What a good system for storing images on a hard drive
I would like to study the effects of my software in different OS environments. I have identified the best way to analyze the differences associated with storing the entire image on the hard drive once the software is finished.
What is a painless system (including hardware and software) that will allow me to quickly connect desktop and laptop hard drives from other computers and store their images so they can be easily retrieved later?
With little I currently know, one direct path would be to have a dedicated desktop computer that has ...
- A copy of Norton Ghost to create an image
- (array) external hard drive for storing images
- Laptop Hard drive for desktop adapter (2.5 "to 3.5") for connecting laptops.
Does anyone have any better ideas? I guess I should mention that cost is an issue, so you get bonus points for inexpensive solutions :)
Thanks in advance, I am very grateful!
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For the problem as you describe it, your solution seems like a good one. The way I have seen similar problems are touched upon in the places where I have worked.
If you are not trying to debug hardware problems, you can use a virtual machine (VMWare, Virtual PC, etc.) instead of rendering real hard drives. Use a separate VM with VHD for each software configuration you want to test.
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You can reduce the cost of the software slightly by using PartImage . It is a linux / unix program that saves / restores entire partitions like norton ghost. It can back up and restore many file systems including Microsoft FAT and NTFS. It can be run from most of many live linux CDs.
For your use, I would set up a dedicated Linux machine with PartImage installed and connect to the source and destination disks as needed. I would also use a disk dock, Like This . Remove the bare disk in the dock. Then read or write as needed.
From the description of the problem, the disk space will be significant. PartImage does not store empty sectors of the file system. With 50% full 80Gig partition, PartImage will only write 40Gig or even less with extra compression.
I personally did this approach, but on a smaller scale. I only save 5-6 section images at a time. The only error I found with PartImage is that there is a 2Gig file size limit when writing partition images to FAT or NTFS. In practice, this is not a problem, as PartImage easily splits images into multiple files with the size you specify.
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Have you considered virtualization in one form or another? This is what thousands of other developers use for compatibility testing. It's fast, cheap, and very good. That said, if you want your OS to run on bare metal then simply "Ghosting" to a large USB drive from a bootable CD should give you what you want, albeit a little disgusting, though if fair.
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