Re: Theoretical drive swapidge.
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jeremy jozwik wrote:
> what i am hoping for however is to more or less mirror the current
> drive / instillation over to the larger drive that will be installed.
> i would rather not have to re-install debian and all its
> configurations to the larger drive.
It has been a while since I have had the need to do this, but I have
done this successfully using a live CD. I created the partitions exactly
how I wanted them with Gparted and then used partimage to copy the
partitions over. The reason I used partimage over something like dd is
because dd would resize the partition as it was making an exact copy.
Using partimage I just told it to copy over the data and expand to the
larger partition on the new drive. I was told partimage uses dd in the
background so it obviously knows the right flags that I don't. Either
way, it is a nice interface to the whole process.
Two words of my own personal advice (take or leave as you see fit).
1) Use something like BleachBit (It is in Squeeze don't think it is in
Lenny) to wipe free disk space. I have found that a drive that has been
well used takes a LONG time to copy over, but when you zero out all the
'empty' space and only copy over the retained data you actually want, it
goes much faster. You may prefer to not risk this and wait out the time.
When I did this I went from a bunch of 300GB drives to 1TB drives, the
drives that I zeroed out the /scratch partition that held temp files
(~80% of the drive) were done so much faster then the one I did the
whole drive without zeroing. It makes sense though. Copy 50GB vs 300GB.
You only have an 80GB drive so you may just want to wait it out. Up to you.
2) Practice the methods on a drive with data you don't care about losing
first. Dig out some old 10GB drives from the back of the computer bin or
something, test it out, and keep good notes. It is really just a test to
make sure you don't make a silly mistake that zero's out your whole hard
drive or try to copy the wrong partition to the wrong place and lose
data. You *should* have a backup before you start, but restoring can be
a bother so this is just an extra step to help ensure you don't mess
something up when it is time to do the real thing. They say practice
makes perfect, right?
> ok, does it help if i have another machine where i can mount both the
> old laptop drive and the newer laptop drive and then do a copy
> everything from old to new and still retain a working machine?
If your laptop can hold both drives at the same time then you don't have
to have another system. Also, if you don't mind USB speeds, there are
plenty of adapters you could use to have both online. However, if you
have a spare system ready to go that requires no modification then might
as well use it. If you don't have an adapter and your laptop can't use
both at the same time, it would be recommended to have another system.
Hope this helps!
~Stack~
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