HDD/CF Mounting question

[Asmodean]

I'm currently running Amiga OS 3.2.1 on my A1200 (#1) on an internal CF disk with four partitions. DH0, DH1, DH2, DH3.

I want to copy the contents of a CF disk which I have in another A1200 (#2). The partitions in this second A1200 is exactly the same as the first one, DH0, DH1, DH2, DH3. My plan was to remove the CF card from the second A1200 (#2) and insert it into the pcmcia adapter that I use in A1200 (#1) and then copy the contents.

My question is: How does Amiga OS behave when you have DH0, DH1, DH3 and DH4 and then insert another disk which has identical names for the partitions? Can I break something when doing this?

[Nobby_UK]

Better to have #2 be HD0 to 4

Or Image the whole drive and write that to a new card

[nogginthenog]

Originally Posted by Asmodean

My question is: How does Amiga OS behave when you have DH0, DH1, DH3 and DH4 and then insert another disk which has identical names for the partitions? Can I break something when doing this?

It does something like DH0_1 (not 100% sure, it's been a long time).

[thomas]

Originally Posted by Asmodean

insert it into the pcmcia adapter


My question is: How does Amiga OS behave when you have DH0, DH1, DH3 and DH4 and then insert another disk which has identical names for the partitions?

It depends on the program you use to mount the partitions. AmigaOS won't mount anything on the PCMICA port automatically and the CF0 mountlist is for a single FAT partition on a MBR-partitioned CF card. It does not help with Amiga partitions.

[Thomas Richter]

Originally Posted by Asmodean

My question is: How does Amiga OS behave when you have DH0, DH1, DH3 and DH4 and then insert another disk which has identical names for the partitions? Can I break something when doing this?

This doesn't work at all. Partitions and removable media are mutually exclusive. Removable media do not take an RDB. Instead, they should have the "SuperFloppy" keyword set in their mount list.


For removable media(!) the FFS is smart enough to distinguish between device names and volume names, and it distinguishes by the volume name and, failing that, the time stamp in the root block. IOWs, it works exactly as it does for floppies were you can also simply make a copy of a floppy of the same name, and there is no confusion provided the time stamp is adjusted.



In such a case, the two floppies (or removable media) are both accessed under the same device name (DF0: or DH0 but under different volume names ("Workbench 3.1:" vs. "Copy of Workbench 3.1:"), and even if the volume names are different, the FFS can tell them apart on the date.


This does not work any different for "super floppies" (see above), but there is not a single instance in AmigaOs that re-reads the RDB of a (non-super floppy) partitioned media.

[Asmodean]

Thanks for the answers!

Sounds like it might not be so simple as to mount several FFS partitions on the PCMCIA adapter interface then even if the names of the partitions will be taken care of

[thomas]

Originally Posted by Asmodean

Sounds like it might not be so simple as to mount several FFS partitions on the PCMCIA adapter interface

It is. You just need a program which does it for you, it's not done automatically.

OS 3.2 has the Mounter utility which should be able to do it.

And you should not remove the CF card from the PCMCIA slot after you mounted the partitions.

[Leon Besson]

Originally Posted by Nobby_UK

Better to have #2 be HD0 to 4

Or Image the whole drive and write that to a new card

2nd that. I use a program on Windows called USBimager that I use to to raw image copies of my SD and CF cards for the Amiga. You just need a USB multi card device and away you go. Just my 2 cents/pence worth Bromigo!

[bdb]

I've done this by just using 2 CF card readers, AOMEI Partition Assistant and a simple "Clone Disk" of the otherwise, unknown CF Card. It works like the Linux DD command, and makes a perfect copy of CF cards for my A1200's.

AOMEI have a free home version, although I use it so much, I use the paid version.