partimage

Forum: Apps
Topic: partimage
started by: doglover

Posted by doglover on May 31 2007,01:08

Hello. I am trying to learn linux but caught in a catch-22 since I can't get partimage to work. I wonder if the problem is partially (? entirely) because I was given a very old Pentium 1 laptop with 32 meg of RAM, and it is kinda a piece of garbage. The problem:

I want to copy off the contents of the win98 hard drive so I can wipe it and put linux on it so I can learn. I have used partimage before, so I want to use it again to copy the contents to an external hard drive or even a big thumb drive.

DSL 3.3 liveCD will load just fine by itself, so not a problem. It does lock up alot, though, as I use it. Anyhow, partimage does not come on the DSL distro, so I want to add it. I read through the DSL forums, and downloaded rescue.dsl. I put it on the thumb drive in a mydsl directory, but when booting and getting to the part where it loads the extension, I get a run of errors about can't find files and running out of processes. Then I saw that another post said to just get the executable and run it, not to worry about libraries because they would be there. Well, it can't find the libraries. I tried adding the rescue.dsl to the iso file in a mydsl folder using winiso, but when I boot I get a isolinux checksum error. I tried several times to make this CD, always the same result. I then put the rescue.dsl in my home folder, and tried the MyDSL install tool. I loaded up and looked like it tried to do something, but I can't find the files and after this no command line instruction would work, it just said it couldn't find any command, even ls or sudo or anything. So I just had to shut down.

I am not sure what else to try. The other distros that have partimage are too big. The one that came closest to working was INSERT, where partimage would load, but freeze when it started writing the file.

Any suggestions? It's not like I haven't tried. I have spent days trying different things. Thanks,
IMF

Posted by ^thehatsrule^ on May 31 2007,01:56

I guess you want to "clone" your current win98 installation? You could use `dd` (I think it was cybercod who posted several scripts for backing up partitions).

I'm guessing you ran out of memory... hence your problems and lock ups. If you get these problems without loading any extensions you might need to use some cheatcodes such as lowram nousb etc. You might also want to try the swap-in-ramdisk technique. If these problems are just from loading the extension, you should try using a .unc (or convert it into one).

Posted by doglover on May 31 2007,02:48

Thanks for the feedback. Yes you are probably right, I wondered if I was running out of memory. Also, I saw the posts describing dd and also bzip2. I was just less familiar with them, more familiar with programs like partition magic, partimage, and ntfsclone. I will try and follow their instructions. Thanks,
IMF

Posted by WDef on May 31 2007,23:32

partimage on INSERT works well.

The references you have read to 'just using the binary' are referring to the static binaries for partimage, which are hard to find but can be downloaded for the release before the current one.

If I was you, I'd just backup the files I wanted to save from your win98 laptop and then just trash the win98 install.

You can always get hold of win98 installation disks and reinstall it later if need be - I assume there's some legal way to do that.