Mailinglist Archive: opensuse (3397 mails)

["Greg Wallace" <jgregw@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

     I recently purchased system backup software from a company called
Storix, specifically STORIX DESKTOP EDITION.  One of its options is to
create an entire system backup.  To do that, you use a specially formatting
tool built into it to format a disk drive for backup purposes, then you run
a job via their GUI to create a backup on that drive.  You also create a CD
that can be used to boot a bare bones linux system up from which you can run
the full restore against that hard drive backup (i. e., it functions like
you were using your SuSE Installation CD to "boot current system".  You
insert this CD, boot from it, it installs a shell Linux system and then
shows you a list of the backups on the hard drive.  You select the one you
want and it fully restores your entire system.  It also allows you to make
configuration changes (file system, etc.) for that installation.  
     All this seems well and good and I have created a backup and a boot CD
and ran it up to the point of pulling the trigger for a re-install, so all
looks good so fare.  But, there is one slight quirk.  The current version of
this software that I bought does not support GRUB (a new release coming out
this summer will).  So, at least as far as I can ascertain, when you restore
from a backup, you are then automatically converted to LILO.  The Storix
support people told me that if I wanted to switch back to GRUB after a
re-install, and assuming I had done a pure re-install (no tweaks to the
partitioning, etc.) from the backup I had done, all I would have to do to
get GRUB back would be to run the standard GRUB utility and have it re-write
my MBR.  At that point, according to them, I would be exactly back to where
I started before the backup except I would have some new LILO information on
my disk.  They say that it would not affect my operation back under GRUB; i.
e., it would be on the disk but would not be active, and everything else
about my system would be just like it was before the backup.  This sounds
reasonable to me, assuming the LILO installation didn't re-name or otherwise
change any of the other settings on my system that would then make it
incompatible with GRUB.  However, I not at all knowledgeable in this area
and wanted to run this by some of you guys who are more familiar with the
boot process to make sure what they are saying is correct.  Does anyone see
any problems with what they are telling me?

Thanks,
Greg Wallace