hello experts I used ghost4linux to copy small hard drive with debian etch 4 to a bigger one the g4L .23 has this feature, then after it is finished copying i started the server machine from the original (small) hard drive and it doesn't want to boot to debian which it starts with Lilo, it says: insert system disk in cdrom, so i try to use the rescue cd for debian, i used as much as i know commands and some of it says: files are read only other one says: no partion table found, now i can't get to the server and everything is down , i am not expert in linux, this is my first linux server. I don't know what to do, it is too much work for me to setup another one from the scatch again after all this work. Any help will be much appreciated and thanks in advance.
Thanks for fast reply hello mr/falko yes i checked everything after your reply again and still says: Disk boot failure insert system disk and press enter. I insert debian netinst and select rescue mode but when i select install Lilo loader it it goes to (install base system first), and i am afraid to do that it may overwrite all my files then i changed to shell run debug and it recognize the hda as hdb which is the name for the one i was copying to, honestly i am lost i don't know what is going on, if even there is a way to copy the all files on the drive i can install debian again and copy those files on it. I tried again the rescue install from debian 4.0r2 after download it and i got something interesting when i choose to install Lilo says:No system files mounted on /target so may be the hd is not mounted and how to mount it again i don't know. Thanks again very much
Thanks again for fast reply hello mr/falko I changed the cable and the power connector also the hd connection on the MB, the same result, what i can see and this is just my view is : the system files are corrupted and read only, also the drive is Unmounted, alot of these backup software Unmount the drive after copying it or hide it , that is why the drive does not work, the computer cannot recognize a hidden drive, so this drive even it is recognized in the Bios but it is not Mounted. I can get to a shell with floppy i have or debian rescue cd but the thing is i don't know alot of linux commands specially for situations like this, i thought may be i can use the shell to copy hda1 + lilo to another place on the drive, or use like mnt/mnt -0 remount hda, i am not sure of these commands but the question now is how to correct the system files and remount the drive with a shell command. BTW i am a visual foxpro former programmer and also A+ certified. mr/falko i have to add this to the post: iI just run the rescue cd and i checked with cmd fdisk -l and it says: /dev/hda does not have a valid partition table. I just decided to prepair the big HD from a-z again and i installed etc 4.0r2, fixing this problem going to take alot of work and may be end with nothing. I appreciate your help very much . Thanks very much again
You can try to boot Knoppix. It has a GUI, so you can try to mount the broken disk and try to save files from it. Afterwards, I'd try to restore the disk from your Ghost4Linux image.
hello again and thanks for your help hello again I did put it on a cd version 5.1, then after loading i put mount /dev/hda -rw and it says : could not determine the filesystem type, and none was specified. ineed some commands to see if i can get to the files then i can copy it or find a way to move it. now what is more important is a question : what is the best and simple and safe way to backup the new one now? can i back it up making like a bootable dvd ? so if this happen again i will just use the media to restore it ? Thanks very much again
A VFP programmer? Hooray, another one There are discussions threads over at http://forums.scotsnewsletter.com/ that deal with similiar problems to yours. Does your Knoppix have gparted? If not, create a SysRescue CD (http://www.sysresccd.org) and run gparted and see what it says. One problem may be that it does not see the proper disk geometry , maybe your old "disk configuration" file is being seen by the OS
Thanks chipsafts alot for the information hello chipsafts Thanks alot for the informaion i am going to try it but anyway i setup a new server with big HD so may be i will just forget about the old one. Thanks alot again.
This has me worried a bit - I think I will practice catastrophic failure before I configure my server much more. Would this be sensible?: Copy all partitions to new drive (ie as backup) and note partition table details Swap drives Work out how to get the new drive to boot (ie write partition table etc)
That will be a very good idea hello normanp this was my first bad experiance with linux, but it was my mistake if i did like you said i will not be in trouble now, the only thing why i didn't because i couldn't find an easy way to do it and even easy simple software backup with gui, and this g4L was the first one to use because you can start it from cdrom but i think i didn't use it right, there are many backup programs for linux but most of them command line and i am not very advance in linux, so you better do it before you get in trouble like me, it cost me alot of work i have to setup another one from a-z. Thanks
I certainly will! I'm thinking of something similar to Norton Ghost but using the command line. I'll have to also work out the most reliable way to restore an MBR - or at least create one consistent with the partitions. Personally I prefer command line solutions as I got so fed up with trying to remember which tab after clicking what Advanced button etc in M$ Win! Graphical interfaces have a disturbing habit of continually morphing with each new OS release...
