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Number   :  5219
Date     :  2003-08-07
Author   :  Garry Deane
Subject  :  Re: new user question
Size(KB) :  3


--- In xxcopy@yahoogroups.com, niteowl  wrote:
> Hi all,
> 
> I have just installed and run xxcopy (the free version) and
> have a question concerning using the backup.
> 
> My goal is to have a backup of my C: drive, specifically the
> windows folder, that I can simply copy back to the a clean C:
> drive in the event of a crash that necessitates either
> deleting the windows folder or formatting and starting over.
> 
> Since XXCopy won't work in DOS because of LFN's, that means
> I would have to reinstall windows. My systems are all setup
> with only "windows" on the C: drive, all other programs are
> installed to the D: drive. Of course most programs write files
> to windows\system folder and to the registry, so ..... 
> my question is: if after I either delete the windows folder or
> reinstall windows and copy the backup over the new installation,
> will everything then be as it was before the crash? Will the
> registry entries be overwritten as well as all system files?
> 
> I do not want to copy the entire drive using programs like Ghost
> or whatever because I may not want the same size partition, I
> just want to be able to copy the files back to the drive and
> have it work.
> 
> Is this program going to do what I want?

You don't say which OS or file system you are using so it's hard
to be specific. The most direct method is to carry out the backup
in a few steps.

Step 1. From windows, copy the required directories to the backup
drive e.g. xxcopy c:\ d:\backup\ /clone

Note whether there were any files that weren't able to be copied.
These would typically be registry files which are opened for 
exclusive use by the OS and can't readily be copied while the OS is 
active. If you have these, proceed to step 2.

Step 2. Boot to DOS using a DOS boot disk or dual boot or W98 boot to 
DOS option. Copy the previously locked files using xxcopy16 e.g.
xxcopy16 c:\ d:\backup\ /backup
Since the xxcopy in step 1 preserves short file names, this command 
should only copy those files which are new or different i.e. those 
that weren't copied in Step 1. Also, since the files which were 
locked will almost invariably have 8.3 names no further fixup should 
be required.

Of course the above step requires that you can read both disks and 
write to the destination from DOS which you couldn't do if they are 
NTFS unless you have a DOS NTFS driver. It also requires that the 
paths to the locked files aren't too long for DOS to handle. This 
might be a problem for some W2k/XP registry files although you can 
work around this using SUBST.

Step 3. If you are concerned that Long File Names might have been 
lost in Step 2, you can carry out a LFN fixup. Boot back to windows 
then run:
xxcopy c:\ d:\backup\ /nl/s/h

There other ways to do what you want but they are OS specific. If you 
are using W98, take a look at http://www.xxcopy.com/xxcopy10.htm 
which includes more detail on the steps above.

If you can't get the above to work, post back with more details.

When it comes to restoring windows, you would simply carry out step 2 
in reverse. Since the essential windows files are 8.3, you should be 
able to restore enough of these files to be able to boot into 
windows. Once you can get windows running, you carry out Step 3 in 
reverse to fix up the LFNs. If worst came to worst, you could re-
install windows so that you could make it bootable, then carry out 
Steps 1 - 3 in reverse to restore your backed up setup.

Regarding using Ghost, if you copy the partition to an image file, 
you can restore that image to any size partition provided it is large 
enough for the files to fit. It is only when you create a complete 
disk image that the partition size is fixed.

Garry



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