Backup on two HDs of different sizes. (Not gnuparted related, sorry).

[Hans Deragon]

Greetings.


  The posting is not related to gnuparted.  My apologies.  It is not my
  habit to post on a products mailing list about another issue.  But it is
  related to partition and since many of you are experts on the issue, you
  might be able to provide me with some insight.

  I currently own 2 HDs of the exact same model.  One is the backup of the
  other.  I perform the backup with the following command (BTW, if you
  know a better tool/way, do not hesitate to suggest)

    dd if=/dev/hda of=/dev/hdc ibs=1M obs=1M

  Thus, using mobile racks, I can switch the drives and boot from the backup
  one.  Both OS (I dual boot with Linux/Windows) start well on the backup.
  Its a perfect mirror.

  Now, I have bought a few months ago a 60G HD.  I plan to buy another one,
  of a different mark and probably a different size (around ~60 Gigs, but
  I do not expect both HDs to have the same CHS and nominal sizes).

  Now, if I take the smaller of the two HDs, and setup both Windows and
  Linux paritions on them, and apply the same command as above, will the
  backup become a perfect mirror too?  Will it boot both OSs?

  I do not know anything about partitions, and this is why I am asking
  here.  Does copying a partition scheme from one HD of one model
  on another HD of another would work as long as the 2nd HD has
  a bigger size?

  I also assume that if this work, then recopying from the backup HD
  to the master HD the partition scheme would work too.  Am I right?


Sincerely,
Hans Deragon