[TriLUG] Re: HDD Migration

[Lance A. Brown]

Marty Ferguson wrote:
> I still like Lance's solution, but for 1 alteration.
> Being lazy, I just use
> # cp -a
> to create a recursive archive copy of the orginial filesystem.
> The good thing (compared to dd) is that, since no *nix has a
> "defrag" you end up with one big whoppin chunk-o freespace using
> cp -a.  dd will duplicate the fragmentation.  The contiguous-ness
> probably goes the same for dump | restore into a brand-new mkfs'd
> ext3, but I never compared.

I'm paranoid about doing the right thing with various things like holey 
files, etc.  I know dump/restore does the right thing so I use it.

I've also used a very similar mechanism to upgrade systems to the next 
version of the hardware.  We are a Dell shop at work and use LOTS of 
PowerEdge 2x50 boxen.  I've rolled servers from 2450 -> 2550 -> 2650 over 
time using the dump/restore mechanism to move the data.  Works like a champ 
as long as you pay attention to changing hardware devices (RAID 
controllers, ethernet devices, etc.)  Adjust the 
modules.conf/modprobe.conf, run mkinitrd again, and you're gold.

--[Lance]

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