[SOLVED] Alternative to Ghost under Ubuntu 10.04

[stefanofalone]

Hi everyone,
I am quite new to Linux environment. I come from Windows where I backup frequently my partition by using Symantec Norton Ghost; in case of corruptions, viruses, driver issues etc., I can restore partition image and be "on the road" again.
Now, as I said, I am switching to Linux and I'd be glad to find something similar to backup my ext2 partition. Actually, I found partimage but it cannot operate on a mounted partition so I am forced to use the tool from a CD/usb drive. That is boring and unfriendly; with Ghost I am able to backup the main windows partition with windows running!
In addition, I'd like to save my image file in a NTFS partition, when I store my data and documents.
Is there anyone who can help me, please? Thanks in advance.

Stefano

[oz]

I'd personally recommend that you do all your system imaging from a liveCD rather than on the live system. Some apps that will work well for system imaging are Clonezilla, FSArchiver, Ghost4Linux, and PartImage, and some of those apps come on the Parted Magic LiveCD, which also includes a number of other handy utilities.

Other cloning/imaging apps can be found here.

For my own Linux imaging, I use a Linux version of Acronis True Image that runs from a liveCD, and it has worked perfectly for the last 5 or 6 years.

Best of luck with whichever route you choose.

[hatebreed]

You can use norton ghost from dos too. I've used this many times and works great. ghost is the fastest image program i've ever used and it can burn cds or dvds from dos if you wish.

[kerim]

You can do live backup under linux too . Like norton ghost do.You must have a logical volume manager todo.Then you must have a free space for snaphost for lvm.

Another program is clonezilla . It is a live cd.You can take image from your hdd.

Select two one of them.But my choice is lvm better and get image from running system with lvm2.

[Mudgen]

I use g4l:
G4L | freshmeat.net
G4L | Get G4L at SourceForge.net
It's very robustly maintained, and in years of using it, I've had exactly one machine I couldn't get it to work on.

It's a re-engineer of the old g4u. g4u is once again being maintained, but the mailing list has had only one post in the past year, so not a lot going on with it. The g4l maintainer responds fairly quickly to questions posted on the comment page (first link above).

[robertdaleweir]

Hi
I used Ghost for years. Of late I have been using Clonezilla. I have backed up and restored full systems and individual partitions of everything from Win 2k, WinXP, Win 7 and all of my many Linux Distros. I downloaded a 64 Bit Live Distro which I use on the computer of interest and I boot it from a CD which I burned the Bootable ISO onto.
I can tell you that it may not be so spiffy but it works seemlessly, much like Ghost 5d which booted into a Dos OS. I couldn't be happier with a utility! I still believe that if you want a solid backup do it with the OS not running.
Cheers...
Robert

[zarliexs]

for my little experience, you can also use Hiren's boot cd.. the cd contains various application for users to use, from backup like ghost, acronis, pwd reset and other things that embedded on this disc..

[Route]

for my little experience, you can also use Hiren's boot cd.. the cd contains various application for users to use, from backup like ghost, acronis, pwd reset and other things that embedded on this disc..

That thing is OP. It's like a lockpicking kit that has an easy to use instructions guide, can also make a new lock with a different combination, or if necessary can just switch the door out for an easier one, or a different type of house, and still fits inside a little velvet bag.

I bring it with me whenever anyone says "windows won't let me log in!" because I know I'll be able to say "Windows doesn't get to do that around me"

That being said, I don't spread the word about it much as I don't think all the software in it is free and legal, and good things are most often ruined by becoming too widely known.

[glene77is]

This is from the Part-Image docs, editing is mine:

[Filesystem being backedup must be unmounted and inaccessible to other programs.
This means that when backing up the "system" filesystem,
the ... ]+[ "system" filesystem ]+[ ...is down.]

This is my message:

I have always done backup-Images from either from DOS (for Windows) and plan to continue this practice from a Linux Live-CD.

Logically, I have a problem imagining that a program can image its own "running system", since this "running system" is writing out to a swap file to keep track of its own "running system" operations.

This is like copying a "moving target",
and looks like it will be inviting problems.

Anyway, When you do the "RESTORE",
then you will have to be running from a different system!

Buena suerte!

glene77is

[Robertnlr]

Hi Stefanofalone,

Having used Acronis True Image home 2010 or its earlier releases for years on both Windows of all shades, and Linux of all flavors with few to no problems, I would recommend it. The free flavors are good, I'm sure, but I would suspect that lots of folks use True Image and keep them honest and up to date.