As mentioned before, since I’m now using Ubuntu, my focus would be tools that should runs on Linux. But keeping in mind that many non-technical users are on Windows and I also uses MacOSX, the perfect backup solution is indeed one that runs on the 3 major platforms – Linux, Mac and Windows.

As with most solution search these day, the first stop is to visit the seach engine and generate a few alternatives as the starting point.

With the increasing popularity of using the “cloud”, the other alternative is to backup to one of those online backup services. A few that I had tried come to mind – Mozy, Carbonite, Wuala and here is a list with comparison.

So far none had led me to sustained use.

Now that Google is providing space to upload any file, perhaps someone will soon come up with a way backup files to Google. The price for additional space is pretty attractive too.

Do you have any other recommendation?

Related Post:

• Revisiting Alternative Disk/Partition Cloning Tools
• Alternative Disk/Partition Cloning Tools
• Brainstorming a Backup Strategy

I actually did got something out of that exercise but things began to turn really busy after that. In fact using that same tool, I cloned and deployed more than 30 Ubuntu desktop.

So which is it? Clonezilla.

Halfway throght the list, Clonezilla fit the bill so well that it wasn’t necessary to try the other.

So far clonezilla has worked for me on Windows XP and Ubuntu system. It has even worked on virtual machine on VirtualBox.

How does it work?

First download a copy from the website. You can either get the ISO and burn it onto a CD or get the USB version and put it on an usb thumbdrive.

For newer PC, the BIOS can be set to boot up from a usb thumbdrive. By using this I deployed many desktops without CD drive.

CloneZilla is actually built on top of Linux (based on Debian and Ubuntu for the experimental version). So just insert the CD or thumbdrive and boot up the system.

Usage is rather simple and easy but you might want to try it out on a non-critical machine to get the hang of using it.

When using Clonezilla, there are a few terminolgies to pay attention and get to know well what they mean.

Save/Restore
This means whether to save the existing disk/partition or to restore from a copy that was previously saved.

If it is the first time you are running, you probably want save.

If you are installing a new PC and want to use a clone of another PC, you will want to restore the clone onto the new PC.

Disk/Partition
Disk means the entire harddisk. Partition means just the partition you had selected to save or restore.

Clonezilla use compression and can take care of empty spaces, so even if you have a new 1T disk with a newly installed system, the resulting image should be rather small.

If the orignial disk or partition has different size, it might still work, but be careful, especially if the target is smaller than the original. To be safe make sure the disk to be cloned is the same as the original.

Image/Device
Clonezilla can save the disk or partition as an image. An image is a set of files that can be save somewhere (see the next section on image location). This image can then be used multiple times to clone new machines with the present of the original.

Also you upgrade the system you can create new image so that new clones get the updates as well.

Alternatively, you can directly clone a device to another device. If you have two identical hard disk attached, you can clone one to the other using a device-device mode.

Image save to/read from location
One thing I like so much about clonezilla it the flexibility it offers in terms of where to save/restore the image files.

Choose from, local partition (not the same as the one being saved), usb attached storage, network attach storage via NFS, Samba or even ssh.

If you have a Linux box running on the network, simply follow the few simple steps to configure the network and save the image via ssh. To clone a new machine, simply attach the network and copy back the image.

Conclusion
For businesses or home user with more than a few PC to mainain, Clonezilla can help to deploy standard setup, manage configuration, shortern setup time, and provide an easy way to backup.

Compared to commercial application that does similar task, it easily meet or exceed the task requirement of cloning disk and partition.

If you have used Clonezilla, tried other disk cloning tools or has other recommendation, why not leave a comment.

Where to get it?

• Clonezilla is at http://www.clonezilla.org/
• Current version: Stable version is 1.2.1-53
• Function: Disk/Partition Cloning

Related Post:

• Alternative Disk/Partition Cloning Tools
• Revisiting the Search for a Backup Solution
• Brainstorming a Backup Strategy

The selection has certainly improved and matured since I research this topic more than 2 years ago. Back then a few alternatives (including SystemRescueCD and PartD, Partition Saving) was tested but none gives the comfort that the restore would be fail-proof should the need suddenly appears. The main problem I remembered was NTFS wasn’t well supported at that time. In the end I stuck to Norton Ghost.

Now it is time to return to this topic after installing 2 PCs in 2 days and potentially having to provision 100 more PCs to come.

Let me list the alternatives and I will get back with the result in a few days. In the meantime, if you have any experience, good or bad, with open source/free disk clone utilities, please leave a comment.

1. Partition Saving
2. SystemRescueCd
3. UBCD – Ultimate Boot CD for Windows
4. Clonezilla
5. FOG – Free, Ghost-like Cloning Solution
6. g4u
7. Trinity Rescue Kit
8. PING – Partimage is Not Ghost
9. Linux Rescue Server – this one is interesting from an overall system management point of view.

Wikipedia has a good article to learn more about disk cloning.

Related Post:

• Revisiting Alternative Disk/Partition Cloning Tools
• Revisiting the Search for a Backup Solution
• Brainstorming a Backup Strategy

I have to confess that I had been thinking about backup since day-one and have yet to do any concrete about it. So I sat down today and did a mind map (using FreeMind) for a backup strategy.

So the next steps are

1. Figure out and decide on what strategy to use
2. Find the right softwares (free/open source preferred)
3. Implement
4. Train users
5. Monitor and manage

I will be posting the progress and any related softwares that I find. Hope this helps you too.

Related Post:

• Revisiting the Search for a Backup Solution
• Revisiting Alternative Disk/Partition Cloning Tools
• Alternative Disk/Partition Cloning Tools