Copying & backup

[ConradBhart]

I am trying to back up my Amigas and would appreciate some advice.

My systems:
1: A1200 + internal 120mb IDE HD, Wizard 68040 accelerator & 32mb ram. Squirrel connected to a Powerstation - with SCSI CD drive (2x I think) and 160MB hard drive.

2: A1200 + internal 4GB CF card, Hawk 8mb ram expansion.

I thought one way might be to get an AmigaKit CF drive and take the CF card out of its holder and plug it in a PCMCIA Compact Flash Transfer device in my PCMCIA port and copy my hard drive onto it. So, in an emergency I could just plug my back-up straight into my machine and be ready to go without any fuss.

Would this way of copying work ok? If I just drag the entire contents of my main drive onto a CF card can I  boot from it or do I need any special copying software.

Also I have read of incompatibilities with certain accelerators/ram boards, particularly my Hawk board. Does anyone have a Hawk. Is it compatible with a PCMCIA device?

Finally, is this the best way of doing this or am I missing something more obvious?

Apologies for long question(s). All suggestions appreciated!

[mongo]

Also I have read of incompatibilities with certain accelerators/ram boards, particularly my Hawk board. Does anyone have a Hawk. Is it compatible with a PCMCIA device?

It won't work with 8 Meg for sure. It might work if you set the jumpers for 4 Meg, but you'll lose half of your fast ram, of course.

[ConradBhart]

Thanks, The Wizard board I know is ok as the Squirrel is working. I thought there might be a problem with the Hawk. I know the obvious thing is to pull it out which I can but it was a bit of struggle getting it in and I don’t like disturbing it too much in case of damaging it. May have to though.

My main concern is my whether my suggested way of copying things lets me end up with a drive I can boot from.

[giZmo350]

Give it a try?

[ BACK-IT-ALL-UP (v50.11 - 68K version) ]
( Supports >4 GIG Drives, More Features, Custom or WB Screen configurable.)  
HD to HD Mirror Backup Program. Supports up to 8 partitions.

[PanterHZ]

Thanks, The Wizard board I know is ok as the Squirrel is working. I thought there might be a problem with the Hawk. I know the obvious thing is to pull it out which I can but it was a bit of struggle getting it in and I don’t like disturbing it too much in case of damaging it. May have to though.

My main concern is my whether my suggested way of copying things lets me end up with a drive I can boot from.

No reason to pull out your Hawk board. It is a bit "dumb" since it will automatically assume that the amount of RAM it is configured to have, actually is the amount of RAM that is installed. All you have to do is move the LK1 jumper to get 4MB Fast RAM. You can read more about the Hawk here: http://amiga.resource.cx/manual/Amitek_Hawk.pdf

As for your backup needs, I can suggest one of my Amiga911 boot disks which contains everything you need for both setting up a new harddisk, and for copying files from a backup. The disk also contains what is needed for using a CF-PCMCIA adapter.
If you need to preserve the Amiga specific file attributes of your system files, you can either add them to a lha archive, or you can create a HDF file in WinUAE, and then copy it to the CF card you use with the CF-PCMCIA adapter. The Aniga911 disk contains software (DiskImage) that can be used for mounting HDF images as virtual drives, which allows you to copy files from/to them.

If you are interested, I think this version of the Amiga911 disk may be suitable for you: https://www.box.com/s/30snom1sogojovgvfret
You can read more about the Amiga911 disk and the program for creating your own ones here: http://amiga911maker.site11.com

[ConradBhart]

Thanks for the info. I am only just getting myself set up properly so have yet to get something like WinUAE or Amiga Forever, though I realise this kind of emulation software will be very useful. I will read the web-links you gave & see how I go.

[vince_6]

I backup mine via winuae. I connect the cf card to peecee and I choose add hardrive, IDE0.

[ConradBhart]

Will be checking out WinUAE for copying. What I want too is a back-up drive(s) that I can use as a complete plug-in and play replacement if one of my drives goes down. Quite possible as they are quite old now.

What I am not sure is if I just copy my drive onto another device it will autoboot or if I need to copy it with any special copying software. This might be obvious to many but I am a bit out of touch with a lot of the system stuff. Trial & error should tell me I guess.

[vince_6]

Will be checking out WinUAE for copying. What I want too is a back-up drive(s) that I can use as a complete plug-in and play replacement if one of my drives goes down. Quite possible as they are quite old now.

What I am not sure is if I just copy my drive onto another device it will autoboot or if I need to copy it with any special copying software. This might be obvious to many but I am a bit out of touch with a lot of the system stuff. Trial & error should tell me I guess.

It will be OK.
When you format your new disk, just tick bootable option on HDToolbox the drive/partition you wan to boot from and then copy your content.

[danbeaver]

Did someone mention a 3 connector 44-pin cable and setting the backup drive or cf card with adapter as slave, then after installing the slave cf/HDD and formating it, just a straight copy ALL CLONE command?  This can be left in place and by either making it bootable or changing the boot priority, letting it take over.  No need for WinUAE, sneaker-net, etc.