hard disk imaging tool

[deadmeat]

not sure if this needs to be in hardware or software sorry about that.

In the post below I managed to connect and spin my old SCSI drive that had some issues, I am able to boot it however the disk is largely empty because I probably deleted programs back in the 90s to make room for an experimental BBS I ran for friends - I do not think I've formatted the disk but just deleted files. Now I'd like to try recovering as much I can of my old files but would like to do it on winuae... is there a way to exactly copy the entire hard disk on an image file or another hard disk (I've a zuluscsi where I can create the space I need) ? And if so is there a good file recovery program?

PS: I've tried the zuluscsi initiator feature but does not seem to work...


https://eab.abime.net/showthread.php?t=115796

[Lynk]

You can image the hdd from winuae itself if you can connect it to the pc via a usb scsi cable.

I run a Windows xp laptop and and older version of winuae to image scsi hdd's with a usb to scsi cable.

[Nor Bert]

If your SCSI drive is up to 2GB then you can do a disk image on an Amiga and an Amiga filesystem.
I recommend the program TSGUI.

[Jope]

If you prefer the command line, fat95 comes with an amigaized version of dd

[deadmeat]

Originally Posted by Lynk

You can image the hdd from winuae itself if you can connect it to the pc via a usb scsi cable.

I run a Windows xp laptop and and older version of winuae to image scsi hdd's with a usb to scsi cable.

I didn't even know this existed, but honestly I don't plan to invest on one of those adapter to use it only once: thanks for the suggestion anyway.

[deadmeat]

Originally Posted by Nor Bert

If your SCSI drive is up to 2GB then you can do a disk image on an Amiga and an Amiga filesystem.
I recommend the program TSGUI.

Perfect will give it a try (my hd is 100MB).

[mark_k]

What I would do (given your system has some fast RAM) is something like this:
- Build a bootable floppy which loads a later Kickstart version (3.1) using ReKick or similar.
- On the same disk you can have the GVP 3.15 driver and load that using BindDrivers.
- And also on the disk, put the Dev-Handler package and its associated Extract program. And SCSIQuery which you can use to e.g. find the exact capacity of the drive.

You would boot the floppy and then use (very carefully) Dev-Handler and the Extract program to create partial image files (e.g. several chunks of 10MB) on a partition on the ZuluSCSI. You can then join those together on the PC.

I did something similar back in the day to image a 9GB drive that came in an old Macintosh I bought. (That was trickier since I had to use NsdPatch to allow access past the 4GB point.)

[steveed]

Edited as I missed the part about the initiator. Not sure what the issue you had with the initiator mode in the other post, I had some trouble with mine and I just had to update to the latest version on the RP2040. I also found it was a bit picky with SD Cards.

You can use a zulusci RP2040 in initiator mode and it will clone the drive onto the SD card. You don't need a computer at all. Just connect the zulu to the HD and then power the HD. You can also watch the status of the backup via the serial console using a USB to micro USB.

[deadmeat]

Originally Posted by steveed

Edited as I missed the part about the initiator. Not sure what the issue you had with the initiator mode in the other post, I had some trouble with mine and I just had to update to the latest version on the RP2040. I also found it was a bit picky with SD Cards.

You can use a zulusci RP2040 in initiator mode and it will clone the drive onto the SD card. You don't need a computer at all. Just connect the zulu to the HD and then power the HD. You can also watch the status of the backup via the serial console using a USB to micro USB.

Ok I didn't really make a lot of effort with that, I've just connected everything and set the switch initiator but nothing happened. Will give it a try again. For the serial console is there any documentation? Any serial speed or setting will work?

[deadmeat]

Originally Posted by mark_k

What I would do (given your system has some fast RAM) is something like this:
- Build a bootable floppy which loads a later Kickstart version (3.1) using ReKick or similar.
- On the same disk you can have the GVP 3.15 driver and load that using BindDrivers.
- And also on the disk, put the Dev-Handler package and its associated Extract program. And SCSIQuery which you can use to e.g. find the exact capacity of the drive.

You would boot the floppy and then use (very carefully) Dev-Handler and the Extract program to create partial image files (e.g. several chunks of 10MB) on a partition on the ZuluSCSI. You can then join those together on the PC.

I did something similar back in the day to image a 9GB drive that came in an old Macintosh I bought. (That was trickier since I had to use NsdPatch to allow access past the 4GB point.)

This looks a bit more complex that I tought, will give it a try. Would be much easier to test all this on winuae but not sure if possible as I still can't find the proper rom to use on the emulated GVP controller.

[mark_k]

Norbert's suggestion of TSGUI may well be worth trying first.

I'll try to find the ROM image I used for GVP Series I emulation. But it would be better to (on your real hardware) disable the old ROM and load gvpscsi 3.15 via BindDrivers.

[steveed]

With the disk imaging there are a few things.
1. update the zulu to latest revision.
2. use a blank SD card.
3. connect a micro-usb cable to your computer. On my mac I did this `screen /dev/cu.usbmodem211101` to watch the logs. On my windows machine I just connected Putty to COM8 (that's what showed up in the device manager). Speed does not matter.
4. connect the zulu directly to the hd and then power the HD (no need to power the zulu)

[deadmeat]

Made very good progress - thanks to Steveed for the instructions on how to use correctly the initiator mode. It actually worked flawlessy and I managed to get my hard drive imaged on the SD card. I can't autoboot from it on winuae as GVP driver 3.15 does not see a drive prepped with with the old version but I can access it by manually loading scsidev.

I think faastprep is actually able to convert old drives to new mode... will give it a try (on a copy).

Once again thanks... I also managed to burn a fresh copy of 3.15 roms that actually works on the controller so once I copy content on a drive prepped with the new version (that I can load in winuae) I can freely use the drive on PC with winuae and on the amiga with the zuluscsi.

This is perfect.