upgrade not going to plan!

[doubledrat]

Hi all

I need some help!

trying to upgrade 120+30gb tivo to 2*250gb

I've booted into knoppix, and I've done a security backup of A&B no probs. now I want to copy everything including the programs to my 1st 250gb disk. using the command

mfstool backup -Tao - /dev/hda /dev/hdb | mfstool restore -r 4 -s 127 -pxi - /dev/hdd

and after scanning it says

"backup target not large enough for entire backup by itself"

which is rubbish, cos it is!

my bios and knoppix see hdd as 250GB

any idea what might be wrong?

thanks

[doubledrat]

is it anything to do with having increased the space in the past? mfstools info says that it can be expanded 3 more times...

[doubledrat]

I've left the -x out and now it's going. I'm hoping to be able to expand as a separate operation. is that going to be the case?

[doubledrat]

while we're on the subject of super large tivos, the info says that new tivo sw will break because of the kernel differences. is there a way I can prevent new tivo software being installed?

[cwaring]

WOW! Four posts in a row. You haven't found the 'edit' button yet, then? ;)

You should use the LBA48 (http://www.tivoheaven.com/download/ptv-mfstools2-large-disk.iso) CD and also run 'copykern' for any disk >120gb.

[doubledrat]

to avoid post 1 looking daft - I'd have had to reworded it, and I couldn't be arsed ;)

[cwaring]

Fair enough. I never worry about that :p

I was going to correct your command-line as it doesn't look quite right to me, but I wouldn't want to make you go more wrong that you have already :) However....

mfstool backup -Tao - /dev/hda /dev/hdb | mfstool restore -r 4 -s 127 -pxi - /dev/hdd

My thoughts...
1. Shouldn't that restore command include a z in the switches? ie -xzpi
2. I thought you were using 2 NEW disks so shouldn't there be a second disk reference in the restore?

As I said, I could be totally off but I'm sure someone who knows for sure will be along shortly :D

[Rob Nespor Bellis]

-z re-orders the partition layout to the DTiVo version, it doesn't really matter, it is marginally faster ( possibly. )

I know everybody loves MFStool for everything but personally I would have dd'd the 120GB to a 250GB, then the 30GB to a 250GB, installed the new kernel and *then* used MFStool to expand both drives out.

Rgds,

R.

[doubledrat]

rob, would dd be quicker? only it's taking FOREVER (1.5% at the mo)

PS: Carl : I only have 4 ide on this pc, so with a boot cd and the 2 tivo drives I can't do it all in 1 go

[Rob Nespor Bellis]

The speed of dd seems to be very variable with different people/machines.

I get ( using a none byteswapped boot CD ) about 20GB/hour using bs=32k, upping to bs=1024k should speed things up. This is on an old P2-300 Compaq, using a more modern machine should also help.

Rgds,

R.

[doubledrat]

well I'm using an old p4 1.4 with 512mb, so I would hope it would go faster than it is at the moment! it's doing about 5gb/hr! I'll try it and report back...

cheers

[cwaring]

PS: Carl : I only have 4 ide on this pc, so with a boot cd and the 2 tivo drives I can't do it all in 1 go
Hmmm. Don't know how you're acheiving it, but I assume you're piping everything onto the one 250 then adding the second as a 'B' drive?

[mike0151]

Was out all afternoon so only just come across this thread. One thing of concern is your swap size - it is going to be way too small for a total of 500GB of disk space.

Using the MFSTOOLS method, I would have put the new disk on hda and the TiVo A and B drives on hdc and hdb and adjusted the commands accordingly adjusting the swap to around 300MB minimum.

HTH

Mike

[cwaring]

Was out all afternoon so only just come across this thread. One thing of concern is your swap size - it is going to be way too small for a total of 500GB of disk space.
Never spotted that :( but you're right of course :)

[doubledrat]

mike: I read that there's a bug in mfstools and it won't do > 127 properly. I intend to increase the swap later with "tpip"

[mike0151]

just set swap bigger and copykern will invoke tpip and fix it

[mike0151]

BTW the reason for putting the new disk on hda is to hopefully avoid byteswapping issues as MFSTOOLS will do the byteswapping internally on hda which is not byteswapped by default.

[cwaring]

mike: I read that there's a bug in mfstools and it won't do > 127 properly. I intend to increase the swap later with "tpip" Really? First time I've ever heard that on this Forum and I've done two >127 upgrades recently with 300mb swap-files with no problems :)

[Rob Nespor Bellis]

The swap space is created correctly but not initialised if >127MB when using mfstool

When ( if ) you use the copykern procedure the swap file gets correctly initialised.

Rgds,

R.

[doubledrat]

well, I got fed up waiting for the copy of the content (ran all night and only copied 40GB!), so I've decided to lose all recordings. I'm not reusing the old disks - is there a way of getting at the old recordings through linux? I know it can't be discussed, but just knowing it's possible would be useful.

ta

[mike0151]

There is a thread on the data base of deals about doing that. It is in the support thread for the relevant activity (IIRC). I don't think it is easy though.

Mike

[mikerr]

A friend (no, not me!) has done a restore and missed off the "-s 127" part, but it seems to work ok.

I take it he's running with no swapfile at all? I said it would be slow, but it seems ok!
(he's not upgraded though, just 40gb)

[Glesgie]

If he really has no swap file then there is a danger that if he gets the GSOD it will be unable
to recover.

[blindlemon]

With no swapfile at all he would probably also have trouble with daily calls...

However, just missing off the -s127 will result in the 'default' swapfile of 64mb, not none, so he should be OK with a 40gb drive.