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» Using DiskDump (DD) for Backing Up Boot Disks
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Backups are of course very important. If you have older computers, you may be interested
in backing up the floppy disks used to install the operating systems.
Some people format a system disk and then copy the rest of the files to the new disk.
A more convenient method of backing up boot disks is to make a disk-image. Programs exist to
create and use disk-images. This means that you can make a backup CD or network directory with files
like: DOS622.bt, Win95.bt, Slackware3_4.bt, etc as well as the mini-utilities needed to use these
disk-images files to re-create a boot-disk.
If you have a Linux PC, you can use the commands:
create disk-image (A:) :
dd if=/dev/fd0 of=/root/dos620.bt
restore disk (A:) :
dd of=/dev/fd0 if=/root/dos620.bt
This longer form is available if needed:
restore disk (A:) :
dd of=/dev/fd0 if=/root/dos620.bt conv=notrunc ibs=512 obs=512
create disk-image (A:) :
dd if=/dev/fd0 of=/root/dos620.bt conv=notrunc ibs=512 obs=512
If you don't have Linux available, you can find disk-image programs on the internet that run from
DOS, Windows, etc. One good list is at:
Rawrite and related (floppy) disk imaging programs.
Be sure to "Google" for others.
I typically use Linux to make the disk-images and use a DOS program like rawrite.exe to
re-create the boot disks. (Run rawrite.exe in the same directory your disk-images are; it will ask for the filename
and destination drive to write to; it requires a formatted DOS disk to work but you can find some programs that don't
have that requirement; most new floppy disks are pre-formatted with DOS anyway).
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