Am Donnerstag, 10. April 2008 schrieb Jack:
> I would like to be able to do a 'bear metal restore' for both Linux and
> Windows.

The easiest thing is probably using BackupPC for data recovery only and use a 
separate product for desaster recovery of the base system (excluding user 
data).

For Windows the usual suspects Ghost and TrueImage can be used.

For Linux there are a number of free alternatives which can also do desaster 
recovery of windows partitions. They are usually just a little more 
complicated then the commercial windows pendants, but easy enough to handle 
with some basic Linux knowledge.

Personally I have used mondo rescue successfully to build recovery CDs/DVDs 
for my servers. These recovery CDs/DVDs can be used to restore the base 
system including the partition layout, etc. from bare metal without any 
manual intervention in just a few minutes. Boot the CD, choose "Nuke", press 
OK, drink coffee. From there on it's easy to restore any system updates and 
the current user data via BackupPC.

http://www.mondorescue.org/

Alternative solutions which I have not personally tested are clonezille, 
ddrescue and probably a bunch of others I do not know. However the basic 
concept of using one software for desaster recovery and BackupPC for 
restoring user data applies to all these solutions.

Alternatively you can boot some Live CD/DVD and dump the partition layout and 
any system partitions to an external USB HDD or the like using dd, ntfsclone, 
etc. mondorescue and the other desaster recovery solutions just automate this 
process and make it a little more intelligent and space saving.

regards,
Andreas Micklei

-- 
Andreas Micklei
IVISTAR Kommunikationssysteme AG
Ehrenbergstr. 19 / 10245 Berlin, Germany
http://www.ivistar.de

Handelsregister: Berlin Charlottenburg HRB 75173
Umsatzsteuer-ID: DE207795030
Vorstand: Dipl.-Inform. Heiko Schüler
Aufsichtsrat: Dr.-Ing. Dirk Elias

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
This SF.net email is sponsored by the 2008 JavaOne(SM) Conference 
Don't miss this year's exciting event. There's still time to save $100. 
Use priority code J8TL2D2. 
http://ad.doubleclick.net/clk;198757673;13503038;p?http://java.sun.com/javaone
_______________________________________________
BackupPC-users mailing list
BackupPC-users AT lists.sourceforge DOT net
List:    https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/backuppc-users
Wiki:    http://backuppc.wiki.sourceforge.net
Project: http://backuppc.sourceforge.net/