Backup & Restore Problems (solved)

lesdelc

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I attempted an upgrade which resulted in problems rebooting. The distro did make it to the login screen but hung up when entering the password to log in. I could not get to my backups and had to re-install the distro after running for several years without any problems.

I have a remedy for my situation. I bought a one terabyte external USB drive. I tested & played with the following backup programs.

1. Vorta GUI for borgbackup
2. Grsync Gui for rsync

After a few days of testing with both programs I settled for Grsync with rsync. Vorta came in a close second however in changing my backup folder I could not figure out how to get another key to activate the program. Vorta had access to the Borg Backup website. I believe the cost was $25/year for a 100 GB. Being from the old school I settled for my one terabyte drive. Rsync was faster in a 10 gig backup. If I should ever have problems again I am prepared to install again and process my Home folder backup.

Out of curiosity what are you using for your backup software?
 


G'day lesdelc, and Welcome to linux.org

Just a quick reply.....still busy here with boxing day and xmas stuff !!

I use Timeshift, and save its snapshots to an external drive.
In a nutshell, it is absolutely awseome !!!.....I cannot reccomend it highly enough.
If I need to use it in a case such as yours, I simply use a usb drive with a copy of my distro on there to boot the pc to......I then access Timeshift on that .....and simply restore.

I also use Clonezilla, which some regard as being too complicated, but I find it fairly straightforward to use. I also send its saved image to yet another external drive.

I am running LM 18.3

Which distro do you use ??
 
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My apologies for the late reply. I worked late last night getting my scanner to work again due to a bug in Ubuntu 18.04 which has not been fixed for quite sometime. I did get it to work.

My recent install of grsync gui and rsync did a backup last night to my USB external drive with all the changes I made to LM 19.3.

When I upgraded from LM 19.2 to 19.3 the boot problems started as well being locked out when attempting to enter my password. I have used LM 17 to 19.2 with no problems for about 2-3 years. I do use Timeshift but was unable to get to it to remedy the problem.

Please explain in some detail how you use the USB to copy your system and boot from it to get to Timeshift. Do you use clonezilla to create a copy on the USB?

G'day lesdelc, and Welcome to linux.org

Just a quick reply.....still busy here with boxing day and xmas stuff !!

I use Timeshift, and save its snapshots to an external drive.
In a nutshell, it is absolutely awseome !!!.....I cannot reccomend it highly enough.
If I need to use it in a case such as yours, I simply use a usb drive with a copy of my distro on there to boot the pc to......I then access Timeshift on that .....and simply restore.

I also use Clonezilla, which some reegard as being too complicated, but I find it fairly straightforward to use. I also send its saved image to yet another external drive.

I am running LM 18.3

Which distro do you use ??
 
with slackware over the years i have used the gino d'acampo concept "minimum effort, maximum satisfaction" . I don't get a stable system and packages and then look for trouble deciding to upgrade kernel etc . I am though now facing a dilemma; i currently am running slackware 64 bit current; everything works great with all packages working . trouble is release 15 will come out and looking at the logs the kernel is already a newer one than i;m using. So the issue is have a go at a complete upgrade from current sept iso to 15. That means maybe trying to clone current system and put it back, if things go bad. Clonezilla would have been on my list but its not available as far as i can see in slackware repos. What i'm wating for and trying as a write this is that i have booted from knoppix 8.6 and installed partimage.

I went for command line as follows:

partimage -od -fl -zl save /dev/sda3 /media/sdd1/sda3.partimage.gz

/dev/sda3 is where my slackware is installed and its not mounted. An external hd /dev/sdd is mounted at /media/sdd1

At the moment it says its initializing.. its copied 8% in about same minutes.in the end it did 2gig chunks , with about 8 chunks. I then went for fsarchiver and installed that on knoppix live. Went to cook while it was running. it copied 54 gig to 14gig and to one file
 
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I run LM 18.3
I have 3 drives
1 x SSD ...this holds the OS
1 x 250gb HDD.....this is used for holding Clonezilla backups exclusively
1 x 300gb HDD.....this holds movies and assorted crap, and Timeshift snapshots

Quite some time ago I managed to do something stupid which borked Linux Mint....I forget the detail but sufficient to say the system was unusable.
I have a usb stick which contains Lm 18.3. I insert the usb and reboot.This runs a "live" version of LM18.3
On my pc if I hit the f11 key it gives me the opportunity to boot from that usb stick
This may be different on your pc You will have to read the manual or ask someone here with the same pc how they boot a usb from that particular pc

Once it is booted to that usb...I then use it exactly the same as if it was the installed version. Access Timeshift, and go to the setting for location, and set the location to the hdd which contains your snapshots. You can then see the various snapshots that you have stored there...select one and click on restore.

My recollection may be a bit rough/hazy.....my main pc has been packed for transport......I am in the middle of shifting countries and dont have the luxury of having the LM18.3 system to refer to. I am typing this from a windows 10 laptop.....The process is giving me a not so subtle reminder of why I switched to Linux 5 years ago !!

Clonezilla......i 'burned' a copy of clonezilla to a usb, in exactly the same way as I burn copy of linux mint to another usb.......I usually use 'unetbootin' to do this.
I boot the pc to that clonezilla usb in the same manner as described above.
I cannot remember all the pages of clonezilla, for the same reasons (pc packed and boxed for transport) but THIS PAGE gives a good run through.
Important to note....I use Clonezilla to copy an image to the 250GB hdd. If somehting goes seriously wrong and i decide to restore that image.......i boot to the Clonezilla usb stick.....then do the restore process. I would select to restore....the select where that restore is kept (250gb hdd), then select where to send that image (120GB SSD).....and it will do the job. I have never had to use it....but I still keep a monthly backup. When I have amassed 3 or 4 monthly backups, I will delete 2 of them. I see it as senseless keeping really old backups
 
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Thank you for taking the time to reply. I did not realize you are moving to another country.

I run LM 19.3 (no other upgrade problems)
I have 2 internal drives, one 640GIB (OS) and one terabyte (western digital).
2 USB external drives which are 1 terabyte each, 1 drive (seagate) with Timeshift and rsync backups the other is USB western digital (my 15 years of research and a book I am writing are stored on it)

After reading thru your response I am going to stay with grsync (gui) and rsync. This has a icon which sits in my system tray. At the end of the day I click on it and does the incremental backups to my external USB drives which takes a few minutes.

I am going to read thru the Clonezilla link you left.

Your Windows laptop needs LM installed it. I use a Lenvo Thinkpad laptop with LM (love it).

Have a great move I trust this works out for you.

I run LM 18.3
I have 3 drives
1 x SSD ...this holds the OS
1 x 250gb HDD.....this is used for holding Clonezilla backups exclusively
1 x 300gb HDD.....this holds movies and assorted crap, and Timeshift snapshots

Quite some time ago I managed to do something stupid which borked Linux Mint....I forget the detail but sufficient to say the system was unusable.
I have a usb stick which contains Lm 18.3. I insert the usb and reboot.This runs a "live" version of LM18.3
On my pc if I hit the f11 key it gives me the opportunity to boot from that usb stick
This may be different on your pc You will have to read the manual or ask someone here with the same pc how they boot a usb from that particular pc

Once it is booted to that usb...I then use it exactly the same as if it was the installed version. Access Timeshift, and go to the setting for location, and set the location to the hdd which contains your snapshots. You can then see the various snapshots that you have stored there...select one and click on restore.

My recollection may be a bit rough/hazy.....my main pc has been packed for transport......I am in the middle of shifting countries and dont have the luxury of having the LM18.3 system to refer to. I am typing this from a windows 10 laptop.....The process is giving me a not so subtle reminder of why I switched to Linux 5 years ago !!

Clonezilla......i 'burned' a copy of clonezilla to a usb, in exactly the same way as I burn copy of linux mint to another usb.......I usually use 'unetbootin' to do this.
I boot the pc to that clonezilla usb in the same manner as described above.
I cannot remember all the pages of clonezilla, for the same reasons (pc packed and boxed for transport) but THIS PAGE gives a good run through.
Important to note....I use Clonezilla to copy an image to the 250GB hdd. If somehting goes seriously wrong and i decide to restore that image.......i boot to the Clonezilla usb stick.....then do the restore process. I would select to restore....the select where that restore is kept (250gb hdd), then select where to send that image (120GB SSD).....and it will do the job. I have never had to use it....but I still keep a monthly backup. When I have amassed 3 or 4 monthly backups, I will delete 2 of them. I see it as senseless keeping really old backups
 
In clonezilla the only important bits I commit to memory, and are really careful with, are ....where the image is being saved to ....and where the image is coming from (source). The majority of other questions asked I simply hit enter.
If I have done something wrong, then Timeshift will restore it for me.

""Your Windows laptop needs LM installed on it
""....I know this ....I have been itching to do so.....But.....it belongs to my wife !!.....she resists....:D....and yet she has a tower pc which runs lm 18.3 and she loves it !!!!.....go figure.

The move will go well....We are going back to Australia !! :cool:
 

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