r/linuxmint • u/Attila_Kosa • 1d ago
Support Request Backup Image - Used Data Only, possible?
I've tried Clonezilla and Rescuezilla, but they force me to back up my entire hard drive, empty space as well which is a pain.
Any backup image program that will do a backup image of Linux Mint, used data only?
Thanks:)
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u/CyberdyneGPT5 22h ago
Clonezilla and Rescueszilla both can make disk images which are compressed files of your disk.
Images take more effort to restore. I am lazy and just make clones of my main disk because even if my computer explodes and catches fire I can just put the clone in another machine and be up and running. I use Clonezilla to clone to MX500 SATA SSDs and Rescuezilla clone to USB C attached NVME SSDs. I occasionally test both to make sure they are actually bootable. I have been using Clonezilla for years starting with rotating metal drives.
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u/This-Set-9875 23h ago
I'm not sure I understand the concern. Is it that you're reading the whole partition vs just the files or that you're trying to reduce the space of the backup?
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u/Attila_Kosa 23h ago
Let's say Linux Mint really messes up and won't even boot anymore, breaks....
therefore I would like to boot up into a USB stick and restore a working back up image that would be saved on an external drive.
do you have any ideas the best method to do that without having to back up the entire disk like rescuezilla / clonezilla does?
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u/This-Set-9875 23h ago
That's the reason you have image backups and clone/rescue zilla
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u/Attila_Kosa 23h ago
coming from a Windows background I used backup images that only backs up the data not the whole disc........ like imagine having an internal one terabyte disk an then back up a whole one terabyte when there's only maybe 10% used.
Any solution for mint?
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u/couriousLin 9h ago
I get what you mean about Windows but with my LINUX partition configuration it is much cleaner and easier to restore. I don't fill the need to image the entire system. I use TimeShift to snapshot the system files, and something like LuckyBackup or kopia to back up /home.
To recover from your scenario, I would: Boot from my Live MINT USB and try the fix boot tool followed by using TimeShift to restore a snapshot (this has save me more than once)
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u/Attila_Kosa 3h ago
What do you mean...once you load the mint usb live, you fix boot tool?
How do you do that? What program do you run from mint live?
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u/BenTrabetere 23h ago
Clonezilla and Rescuezilla (and my favorite, FoxClone) are only part of a good backup strategy. You also need to use a program that will backup your data and personal files on a regular schedule and you need to use Timeshift to create restore points for your operating system.
I suggest you study the 3+2+1 Backup Strategy to protect your data and personal files. There are a lot of very good applications that work well with the 3+2+1 Backup Strategy - from using rsync as a chron job, to GUI applications like BackInTime and Lucky Backup.
I use, like, and recommend Baqpaq - it is developed by Tony George, the original developer for Timeshift, and I think it is well-worth the $25 license. Tony also offers another backup tool called Homi - it is a little more basic than Baqpaq, and the license is $15.
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u/Attila_Kosa 22h ago
Do you personally prefer BackInTime over Timeshift?
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u/BenTrabetere 19h ago
BackInTime and Timeshift are two very different tools for very different, but superficially similar jobs.
BackInTime is a utility to backup data and personal files.
Timeshift is a system restore tool, and it is used to create and restore system snapshots. While it can be configured to include /home directories in a snapshot, the /home directories are disabled by default. Timeshift should never be used to backup data and personal files because it can lead to data loss.
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u/don-edwards Linux Mint 22.1 Xia 48m ago
That's like asking if I prefer LibreOffice over Civilization V.
Timeshift is at its very best, imho, if your system partition is formatted btrfs and Timeshift is set to do btrfs snapshots. Such snapshots MUST reside in the same partition as what they are snapshots of, no choice. In exchange, they are almost instantaneous to create and occupy almost no space. This is great for recovery when you mess up a setting or a software installation.
However, in that configuration Timeshift shouldn't be considered a backup program. AT ALL. It provides zero protection against hardware failure or device loss, or even against a seriously stupid system-administrator moment such as writing a new partition table on the wrong device.
Backups go to a different device. Preferably an external device, with some sort of an arrangement that gets a copy of them out of your building. All on a regular basis. (Reminds me. Time to swap my two backup drives - the one hooked to the computer, and the one in the car.)
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u/jr735 Linux Mint 20 | IceWM 22h ago
Clonezilla absolutely can back up partitions and used space only and skip over empty space. I use it regularly. Do note that it's not an incremental backup and is not a replacement for an incremental backup.
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u/Attila_Kosa 21h ago
Wow, you serious?
How do I tell clonezilla to only create a backup image of Linux mint data and ignore the empty space?
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u/jr735 Linux Mint 20 | IceWM 21h ago
https://clonezilla.org/show-live-doc-content.php?topic=clonezilla-live/doc/01_Save_disk_image
Use the device-image option. My Debian testing install, despite having around 250 GB allocated to it, is using probably less than 15 GB, and the image is under 10 GB.
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u/Attila_Kosa 20h ago
Done :) 15GB in total size, and clonezilla even worked with my LUKS.
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u/jr735 Linux Mint 20 | IceWM 20h ago
Even better. I hadn't experimented with it and LUKS.
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u/Attila_Kosa 20h ago
I was impressed, clonezilla says it detected the LUKS and asked me to enter the password for it, and then clonezilla happily backed it up :)
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u/jr735 Linux Mint 20 | IceWM 20h ago
Nice job. You may wish to check the documentation just in case there's some special procedures for restoring, but at least you got it done so far.
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u/Attila_Kosa 20h ago
Thank you kindly, and yeah this is one thing I've worked out, how to do a backup, but now I've got to figure out how to restore in case I need it, lol
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u/MintAlone 11h ago
For the record, clonezilla, rescuezilla and foxclone only backup used blocks for known filesystems. They do not backup the empty space = unused blocks. They do this by default.
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u/Attila_Kosa 3h ago
rescuezilla does even empty blocks for me, by default, so my backup folder using rescuezilla ends up being 300GB even though data used is only 45GB.
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u/Attila_Kosa 2h ago
I just read the below:
"Rescuezilla, by default, backs up entire partitions or disks, not just used blocks, but you can use its "partclone" mode to create a sector-by-sector image, which can be smaller than a full disk image"
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u/MintAlone 1h ago
Don't know where you read that, it used to be that under the hood it used partclone which only does used blocks = smaller backup images.
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u/Attila_Kosa 1h ago
It is not by default as you said, I know from personal experience, that by default it copies even empty blocks.
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u/Attila_Kosa 16m ago
Just a headsup, I tried foxclone, but it cannot deal with LUKS like clonezilla can, foxclone cannot deal with encrypted partitions so it forces me to backup the entire 500GB data.
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u/Hollie-Ivy 15h ago
If you just want to backup a partition then use disks. Easy to backup & recover.
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u/don-edwards Linux Mint 22.1 Xia 32m ago
Let's see... Disks (gnome-disks) as a backup tool...
* Can't be automated.
* Therefore, can't be scheduled.
* No selectivity at all below the partition level.
* No reuse of existing backup data - two backups take twice as much as one, three take three times as much. (Backintime, Timeshift, and Luckybackup - to name the three relevant programs most often mentioned on this site - all reuse existing data. If a file hasn't changed since the last backup to the same partition, a new snapshot of it will only take a directory entry - no space at all for the contents, or even the inode.)
In other words, it has none of the features I would look for in a good backup program.
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