Can I bakup like this...??

[Ruben de Groot]

On Wed, Nov 19, 2003 at 09:43:30AM -0500, Lowell Gilbert typed:
> Keith Spencer <bsd2000au at yahoo.com.au> writes:

[...]

> > a) Throw another drive in the box
> > b) Createthe same or at least minimum size partitions
> > as the active drive
> > c) Cron job to "dump" or tar or ??? the partitions
> 
> dd(1) is the easiest way to make sure that the disk will work just
> like the other one.  It requires a same-size-or-larger second disk.

I consider dd a very lousy backup method. Any writes to the first disk 
while dd is running will likely result in corrupted filesystems on the
second disk. Performance is bad as well, since dd will copy every single 
bit, not just actual data.

A better approach would be to follow a) and b) above, newfs(8) the
partitions, make the second drive bootable using boot0cfg(8) and then 
periodically use dump/restore, tar, pax, cpio or even rsync to backup
your first to second disk (I've used them all and can't really 
recommend one over the other so suit yourself).

Ruben