Eisbärs Eisberg

This is a kind of a rewrite of my very first blog entry and it describes how to copy one disk with a linux-os on to another one, including the creation of the master boot record.

I assume you have the SATA disk as /dev/sda with two partitions: /dev/sda1 is the root filesystem, /dev/sda2 is the swap.

• Connect the SATA drive to the computer.
• Reboot Computer.
• Partition the Harddrive:
  # cfdisk /dev/sda
• Create the filesystem:
  #mkfs.ext3 -m 1 /dev/sda1
• Mount the new filesystem:
  # mount -t ext3 /dev/sda1 /mnt
• Copy the files over:
  cd /; find . -xdev | cpio -padm /mnt
• Chroot into the new filesystem:
  # chroot /mnt
• Edit /etc/fstab so the new system finds it’s filesystem:
  # gedit /etc/fstab
  Then change the entries so the root-filesystem ( / ) is located on /dev/sda1 and the swap is located at /dev/sda2.

• Edit /boot/grub/menu.lst:
  # gedit /boot/grub/menu.lst to have an entry like (italic portions matter for the diskchange:

  title           Ubuntu, kernel 2.6.15-27-386
  root            (hd1,0)
  kernel          /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.15-27-386 root=/dev/sda1 ro quiet splash
  initrd          /boot/initrd.img-2.6.15-27-386
  savedefault
  boot
  

• Leave the chroot environment by typing
  # exit.
• Install master boot record:
  # grub. In the grub write:

  grub> root (hd1,0)
  grub> setup (hd1)
  grub> quit