Apple Software Restore (asr)

Question

Level 1

0 points

Apple Software Restore (asr)

Hi,

I want to make a exactly backup of my system drive using ASR, but I want to know if in the following process the source volume is going to umount.

sudo asr -source / -target /Volumes/BACKUP_DISK -erase -noprompt

If the source Volume is going to umount. I can't use ASR because my server can't stop mail service per a moment.

And .... another question?. Do yo recommended me CCC (Carbon Clone Copier? Is is easy to use?

Thanks,
Álvaro.

Ibook G4, Mac OS X (10.5.2)

Posted on Oct 18, 2008 6:40 AM

Reply

Answer 1

Oct 18, 2008 7:51 AM in response to alraben

CCC is very easy to use. Especially if you are cloning between hard drives physically attached to your system. Unfortunately to clone any drive you have to be willing to unmount the drive you are cloning due to files being open on that drive. Otherwise, you just will be backing up the files from one drive to another. File backups are good too and also easily done with CCC.

Reply

Answer 2

Camelot

Level 9

59,271 points

Oct 18, 2008 12:24 PM in response to alraben

The asr command you quote should work fine.

As with any disk clone there may be issues with open/active files so you should try to do it when the system is idle, but it won't force an unmount of the source volume.

Reply

Answer 3

alraben Author

Level 1

0 points

Oct 19, 2008 1:01 AM in response to Camelot

Hi again,

I've seen the CCC documentation ( http://www.bombich.com/software/docs/CCCHelp/CCCHelp.html?page=clone) and I have doubts, maybe because of the Language ... :s Please clear me ...

Well, I need to clone a entire disk to another in my xserve and I want to use CCC. I *can't umount* the source because I have critical services. For a few problems last week, I have only one disk system in my server (Before RAID 1 with a Spare).

I see the following characteristics of the Block-Level copies:

---------------
+To benefit from a block-level copy, the following criteria must be met:+

+You must choose to "Delete items from the target that don't exist on the source" during the clone.+
+You must be able to unmount both devices (there cannot be any open files on either drive and you cannot be booted from either drive). Do not actually unmount the drives prior to the clone.+
+The target drive must be at least as large as the source drive.+
+If any of these criteria are not met, CCC will automatically fall back to a file-level clone. A file-level clone will yield the same result -- a bootable clone (assuming you didn't merge two operating systems), but it will take a little longer.+
--------

But I don't understand the second point. Is the CCC aplication going to umount the source? or me?. If I want a Block-Level copy must I force the umount before the clone?

So...I know that I need a file-level copy because of my condicions but I don't know how can I force to make CCC works in this mode.

Thanks for all amigos!!!

P.S Sorry for my English.

Reply