Transfering HDD contents to another HDD

[JoHubb]

Using Mint 18.3 in a desktop.

I am running out of space on my 2TB HDD. I wish to copy the contents of the drive to a new 4TB HDD.

Should I just copy and paste, or is there a better way of doing it? Thanks.

[philotux]

For data only, maybe Grsync could be useful.

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apt install grsync

If you are thinking of system cloning, then perhaps other tools/methods are to be considered (Clonezilla, etc.)

[JoHubb]

No, just data. I will try Grsync. Thanks!

[phd21]

Hi JoHubb,

I just read your post and the good replies to it. Here are my thoughts on this as well.

FYI: One of the fastest methods of copying a drive's partition is to use "GParted" partition manager editor and literally copy the source drive partition and paste it onto the destination drive partition. You can use "GParted Live" on a bootable CD/DVD disc or USB stick. "Clonezilla Live" disc imaging program works well too. If the drive and the partitions are not part of the drive you booted into, then you can use "gparted" from the Linux Mint menu, may require installing it first.


Hope this helps ...

[JoHubb]

FYI: One of the fastest methods of copying a drive's partition is to use "GParted" partition manager editor and literally copy the source drive partition and paste it onto the destination drive partition. You can use "GParted Live" on a bootable CD/DVD disc or USB stick. "Clonezilla Live" disc imaging program works well too. If the drive and the partitions are not part of the drive you booted into, then you can use "gparted" from the Linux Mint menu, may require installing it first..

Thanks, phd21.
The data I wish to copy is on its own partition on a different drive from the boot partition. From what you say, I can use GParted (already installed) to copy this data partition directly on to the 4TB drive.
The question is then how best to partition the 4TB drive? From memory, the last time I partitioned a drive there was an option to let the installer do its own thing....from a practical point of view I would have no issues with the entire drive being a single partition. Is there a problem doing that?

[phd21]

Hi JoHubb,

Yes, you can run it from your Linux Mint system in your case, but gparted might be faster from a bootable disk or USB stick without the overhead of the Linux Mint operating system. You should have no problems using "gparted" to quickly copy from one drive's partition to another drive's partition. I think gparted will create the partition for you on the destination drive. I cannot remember if it will automatically use all the available space or not. But, resizing partitions is easy with gparted.

With all the available options for getting all the content from one drive's partition to another drive's partition, "gparted" was by far the fastest especially when run from a bootable disc or USB stick.

[JoHubb]

Thanks, I'll see if I can find a live USB with GParted. Or create one, of course!

[phd21]

Hi JoHubb,

You are welcome...

Keep in mind that there are 2 versions of "GParted Live" a 64-bit (amd64) and a 32-bit (i386/i686) .iso files, use the 64-bit if your computer is 64-bit. You can use any USB stick image writer application including Linux Mint USB Image writer, or unetbootin, etcher, etc... Or "MultiSystem" for putting multiple operating systems or utilities on one USB stick.

GParted -- Download
https://gparted.org/download.php

I created a multi-bootable DVD and USB Sticks of both versions because I help people using both 64-bit and 32-bit systems.

Here is a download link to an "multicd.iso" file I created earlier this year (2018) using "multicd" that contains both 64-bit and 32-bit versions of various nice to have utilities like "GParted Live", "boot-repair-disk", "Clonezilla Live", "SuperGrub2", "Minitool Partition Wizard", Rescatux, (Kaspersky does not work on this, but everything else does work), etc... It is around 3.6gb and should work with a DVD or USB stick.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1yyBp67 ... sp=sharing

Let us know how it went...

[JoHubb]

Many thanks for all this, phd21.

I will let you know how it goes in a few days. In the meantime, I have to do a bit of internal jiggery-pokery to make room for the new drive. Believe it or not, I have managed to use up all six SATA connections so something will have to make way.

...and I have to put up a Christmas Tree and be generally useful about the place!

[JoHubb]

Sorry for the delay in posting back. Christmas is a serious business in our house - the place was awash with relatives, some of whom I can't remember their names

I used Gparted to partition the HDD. For some reason it has pointed the disk drive to a strange place so I cannot write files to it.

GParted_4TB.png

I'd be grateful for advice.

[JoHubb]

As a follow up, this is the error when I try to transfer a file from one disk drive to this new one (3.7TB):

Screenshot at 2018-12-31 14-01-14.png

I'm hoping someone can put me right.

[phd21]

Hi JoHubb,

You are welcome...

Because the drive has a Linux filesystem (ext4) you have to give yourself permission one time to read and write to the drive.

see post below for the command to give permission

For mounting any connected drive using any file system.
NTFS Partition does not activate even with automount, until clicking drive in file manager - Linux Mint Forums
viewtopic.php?f=208&t=278971&p=1535140#p1535140

Command will look something like below, you can copy and paste the command.

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sudo chown -R $USER:$USER /media/$USER/

I do not know if the command below would work or not for you, just referencing the drive's partition, but it might.

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sudo chown -R $USER:$USER /dev/sdd2/

If you use "Disks" to automount a drive's partition(s) it will usually use the folder "/mnt" for mounting.

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sudo chown -R $USER:$USER /mnt/

Hope this helps ...

[JoHubb]

Thanks again, phd21, but I am not getting anywhere with this.

None of those terminal commands have given me access to the disk drive, e.g.

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howard@Snow-White ~ $ sudo chown -R $USER:$USER /dev/sdd2/
[sudo] password for howard: 
chown: cannot access '/dev/sdd2/': Not a directory
howard@Snow-White ~ $ 

The disk is listed on the left in File Manager but when I try to create a folder, that option is greyed out.

When I created the partitions with GParted I don't remember seeing an option to 'automount'. Perhaps this is the problem?
Should I try 'Disks' - it's not a utility I've used before and I have set up numerous drives in Mint and Kubuntu in the past without it!

[JoHubb]

Does this cast any further light on my problem?

Screenshot at 2019-01-02 09-41-08.png