Linux saved the day again :-)

[Maxxarcade]

This is the third time I've used Linux to save someone's ass...

My Sister's Maxtor hard drive started acting up... computer worked fine the other day, then she turns it on today and it says NTLDR is missing. I tried all the usual and nothing could fix it. Of course she had no backups.

The one folder she needed was the My Pictures, and it would not read in any computer I tried it in, not even Windows recovery console. It just said access denied...

Popped in my old Knoppix 5.0 CD, which read everything fine, and I copied it all to my NAS.

Linux may be a pain on the everyday desktop, but it's always there when Windows fails you

[Spacedye69]

Re: Linux saved the day again :-)

I've been using Vector Linux on my laptop. Perfect desktop Linux. It comes with Java and all media codecs already installed. I just re installed Windows on the same laptop and took twice as long to get my wireless working.

[Maxxarcade]

Re: Linux saved the day again :-)

I'd have to say Ubuntu is by far my favorite for anything close to desktop use. I also liked what I saw of Vector when I had it installed on some older systems. I can't remember what it was that made me stop using it

They all seem to have their quirks, no OS is perfect. Linux will never have the media compatibilty of Windows though, especially without Quicktime.

[toastygoodness]

Re: Linux saved the day again :-)

I like BartPE. that's still windows. BartPE actually saved my day, but Knoppix was close. Samba was a pain in the butt to configure (i'm not lucky enough to have a NAS), so I gave up, and used my BartPE. i like Slax too. I actually like Slax better than Knoppix, but its getting kind of weird now.

[bgavin]

Re: Linux saved the day again :-)

I use BartPE every day in my business. I sent the guy some money, cuz it is that good.

I constantly update mine, so it has the drivers for all the latest SATA drivers, etc. I use it with Symantec Ghost 8.2 for imaging. Essential utility for the tech.

[Wolus]

Re: Linux saved the day again :-)

in other cases i don't know , but if NTLDR is missing then i would hv installed a new copy of windows in a new drive........30 mins max n sys back on work.......linux though always handy, keep it in ur system for the work or saftey that windows can't give!

[gonzo0815]

Re: Linux saved the day again :-)

Hey bgavin, i just discovered this topic, and your last statement has made me curious.
Can you do image with your BartPe & Ghost 8.2 any drive accessible by the driver you integrated into the Bar PE disk?

In have more and more units with SATA drives, where there is no option to go into IDE compatibility mode via the bios setup (laptops...).
And i am looking for an solution, to image those HDD´s for disaster recovery.
Up to now, i haven`t found a working solution for this problem.

[bgavin]

Re: Linux saved the day again :-)

The trick to making BART-PE (almost) universal is slipstreaming the chipset + mass storage packs from www.driverpacks.net. The mass storage drivers will let BART recognize all the various AHCI storage hardware.

1) Download the BASE unit
2) Download the CHIPSET unit
3) Download the MASS STORAGE unit

Store these in your normal driver area. I do a lot of field work, so I have E:\CDROM\DRIVERS\... set up for this purpose. I copy the entire E:\CDROM structure to an external USB disk I take out in the field.

Run the BASE code, and let it create a *separate* directory structure for slip streaming. This is E:\DRIVERPACKS on my system.
Copy the .7z cab for for Chipset and Mass Storage to E:\DriverPacks\DriverPacks. This is the expected source area where the base code wants to find the .7z cab files.

Run the E:\Driverpacks\dps_base.exe file. You are going to slipstream a BART-PE disk. I assume you already have a source directory, i.e. E:\PEBuilder on your drive. Point at the top BART directory.

All the above will slipstream the chipset and mass storage drivers into BART. You will have to enable the package in BART... see the enclosed instructions. It is a bit obtuse at first, but it works well.

BART and Win-PE both choke on linux volumes. I have not yet found anything close to BART/Ghost 8.x for linux volumes. Probably the DOS version of Ghost 8.x won't have any problems, but this will pose new problems getting DOS to recognize external disks, or using an SMB network boot disk. All choices are messy.

[gonzo0815]

Re: Linux saved the day again :-)

I probably haven`t used a non DOS based Ghost version yet. Is Ghost 8 a genuine Windows application? How can i get it onto the BartPe disk?
Driver integration is probably no the big issue for me, but i am not that experienced with
BartPe yet.

[bgavin]

Re: Linux saved the day again :-)

I use Ghost Corporate 8.3 on a BART disk. Read the BART instructions, copy a few files... completely easy.

The Win32 version on BART opens up a lot of doors that are closed to DOS. IMO, every service person should have a fully working version of BART + Driverpacks in their kit. Indispensible.

I use the Win98SE version of DOS. There are a few fixes applied to FDISK, and others, that are absent from the Win95 and DOS 6.x versions. The good news here is, DOS doesn't crash on Linux partitions like Win32 does.

I'll have to look around to see if there is a device driver for DOS that allows it to see USB drives. The alternative is a DOS based network boot disk (another Bart product) for Ghosting to a network host. This gets iffy in a hurry, as all those MS networking drivers gobble up the 640 kb address space quickly. Ghost32 for DOS needs some room to work. I think it uses a DOS extender to use extended memory, but it still needs room to work.

Novell ZenWorks imaging uses SuSE linux for the boot OS. It fully understands NTFS partitions, but does not create "disk" or "partition" images. It instead creates "file" images, where if you restore an image to an existing disk, it just replaces files, not the whole disk. This does not meet my requirements. Worse, ZenWorks is very pricey, far too much for an imaging program for a field tech.

[PCBONEZ]

Re: Linux saved the day again :-)

Spacedye69

Do you think that Vector Linux would be a suitable basis for a MythTV type box?

.

[i4004]

Re: Linux saved the day again :-)

>And i am looking for an solution, to image those HDD´s for disaster recovery.

acronis?
i have acronis true image ent. server 9.1 bootable cd and i can say it supports usb hdd and it recognizes hdd of lenovo laptop i have(judging by the bios it only has sata mode...)...even saws the hidden partition where lenovo put os and utils...

but i didn't try copying or restoring, as it seems i can never free 80gb of my usb backup hdd....
restoring i wouldn't try untill i really need it anyway.

here's home version web
http://www.acronis.com/homecomputing...age-media.html


i used ghost on pata, yeah...but this is faster if (older) chipset is supported
http://www.pcinspector.de/Sites/clon...htm?Language=1

by now ghost also has usb and sata support, it seems
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghost_(software)
here's tutorial for ghost12
http://nortonghost.radified.com/

[bgavin]

Re: Linux saved the day again :-)

The Lenovo laptop is almost certainly running SATA in compatability mode. I'm doing imaging consulting for a Calif. State agency now on ThinkPad T61 laptops, and that is how we build them.

It is pointless to use AHCI mode on laptop, because they will never do RAID. Real world performance testing indicates there is no boost from AHCI. In fact the IDE mode is a skosh faster... probably the usual diagnostic skew. The IDE mode also boots noticeably faster.

The ThinkPads use the Intel chipset and Matrix Storage Manager drivers when AHCI is enabled. Without these drivers, your Win32 based boot OS will crash at BSOD 0x7B, boot device not accessible.

[Paul S]

Re: Linux saved the day again :-)

Do you think that Vector Linux would be a suitable basis for a MythTV type box?

I think that you will need to install MythTV from source, as I don't think that there are any pre-compiled packages.

http://www.mythtv.org/wiki/index.php...thTV_on_Vector

PCBONEZ: I finally noticed your PM, check for my reply.

[gonzo0815]

Re: Linux saved the day again :-)

Well, last time i checked out Acronis and Ghost, there was no AHCI support outside of the Windows installation.
Sure, with newer versions of Ghost and Acronis ( the Win32 versions) can backup your disks within Windows, but if this fails, you can`t redeploy it easily, as you don`t have access to the SATA drives from the bootable CD.
I think i go into the BarPE & Ghost / Acronis, this seems to be the only bulletproof way to get those laptops done (in this case a Sony vaio c2d designed for Vista...)

[Bookworm]

Re: Linux saved the day again :-)

To point out, the newer versions of Ghost aren't Ghost. They're the other company that Symantec bought out. Basically, Ghost has been completely abandoned as of the Ghost 2003 dos version. They just relabeled the other (Windows based) package to 'ghost', and went on their merry way. It's similar to the "Office 2007" stuff, which isn't an upgrade. It's a totally new set of programs, that have almost NOTHING in common with the last decade+ of M$ office programs. (I'm not objecting to that. I'm objecting to reusing names of products. It's just confusing. It's bad enough with Linksys et al using the same name for five different wireless chipsets)

BW