Cloning hard drive with dd or other?

[Patton Echols]

On 11/12/2010 06:55 PM, Ric Moore wrote:
> On Fri, 2010-11-12 at 18:32 -0800, Patton Echols wrote:
>   
>> I have a failing hard drive that boots WinXP for one of my work machines.
>>
>> I want to clone the drive while it's still alive and run from the 
>> clone.  I had expected to use dd and was reading to try and see if there 
>> are challenges I am unaware of. The comments to this article:
>>
>> http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/19141/clone-a-hard-drive-using-an-ubuntu-live-cd/
>>
>> say that it will not work if the drives have different geometries. 
>>
>>
>> Does anyone know of work arounds / other solutions that may accomplish 
>> what I need to do?
>>     
>
> Can you just backup the entire thing, (or just the data directories)
> install the new drive and copy it all back? Might be safer in the long
> run. I know, not very optimal, but I'd save the valuable data right
> away ...like last night. Ric
>  
>
>   
Yeah, I have that covered.  All the mission critical stuff is backed 
up.  The big problem is a couple of proprietary database programs, the 
data is safe, but the "relicensing" is intentionally difficult per the 
vendor.  I've had to do it before and it takes a couple of business 
days.  If I can get it running over the weekend, then my staff member 
can work again starting monday, not wednesday.