4 Aug
2003
4 Aug
'03
7:50 p.m.
At 11:46 AM 8/4/03 +0100, you wrote:
Hi all,
I'm just wondering how to back up the hard drive (a 20MB MFM) in my Research
Machines fileserver. The system runs CP/M, has a couple of floppy drives, and
the hard disk is hooked up to a Xebec controller with a SASI bus linking
it to
the host controller in the fileserver.
There are actually two problems:
1) Getting the data off the hard drive somehow (possibly via floppy) and
being able to read it on another system (ideally a PC I suppose)
If you just wna tto get it onto anothe machine I would set up some kind
of a null-modem link and just transfer the files.
2) Being able to rebuild the system if/when the hard
drive fails.
I think I would see about adding a 2nd drive to the system then copy
everything from the old drive to the new one. That should give you a
bootable drive as well as a full backup. After you verify that the drive is
good then take it (or the orignal one) off the system and store it in a
safe area.
Thoughts on both are welcome! I don't have any kind of OS source media for
the
system, and it wouldn't surprise me if it isn't
the only survivor :-( Maybe
there are utilities on the system itself to recreate bootable OS media,
but my
knowledge of CP/M is a little lacking!
For my old SCSI systems I tend to hold a raw block-by-block backup image
of the
drive by putting the hard disk in a PC with Linux and
dragging data off that
way. If the drive fails and I can't get an identical replacement, a slightly
larger drive still works with a little bit of wastage. Due to the
relationship
between the controller and drive using ST506 I gather
things are probably a
little more complex though...
Perhaps. I guess it depends on the BIOS and wheather you can fool it
into thinking that the new drive is the same as the old. Still it shouldn't
be too hard to locate the exact drive that it needs on either E-bay or from
some of the list memmbers.
Joe
cheers
Jules
=====
Backward conditioning: putting saliva in a dog's mouth in an attempt to
make a
bell ring.
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