Best way to backup an Amiga harddisk with a PC?

th4t1guy · 17 February 2010, 04:06

Well, it's time to upgrade the harddrive in my cd32/sx-1 to a CF card, but I need to backup the data on my harddrive first. Right now, the only other device I have that will read the drive is a laptop.

Is there a good way to read the Amiga filesystem on a PC? Preferably with something I can boot from a usb disk like a small linux distro. I think the filesystem is FFS, I used the OS3.9 boot disk to originally install.

I'm hoping I won't have to use a serial cable, but I guess that option is also open.

T_hairy_bootson · 17 February 2010, 06:22

If you have a usb to ide adapter or one of those usb ide enclosures you could load the HDD up in winuae and back it up to the PC no sweat.

fitzsteve · 17 February 2010, 10:10

Quote:

Originally Posted by T_hairy_bootson

If you have a usb to ide adapter or one of those usb ide enclosures you could load the HDD up in winuae and back it up to the PC no sweat.

+1

Thats exactly what I use, was about £4 off ebay

Perfect for the job...

th4t1guy · 17 February 2010, 16:27

Thanks guys. That's definately an option, but I'm hoping to do this without spending any more money, as the only thing I would ever use that adapter for is to back up this drive the one time. It's an 800meg drive, so I'll probably trash it once I get the data off it.

thomas · 17 February 2010, 17:01

Quote:

I'm hoping to do this without spending any more money

Well, then you should list what you already have, only then one can tell you how you could use it.

For example, you wrote "the only other device I have that will read the drive is a laptop". This means for me that you already have a method to connect the drive to your laptop and to read it. If this is the case, you only need some software to read the data. This can be done easily with WinUAE.

If you don't have nothing and just *think* that the laptop could read the drive, then you need to spend money. You need at least a cable or something.

th4t1guy · 17 February 2010, 17:18

Quote:

Originally Posted by thomas

Well, then you should list what you already have, only then one can tell you how you could use it.

For example, you wrote "the only other device I have that will read the drive is a laptop". This means for me that you already have a method to connect the drive to your laptop and to read it. If this is the case, you only need some software to read the data. This can be done easily with WinUAE.

If you don't have nothing and just *think* that the laptop could read the drive, then you need to spend money. You need at least a cable or something.

I can plug the drive into the IDE slot of the laptop, but then I'm stuck having to boot from a usb mem stick or a CD. I guess I can throw XP and winuae on the flash stick though. Do I need anything special installed to get the partitions recognized in XP, or does WinUAE handle all of that?

Photon · 17 February 2010, 17:56

Quote:

Originally Posted by th4t1guy

Thanks guys. That's definately an option, but I'm hoping to do this without spending any more money, as the only thing I would ever use that adapter for is to back up this drive the one time. It's an 800meg drive, so I'll probably trash it once I get the data off it.

Trash it now (or put it aside) and install whatever you want to run instead. That way you save the $7 (or can wait until you have it).

If you can connect it to the laptop, install XP and WinUAE, and 'add harddrive' (source 800mb hdd) + 'add harddisk directory' (destination in winxp installation where the files are backed up to).

alexh · 17 February 2010, 22:20

Quote:

Originally Posted by th4t1guy

I can plug the drive into the IDE slot of the laptop

Is it the right size, thickness wise? Most Amiga hard drives are full height 2.5" IDE drives and do not fit in Laptop's.

What is on your HDD you would want to back up? You can probably download anything not self created.

th4t1guy · 18 February 2010, 00:39

Quote:

Originally Posted by alexh

Is it the right size, thickness wise? Most Amiga hard drives are full height 2.5" IDE drives and do not fit in Laptop's.

What is on your HDD you would want to back up? You can probably download anything not self created.

It's the small one. It was hooked up to my sx-1 previously, but I threw in a CF ide adapter + 8gb card. I had done something to get the CD-drive recognized in OS3.9 (been so long ago I don't remember what is was anymore...I think maybe I used a custom device?), and there's also some WHDLoad games with specific boot options to get them working on there. I think I still have my OS3.9 boot disk somewhere, so I might have a go with that and see how well the install works.

th4t1guy · 22 February 2010, 00:57

Well, it looks like I can't run WinUAE from a winPE install on a flash drive because it's missing components, and manually copying the dll's over doesn't work.
Are there any other tools I can use to read amiga partitions, or is winuae it?

Jope · 22 February 2010, 09:32

If FFS, Linux can do it if there's RDB and AFFS support built into the kernel.

thomas · 22 February 2010, 09:41

With Linux you can also do a full-volume dump of the drive by a simple command like

cp /dev/hda /mybackup.hdf

The HDF file can then be used in WinUAE to access files.

Mounting FFS directly in Linux has the disadvantage that you loose file notes and Amiga-specific protection bits.

Jope · 22 February 2010, 10:21

I'd use dd myself to make that image, cp would probably only make a copy of the device node.

dd if=/dev/hda of=~/amiga.hdf

Naturally you must select the correct device. Don't add any partition numbers after it, just take an image of the entire drive like Thomas said.

Muzer · 22 February 2010, 11:53

Yes - boot a Linux (I prefer Ubuntu) live CD with a USB drive big enough to fit the entire size of the hard drive (NOT JUST ALL THE FILES), mount the USB drive (let's say it's mounted at /media/disk for this example) and type:

sudo dd if=/dev/sda of=/media/disk/amigabackup.img

This will make an image of the whole disk. I presume this will work for the hardfiles feature in UAE, but I'm not sure so don't quote me on this

Jope · 22 February 2010, 12:08

WinUAE will accept a dump of the entire drive as a .hdf.

th4t1guy · 22 February 2010, 18:24

Hmm...that may work for me. I'll see if I can get ubuntu running off my flash drive and try backing it up to a hardfile. Thanks!

17 February 2010, 04:06	#1
th4t1guy Registered User Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: Kansas City, MO, USA Posts: 683	Best way to backup an Amiga harddisk with a PC? Well, it's time to upgrade the harddrive in my cd32/sx-1 to a CF card, but I need to backup the data on my harddrive first. Right now, the only other device I have that will read the drive is a laptop. Is there a good way to read the Amiga filesystem on a PC? Preferably with something I can boot from a usb disk like a small linux distro. I think the filesystem is FFS, I used the OS3.9 boot disk to originally install. I'm hoping I won't have to use a serial cable, but I guess that option is also open.

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17 February 2010, 06:22	#2
T_hairy_bootson Workbitch 1.3 Join Date: Oct 2001 Location: Melbourne, Australia Age: 46 Posts: 2,084	If you have a usb to ide adapter or one of those usb ide enclosures you could load the HDD up in winuae and back it up to the PC no sweat.

17 February 2010, 16:27	#4
th4t1guy Registered User Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: Kansas City, MO, USA Posts: 683	Thanks guys. That's definately an option, but I'm hoping to do this without spending any more money, as the only thing I would ever use that adapter for is to back up this drive the one time. It's an 800meg drive, so I'll probably trash it once I get the data off it.

22 February 2010, 00:57	#10
th4t1guy Registered User Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: Kansas City, MO, USA Posts: 683	Well, it looks like I can't run WinUAE from a winPE install on a flash drive because it's missing components, and manually copying the dll's over doesn't work. Are there any other tools I can use to read amiga partitions, or is winuae it?

22 February 2010, 09:32	#11
Jope - Join Date: Jul 2003 Location: Helsinki / Finland Age: 43 Posts: 9,861	If FFS, Linux can do it if there's RDB and AFFS support built into the kernel.

22 February 2010, 09:41	#12
thomas Registered User Join Date: Jan 2002 Location: Germany Posts: 6,985	With Linux you can also do a full-volume dump of the drive by a simple command like cp /dev/hda /mybackup.hdf The HDF file can then be used in WinUAE to access files. Mounting FFS directly in Linux has the disadvantage that you loose file notes and Amiga-specific protection bits.

22 February 2010, 10:21	#13
Jope - Join Date: Jul 2003 Location: Helsinki / Finland Age: 43 Posts: 9,861	I'd use dd myself to make that image, cp would probably only make a copy of the device node. dd if=/dev/hda of=~/amiga.hdf Naturally you must select the correct device. Don't add any partition numbers after it, just take an image of the entire drive like Thomas said.

22 February 2010, 11:53	#14
Muzer Registered User Join Date: Sep 2009 Location: UK Posts: 146	Yes - boot a Linux (I prefer Ubuntu) live CD with a USB drive big enough to fit the entire size of the hard drive (NOT JUST ALL THE FILES), mount the USB drive (let's say it's mounted at /media/disk for this example) and type: sudo dd if=/dev/sda of=/media/disk/amigabackup.img This will make an image of the whole disk. I presume this will work for the hardfiles feature in UAE, but I'm not sure so don't quote me on this

22 February 2010, 12:08	#15
Jope - Join Date: Jul 2003 Location: Helsinki / Finland Age: 43 Posts: 9,861	WinUAE will accept a dump of the entire drive as a .hdf.

22 February 2010, 18:24	#16
th4t1guy Registered User Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: Kansas City, MO, USA Posts: 683	Hmm...that may work for me. I'll see if I can get ubuntu running off my flash drive and try backing it up to a hardfile. Thanks!

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