/hdd

After 6 hours I had backed up a grand total of 45GB. Definitely not what I was looking for <G>.


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## spike2k5 (Feb 21, 2006)

If your drive is not full, try using mfstools. 
It's little quicker than doing dd or ddrescue

You can download the latest bootcd w/ mfstools from

mfslive.org


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## rmcelwee (Apr 6, 2001)

No one has a comand line for me???


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## wscannell (Dec 7, 2003)

mfslive.org has a nice command line generator if you are using the mfslive CD.


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## rmcelwee (Apr 6, 2001)

OK, here's the solution I ended up with:

mfslive.org - download the bootable CD
hit "3" when it gives you the boot option
use the command line:
dd if=/dev/hdb of=/dev/hdc bs=2M

This took less than 4.5 hours to complete the 320GB copy (didn't see it end so I don't know exactly how long it took).

The problem with my other methods was that DMA was not being turned on the drives. The mfslive.org CD turned it on for me and that is the reason for the drastic reduction in time (1/10th) of the copy.


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