[andwan0]

My Libretto laptop 166MHz 64MB has no USB nor CD-ROM drive but it does have floppy disk booting.

I like to disk image my C:\ which contains Windows 98 SE however the problem is... most modern disk imaging are cumbersome, requires powerful PC, CD-ROM, etc. So I thought about using linux tools but problem is am not acquinted with linux. Anyway, I found a floppy linux distro (tomsrtbt). Then I found PartImage. Big problem is that most of linux tools must be built. I can't build PartImage on a P1 166MHz, it'll take forever and probably kill this 13 year old CPU.

Anyone have any good ideas? Regarding imaging a USB-less CD-ROM-less laptop?

[submix8c]

?another PC using LapLink (COM/LPT ports, "copy" not "image")?

Note: You can usually find most prebuilt Linux components, but you still need to boot to Linux to use them. Did you plan to re-size the HDD???

Anyone else???

[jason_brown1977]

andwan0, on 12 March 2010 - 01:15 PM, said:

My Libretto laptop 166MHz 64MB has no USB nor CD-ROM drive but it does have floppy disk booting.

I like to disk image my C:\ which contains Windows 98 SE however the problem is... most modern disk imaging are cumbersome, requires powerful PC, CD-ROM, etc. So I thought about using linux tools but problem is am not acquinted with linux. Anyway, I found a floppy linux distro (tomsrtbt). Then I found PartImage. Big problem is that most of linux tools must be built. I can't build PartImage on a P1 166MHz, it'll take forever and probably kill this 13 year old CPU.

Anyone have any good ideas? Regarding imaging a USB-less CD-ROM-less laptop?

If you have a newer system and that machine has a hard drive that is fairly easy to pull. You can purchase one of these: http://eshop.macsale...ogy/U2NV2SPATA/
That adapter is compatible with Mac and Windows. You can use that to hook your drive from your laptop up to another machine via USB and use a newer imaging technology to make a copy of the drive. I currently employ 2 of those at my job on PATA for desktop and laptop as well as SATA with no issues moving between mac and windows systems. Very good value for the money. Another side benefit is, if you pick up 2 of them, you can hook up another drive, and clone your drive to that one and hold a bootable copy ready to clone back over at any point without having to store an image file on your machine. Or you could store the image file on that second hard drive. Norton Ghost 15 would be a good program to make the backup if you want something like that. If you are comfortable in a UNIX like environment, you can download clonezilla live and use it to image the drive to another one. Clonezilla will detect that external usb drive adapter with no problem.

[Prozactive]

I agree. I would remove the HD, put it in an USB enclosure, then use another system with USB to image it using Norton Ghost or some other imaging program.

[andwan0]

I was hoping for a floppy solution, ie. PartImage on a floppy rebuilt.... but I don't know whether PartImage is small enough for a floppy...

[jason_brown1977]

andwan0, on 13 March 2010 - 11:09 AM, said:

I was hoping for a floppy solution, ie. PartImage on a floppy rebuilt.... but I don't know whether PartImage is small enough for a floppy...

The problem with a floppy backup is the facts that they are incredibly small and incredibly easy to break. Very easy to lose all your data due to a bad sector. HDD may still be magnetic media, however it is allot more robust than floppy and you wont have to have roughly 700 floppies or more for a 1 gig drive. Not sure how large your drive is, but even for a 250 meg drive, thats roughly 170 floppies or more.

This post has been edited by jason_brown1977: 13 March 2010 - 11:15 AM

[andwan0]

jason_brown1977, on 13 March 2010 - 11:13 AM, said:

andwan0, on 13 March 2010 - 11:09 AM, said:

I was hoping for a floppy solution, ie. PartImage on a floppy rebuilt.... but I don't know whether PartImage is small enough for a floppy...

The problem with a floppy backup is the facts that they are incredibly small and incredibly easy to break. Very easy to lose all your data due to a bad sector. HDD may still be magnetic media, however it is allot more robust than floppy and you wont have to have roughly 700 floppies or more for a 1 gig drive. Not sure how large your drive is, but even for a 250 meg drive, thats roughly 170 floppies or more.

Lol, I didn't mean putting the backup image to floppy... just boot a linux distro from floppy ... and running some linux imaging program via floppy or even from the HD... and putting the image file to ANOTHER partition on the same HD.

[jaclaz]

andwan0, on 13 March 2010 - 11:19 AM, said:

Lol, I didn't mean putting the backup image to floppy... just boot a linux distro from floppy ... and running some linux imaging program via floppy or even from the HD... and putting the image file to ANOTHER partition on the same HD.

Well, not the smartest solution I've seen, an image should be useful in case of media (or device) problems, imaging on the same device looks more like a "recovery partition" than anything else.

Where are you located?

A no-name el-cheapo USB interface can be found for as little as a few bucks (examples):
http://cgi.ebay.com/...=item1e5ae01041
http://cgi.ebay.com/...=item2a049eaf5b

Imaging apps:
http://www.msfn.org/...howtopic=100299
a small DOS one:
http://www.msfn.org/...ic=100299&st=16
a COMPLETE DOS solution:
http://www.partition-saving.com/

jaclaz

[submix8c]

andwan0, on 12 March 2010 - 01:15 PM, said:

My Libretto laptop 166MHz 64MB has no USB nor CD-ROM drive but it does have floppy disk booting.
<snip>
Anyone have any good ideas? Regarding imaging a USB-less CD-ROM-less laptop?

Why the suggestions to use USB ("removal" would work)? Did I miss something?

This post has been edited by submix8c: 14 March 2010 - 10:22 AM

[dencorso]

The idea is to open the machine, just disconnect the HDD from it without actually removing the HDD and, using an el-cheapo PATA/SATA to USB converter, connect it via USB to another machine just for imaging. It's a time proven procedure that works quite well. I do that quite often.

[submix8c]

andwan0, on 13 March 2010 - 11:09 AM, said:

I was hoping for a floppy solution

submix8c, on 14 March 2010 - 10:18 AM, said:

"removal" would work

I'm not really sure the OP intended to "open it up"...

Since someone suggested Ghost, marry that with my Original Suggestion (LapLink cable), and use the Peer-to-Peer option.
1 - Connect the cable
2 - FloppyBoot Target PC (waits for "client")
3 - FloppyBoot Source ("client") PC
4 - Ghost-away!!!

No matter which way you slice it, there's no "free"/"simple" way to do it.
- An external solution requires purchase of associated hardware and opening the Laptop.
- A Software solution is... (think I just said that) but requires purchase.
* Alternative Software solutions that work like Ghost (as above)? Dunno...

In summary... Was I arguing/disputing?

[dencorso]

Norton Ghost 2003 is not free but cheap (on, say, eBay) and would do it nicely.
As for LapLink, in case one has the appropriate cable, DOS Interlnk can be used almost as easily.
So I think the best suggestion, in fact, would be Ghost 2003 with a LapLinked/Interlnked drive as the destination.