Guys I appreciate your quick responses.
So the problem remains- backup vs cloning, with pros and cons.
It's painful to see Clonezilla not being able to take out empty spaces while doing the .img thing. And DD is fraught even with a Linux laptop.
Question: Is the /storage folder the only one physically on the SD card?
How about /flash? I am assuming all LE folders are on SD card, or Clonezilla etc wouldn't be able to backup a complete image?
It's painful to see Clonezilla not being able to take out empty spaces while doing the .img thing.
I'm not quite following that. CloneZilla does do compression, thus it can create small(er) images of large partitions that also have large empty spaces. Data is compressed by default, unless you don't want that and prefer bit-by-bit images. It's an advanced settings thing. You can also do Clonezilla images where you backup/restore partitions seperately but still into one image file. Perhaps you need to dive into Clonezilla's options and capabilities a bit more.
How about /flash?
That is part of the read-only system partition. Which should be easy enough to manually reinstall: creating partitions and copying the 4 files to that system partition. How many times are you planning to restore your LE system files anyway? Remember, LibreELEC uses only 2 system blob files (KERNEL + SYSTEM) in its installation.
i use the qt5-fsarchiver installed on an usb-stick with a complete ubuntu-mate-installation.
I'm not quite following that. CloneZilla does do compression, thus it can create small(er) images of large partitions that also have large empty spaces. Data is compressed by default, unless you don't want that and prefer bit-by-bit images. It's an advanced settings thing. You can also do Clonezilla images where you backup/restore partitions seperately but still into one image file. Perhaps you need to dive into Clonezilla's options and capabilities a bit more.
That is part of the read-only system partition. Which should be easy enough to manually reinstall: creating partitions and copying the 4 files to that system partition. How many times are you planning to restore your LE system files anyway? Remember, LibreELEC uses only 2 system blob files (KERNEL + SYSTEM) in its installation.
Yes I finally did realize Clonezilla does it right- too much smoke and mirrors online !
But now here is what happened- Emailed to steven@clonezilla.com
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Steven,
Saw your name online re:bug fixes.
Have an old Win7 home premium Acer 255E netbook.
I downloaded Clonezilla live USB via tuxboot following all site instructions via online and also downloaded the ISO.
I proceeded to boot from the USB and apparently was able to copy a Linux distro image from the SD card reader to a second USB stick. All seemed fine.
Then I tried booting from the laptop and have realized that it always boots Clonezilla. I briefly saw Acer eRecovery after pressing various F buttons, Alt and Esc etc, before I read about eRecovery.
The Alt + F10 combo doesn't work to bring up eRecovery ( there is no CD drive.) I keep getting Clonezilla screen no matter what. Acer online forums are nice help.
Kindly suggest a solution ! This likely is a bug as I noticed mention of a big fix earlier re: Acer One boot.
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i use the qt5-fsarchiver installed on an usb-stick with a complete ubuntu-mate-installation.
So this is an alt to Clonezilla live USB on Windows?
Can you give me some instructions? I am assuming your method will image the data on LE SD card, not the whole SD card!
i never used it for saving windows, but it is a very good tool for linux. it is imaging the data, partitions or the wohle disk of an installed system, or LE on SD-card and if you want to move it on an other computer, it will do it. i tried it now with LE on a pc-installation, just LE is installed and it works.
i deleted the whole harddisk, formated the disk as it was and reinstalled LE with qt5-fsarchiver.
to your question about eMMC on a s905 box. i am sure this will not work because of the different boot-loaders. you can try to copy userdata and addons to have the same installation like on your computer ....
the guru for those questions is balbes150. he also did a lot for the khadas vim. i am using one of his LE-images.
I will still appreciate any links.
My aim here is just to img (complete backup) from an LE SD card once add-ons and settings etc have been customized. Then transfer (restore) this new img (minimum possible for boot) to another similar S905 box later, plus archive it in case of loss. No wish to run this img on Windows !
Sure we all know balbes150 great work. But my task is simple enough 
so you have to use on linux "Disks" (you find it under Accessories-Disks) or on windows Win32DiskImager ...
So I managed to recover my Windows 7 on my laptop, but Clonezilla still doesn't seem to do the data imaging job...
I am getting piecemeal info and doesn't look like LE is interested in a full single image vs their backup tool. ( LE or CE look the same problem to me. Using both.)
Right now it has become a mini challenge to do a LE/CE single image data only clone. Sure I can always do a backup.
*So what exact steps and settings do I need?* I have a laptop with Windows 7, and an SD card reader + 3 USB slots. Couple USB sticks too. And my Clonezilla live USB works in one USB stick.
1. Here it says it does only copy data not entire disk unless instructed otherwise:
[SOLVED] Clonezilla make image of size of data not size of disk - Data Backup - Spiceworks
So is this done under defaults with Beginner mode?
2. Also I copied my CE SD card to a USB drive, but the size looks 157MB. I know the original 140MB gzip expands to 559 MB, so there must be either hidden partitions on SD card, and/or data gets copied to the S905 eMMC.
So what is the case? I don't think I can copy above to a fresh SD card and boot a S905 box??!!
3. Here is I what I wrote back to steven@clonezilla.com after he suggested a recovery on my laptop ( yes I had used defaults on the tuxboot live USB way and got Clonezilla installed over my Windows 7 instead of a USB !)
Any suggestions ?
I am trying to clone the LE/CE image as a single image (about 1GB or less with a couple addons and settings), not whole 8GB SD card, via Clonezilla live USB attached to a Windows 7 laptop along with one USB stick as destination, and an SD card reader (or a 3rd USB stick) as source.
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Steven
I fixed my Windows via recovery.
Now I noticed that Clonezilla doesn't recognize my SD card reader on my laptop- I am using Beginner mode throughput.
So then I just copied the contents of myCoreElec.org distribution including device tree folder (containing several *.dtb files) and System files.
However Clonezilla first only showed the device tree folder, not the actual root directory at directory selection; then for source shower the HDD on laptop and the destination USB drive.
But when I try selecting USB the red square doesn't stay: it moves with the ok or cancel button !
How do I image data on my SD card/ USB stick then (don't want the entire disk copied)?
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Sorry to bump an older thread, 3 questions.
1, does this still work in version 9 (probably)
2, does this backup manual mapping of SMB folders (storage-(foldername).mount in the system.d folder
3, does it backup docker / docker configs (in my case, Plex server configuration)
Sorry to bump an older thread, 3 questions.
1, does this still work in version 9 (probably)
2, does this backup manual mapping of SMB folders (storage-(foldername).mount in the system.d folder
3, does it backup docker / docker configs (in my case, Plex server configuration)
Anyone?
