XXClone Freeware and my simple "home fleet" project

[Greegor]

I got my family a "fleet" of 5 cheap off lease computers
to have 2 or 3 to use and two spares ready to go or
to donate parts.. All identical Dell GX-280 Small
Desktop (SDT)'s with Win XP Pro, identical model main
boards, 3.4 GHz P4 processors and 3 Gig RAM.
(About $120 each, "off lease" on eBay)

We actually got by with 40 Gig Hard Disk Drives fairly well.

Our collections of photos, MP3's and downloaded
YouTube videos (FLV480 or MP4) for a video jukebox
playlist have pushed us toward larger drives.

I like the idea of keeping the drives on each system down
in size and just having a large external drive to archive
files and back up twice to prevent loss. Will do this.

However, larger INTERNAL drives in some systems are
necessary for the video jukebox and MP3's to be readily used.

The need / want to occasionally set up fresh
"clean boot" Windows systems easier pushed me to
want the data folders out of the root directory
on the same partition as the Windows system itself.

So I came up with this simple plan for larger drives:

I built a "clean boot" PROTOTYPE drive and added all
of the UPDATES, programs and tweaks that we use
on an everyday system.

Partition and Format with Dell Restore CD Windows XP Pro SP2
Wow! only 3.16 GB used for that!
Copied and installed Dell model specific drivers from their web site
from USB Flash drive. Sound, LAN, System SW, Intel Chipset SW
Copied fast shutdown shortcut from Flash drive.

Installed MS Windows update apparatus and SP3 66.9MB took 27 minutes

REBOOT

MS Update site suggests 105 updates (as of early Dec 2011)
( Internet Explorer 8 is in there somewhere )
added two optional updates:
Dell Video Intel 82915G/GV/910GL Express Chipset and
MS Security Essentials (Update estimates an hour to install)

REBOOT

Still only 6.79 GB used!
Tweaked screen saver, power settings
MS Update site suggests Framework 4 all by itself

REBOOT

MS Update site suggests 20 updates.
I rejected/disabled update for MS LIVE but said YES to optional
Silverlight
12 Minute estimate to download and install TOOK more than AN HOUR!

REBOOT

System tried login password stuff we dummy up for quick boot.

MS Update site has 187.8 MB 27 files estimated 13 minutes, actual 38
minutes

REBOOT

MS Update site says (0) urgent and (0) optional
Went to Adobe and got Flash Player and Shockwave Player

9.57 GB total hard disk space used so far.

Installed VLC Video Player, Quicktime, Adobe Acrobat,etc.

10.6 GB used on drive after a few more tweaks and updates.

I settled on 20 Gigs partition size to allow room for:
1. plenty of room for more MS Updates
2. installed software used on system
3. >10% extra space to allow DEFRAG to work.

I got some 160 Gig Hard Disks Partitioned 20 Gig
up front for Windows system and 20 Gig at the tail
end for a CLONED Windows system as a backup.

These systems only have one SATA port but
I adapted the IDE port used for DVDROM drive
to connect up to my prototype Windows drive.
I used one of those IDE/SATA adapters sold
from China or Hong Kong through eBay.
XXCLONE took about an hour to copy the
image from my prototype drive to the front
partition on a 160 GB Hard Drive.
I took out the prototype drive and adapter
and put the IDE cable back on the DVDROM drive.

I should mention that the REASON I settled on
XXClone Free for this was that many Drive Imagers
copy WHOLE DRIVES and not PARTITIONS.
I had used the Acronis True Image SW free
for use associated with WD branded drives
(from Seagate/Maxtor for their branded drives)
but at least the Freebie does whole drives, not
partitions as I need for my plan.

160 GB 152578 ENTIRE DRIVE
--------------------------
20 GB 20481 C WinXP
50 GB 51199 E Misc
60 GB 60416 F Photos-MP3s-Vids
20 GB 20481 G Clone-of WinXP

The idea was to have an identical copy
of the system drive stashed on the top end.
Several computer makers like Compaq
used to do something like this secretly
with a hidden partition, but I'm setting it
up to be plainly visible and available for
me to update and USE with XXClone.

I Cloned the boot partition to the top
partition using XXClone.

Tempted by the "Cool Tools" tab in XXClone
I told it to "Make Bootable" the top partition.

Now I have a multi boot system where
Cool tools "Make Bootable" decides which
of the two paritions boots and therefore
becomes drive C:

It occurred to me that most clone programs
allow you to clone FROM the boot drive
but not to clone TO the current boot drive.
(Would obviously interrupt a running instance
of Windows using swap files.)

This ability to boot from the top partition
would be very handy for cloning from the
top partition back down to the first partition.

The multiboot scripting in BOOT.INI is
interesting, apparently invoking some
type of boot manager in XXClone.

It's a bit quirky in that it appears to refer
to the FRONT partition as a Clone when
the front parition is actually now the original.

I marked the original vs clone systems
by simply turning off auto arrange of icons
and moving an icon as a marker.
If that icon appear on the left vs the right
I know which image actually booted.

It seems like XXClone somehow triggered
Windows to turn on the Language ? button
on the task bar, but it's not really a problem.

The XXClone help file CHM is at

http://www.xxclone.com/xcln_chm.zip

Pixelab's XXClone FREEWARE Version is at:

http://www.xxclone.com/xxclone.zip

The Pro version for pay does incremental backups at:

http://www.xxclone.com/idwnload.htm

It so happens that I had a SATA drive where it
apparently failed from one head/platter on,
effectively making what was an 80 Gig drive
into a drive with a reliable front partition of 16GB.

It worked just fine for my prototype system and
would work as a backup plan B to clone from
the top partition of a large drive to the front partition
of a large drive should I need a clean boot again.

ie The larger DATA partitions would not normally
need to be duplicated to get a clean boot.

None of this completely eliminates the need for
complete backups or of the large external USB
hard disk to back up the DATA partitions.

The incremental version of XXClone would probably
work well for incremental backups in between
complete image clones of the DATA drives to
such a USB portable archive drive.

"Slotting in" Cloned Windows drives works
especially well for me because the fleet of
off lease computers are all big name OEM
and all identical. The OEM version of Win
XP Pro does NOT object to swapping the
Windows System drive from one computer
to another because they are the identical
model with identical main board from a
big name OEM.

If you have 5 different models, 5 different
mainboards or 5 different configurations then
you would need to make 5 different prototype
windows drives to "slot in" a clean boot
partition this way.

The particular main board I settled on for
my "fleet" is 0G8310 which has a second
SATA port in hardware and in BIOS but the
2nd SATA port just has the connector
on the main board missing. If I get a more
precision soldering iron I might populate that
with a connector. If I add in a SATA card
it might change the mother board profile or
driver situation enough to cause me trouble.

I also want to add a piggy backed
2nd power supply just to run drives on one
machine to facilitate cloning for my little "fleet".
I envision a standard PS piggy backed
off to the left with two caseless drive bays
and two SATA cables, so the rest of the
system does not have to be disturbed much
except for preventive maintenance vacuuming
every 6 months.

I'm already keeping my eyes open for the
next fleet of cheap "off lease" computers to
do all of this with in a few years, if possible.

Has Microsoft created some fresh new hell with
Windows 7 or Windows 8 like registering
software or getting prickly about swapping OEM
hardware around in a fleet situation like this?

Thank you Pixielab for XXClone Freeware!

My little home "fleet" of cheap old "off lease"
computers is looking well set for a few more years!

Greg Hanson, Cedar Rapids, Iowa, USA

[Dan Anderson]

Hi Greg,

I'm just an occasional xxclone user and not connected with Pixie Labs.

It sounds like your system is working, optimally creating and updating one relatively small XP partition and then cloning and incremental updating the corresponding partitions on your "fleet" of five hardware-identical machines.

Regarding your middle paragraph that begins "It occurred to me ...", there seems to be a suggestion that, unlike other cloning programs, xxclone might be able to clone to the current boot drive rather than only clone from the current boot drive, but I don't think xxclone can do that.  Terminology might muddy the water, but as a rule my understanding is that xxclone can only clone from the partition into which it has booted (and thereby has access to the current registry information).

Regarding the key paragraph at the end of your email:  "Has Microsoft created some fresh new hell with Windows 7 or Windows 8 like registering software or getting prickly about swapping OEM hardware around in a fleet situation like this?", my impression is that Win7 does have more rigorous controls around the registration of Win7 (compared to, say. XP) but it would be interesting to hear what others have experienced in terms of Win7 constraining the creation of multiple Win7 versions.  However, since your approach only seems to update a single copy of the operating system (and then extending that as a clone to other identical machines), there would supposedly be no need to invoke the update process from the other machines and so registration issues might be avoided.  Maybe there is an argument that it is just a single expanded machine, but I don't know what other registration checks would come into play.

Certainly in a more general situation when clone backups are created for a Win7 (or XP) partition, there will be times when the clone must replace a (damaged) original, which would result in the windows update process being invoked out of sync with the update sequence that had been taking place with the original version.  I don't know what approach Microsoft takes to such disjoint updating of a single licensed installation (such as several machines requesting updates for the same licensed software), but supposedly they have some sort of controls with some degree of tolerance to allow for basic backups.  That would be a little different situation than you are looking at, but there may be some commonalities in terms of understanding the registration controls.

Cheers,
Dan

_______________________________________________________________________


-------- Original Message --------

Subject:	[xxclone] XXClone Freeware and my simple "home fleet" project
Date:	Wed, 21 Dec 2011 09:39:22 -0800 (PST)
From:	Greegor <gree...@gmail.com>
Reply-To:	xxc...@googlegroups.com
To:	The Xxclone Forum <xxc...@googlegroups.com>

It so happens that I had a SATA drive where it
apparently failed from one head/platter on,
effectively making what was an 80 Gig drive
into a drive with a reliable front partition of 16GB.

It worked just fine for my prototype system and
would work as a backup plan B to clone from
the top partition of a large drive to the front partition
of a large drive should I need a clean boot again.

ie The larger DATA partitions would not normally
need to be duplicated to get a clean boot.

None of this completely eliminates the need for
complete backups or of the large external USB
hard disk to back up the DATA partitions.

The incremental version of XXClone would probably
work well for incremental backups in between
complete image clones of the DATA drives to
such a USB portable archive drive.

"Slotting in" Cloned Windows drives works
especially well for me because the fleet of
off lease computers are all big name OEM
and all identical.  The OEM version of Win
XP Pro does NOT object to swapping the
Windows System drive from one computer
to another because they are the identical
model with identical main board from a
big name OEM.

If you have 5 different models, 5 different
mainboards or 5 different configurations then
you would need to make 5 different prototype
windows drives to "slot in" a clean boot
partition this way.

The particular main board I settled on for
my "fleet" is 0G8310 which has a second
SATA port in hardware and in BIOS but the
2nd SATA port just has the connector
on the main board missing.   If I get a more
precision soldering iron I might populate that
with a connector.  If I add in a SATA card
it might change the mother board profile or
driver situation enough to cause me trouble.

I also want to add a piggy backed
2nd power supply just to run drives on one
machine to facilitate cloning for my little "fleet".
I envision a standard PS piggy backed
off to the left with two caseless drive bays
and two SATA cables, so the rest of the
system does not have to be disturbed much
except for preventive maintenance vacuuming
every 6 months.

I'm already keeping my eyes open for the
next fleet of cheap "off lease" computers to
do all of this with in a few years, if possible.

Has Microsoft created some fresh new hell with
Windows 7 or Windows 8 like registering
software or getting prickly about swapping OEM
hardware around in a fleet situation like this?

Thank you Pixielab for XXClone Freeware!

My little home "fleet" of cheap old "off lease"
computers is looking well set for a few more years!

Greg Hanson, Cedar Rapids, Iowa, USA

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[Greegor]

On Dec 21, 7:02 pm, Dan Anderson <dan.ander...@sympatico.ca> wrote:
> Hi Greg,...
>
> read more »

>
> I'm just an occasional xxclone user and not connected with Pixie Labs.
>
> It sounds like your system is working, optimally creating and updating
> one relatively small XP partition and then cloning and incremental
> updating the corresponding partitions on your "fleet" of five
> hardware-identical machines.

I don't have the incremental USB backup stuff working
yet but that plan makes sense.

> Regarding your middle paragraph that begins "It occurred to me ...",
> there seems to be a suggestion that, unlike other cloning programs,
> xxclone might be able to clone to the current boot drive rather than
> only clone from the current boot drive, but I don't think xxclone can do
> that.

Sorry for the poor communication there.
My "aha" moment was because booting from the
top partition instance of WinXP would
enable me to clone that to the first partition.

I don't think ANY drive imager (cloning) program
should ever attempt to write TO the current boot
partition, but switching WHICH partition you
boot from is an obvious way to work around that
limitation.

Some of the other programs run on top
of a CDROM or Floppy system like
DOS, BartPE, WinPE or a Linux so
they are uninvolved in any boot
partition they are likely to overwrite.

I actually bought three new original
and genuine Ghost packages but they
seem to worry too much about registration
and mark the drive images slightly,
so my enthusiasm declined to the point
I started looking for free options
available on the net and found XXclone.

I am not paid endorser or affiliated
in any way with Pixielab.

> Terminology might muddy the water, but as a rule my understanding
> is that xxclone can only clone from the partition into which it has
> booted (and thereby has access to the current registry information).

Are you sure? I'm not sure that anything would prevent
it from copying from the second partition to the third
or from a 5th to a sixth partition, for example.

It's plausible that it might be heavily tied to the registry
but I thought that swap files changing on the fly were
a bigger reason to not copy to the current boot partition.

Do you think that if I turn OFF swap files (I have the memory)
in Windows, a program like this could copy to the boot drive?

I feel little pressure to do that, but any insight
into the software mechanics of this XXClone or
imagers in general would be welcome.

[Dan Anderson]

Hi Greg,
On the last few paragraphs regarding my possibly incorrect understanding that xxclone has to be running within the partition that it wants to use as the source for o/s cloning, you might be correct that other non-active partitions (with an alternate version of the installed o/s) could be used as the source, since xxclone does provide a drop down option list to select the source partition. 

Others, such as Des, have a better understanding than I do on the inner workings and constraints, and so they might provide additional comments.

Cheers,
Dan

___________________________________________________


-------- Original Message --------

Subject:	[xxclone] Re: XXClone Freeware and my simple "home fleet" project
Date:	Wed, 21 Dec 2011 23:14:15 -0800 (PST)
From:	Greegor <gree...@gmail.com>
Reply-To:	xxc...@googlegroups.com
To:	The Xxclone Forum <xxc...@googlegroups.com>

 wrote:
> Hi Greg,...
>
> read more »
>
> I'm just an occasional xxclone user and not connected with Pixie Labs.
>
> It sounds like your system is working, optimally creating and updating
> one relatively small XP partition and then cloning and incremental
> updating the corresponding partitions on your "fleet" of five
> hardware-identical machines.

I don't have the incremental USB backup stuff working
yet but that plan makes sense.

> Regarding your middle paragraph that begins "It occurred to me ...",
> there seems to be a suggestion that, unlike other cloning programs,
> xxclone might be able to clone to the current boot drive rather than
> only clone from the current boot drive, but I don't think xxclone can do
> that.

Sorry for the poor communication there.
My "aha" moment was because booting from the
top partition instance of WinXP would
enable me to clone that to the first partition.

I don't think ANY drive imager (cloning) program
should ever attempt to write TO the current boot
partition, but switching WHICH partition you
boot from is an obvious way to work around that
limitation.

Some of the other programs run on top
of a CDROM or Floppy system like
DOS, BartPE, WinPE or a Linux so
they are uninvolved in any boot
partition they are likely to overwrite.

I actually bought three new original
and genuine Ghost packages but they
seem to worry too much about registration
and mark the drive images slightly,
so my enthusiasm declined to the point
I started looking for free options
available on the net and found XXclone.

I am not paid endorser or affiliated
in any way with Pixielab.

> Terminology might muddy the water, but as a rule my understanding
> is that xxclone can only clone from the partition into which it has
> booted (and thereby has access to the current registry information).

Are you sure?   I'm not sure that anything would prevent
it from copying from the second partition to the third
or from a 5th to a sixth partition, for example.

It's plausible that it might be heavily tied to the registry
but I thought that swap files changing on the fly were
a bigger reason to not copy to the current boot partition.

Do you think that if I turn OFF swap files (I have the memory)
in Windows, a program like this could copy to the boot drive?

I feel little pressure to do that, but any insight
into the software mechanics of this XXClone or
imagers in general would be welcome.

-- 
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[DES]

Hi, let me put in my 2 cents worth and probably re-address a few
points already commented on.

Windows 7 it's self doesn't seem to have any more software copy
protection schemes etc. than XP. In fact it contains more drivers and
will transfer to more different hardware in my opinion. But much
software; primarily security suite stuff, firewalls, etc. do key their
installations to the disk VolumeID. I've found that duplicating that
solves most transfer problems.

A new item (for me) has just arisen. Both a Thunderbird and a Firefox
Add-on refuse to operate on a clone. This appears to be the add-on
it's self's problem, they're not registering their chrome packages and
hence don't appear in the registry. The installed to version will
operate fine but the add-on is disable on a clone. Re-installation of
the add-on easily fixes the problem.

I used to have a multipartion (6 actually) system setup. Kan himself
admonished me at one point, and I took affront at the time. But
discovered over time that he was correct. All it did was cause
problems. Many small but subtle things that finally convinced me to
let folders correctly play the role of my partitions.

Let me state my understanding of "clone". I think it means a "bootable
copy". Creating a clone can even be divided into the separate
operations, creating a copy, and making that bootable. Some of the
catches are what all to include\exclude in a copy and including the
system open files. I don't know how xxclone does that but Windows
includes the Volume Shadow Copy Service for the task. Not to take
anything away from xxclone, but SyncBackSE\Pro can copy anything you
have (and includes a very good default exclude filter). It does suffer
from the "32bit software redirection" problem. In 64 bit Windows all
calls to C:\Windows\System32\ are redirected internally to C:\Windows
\sysWOW64\. Talk about confusing, the 64 bit system files are in
System32, and the 32 bit system files are in sysWOW64
(systemWindows(32)OnWindows64)! But there are a couple of work a-
rounds allowing whole disk\partition incremental updates. A 64 bit
version should follow before long and remove this inconvenience.

Imaging the disk, including MBR and VolumeID, will create a bootable
copy if that physically\electrically replaces the original. Booting a
copy in place (test booting) requires a bit more. If both source &
destination are to be simultaneously connected, it's necessary for the
copy to be convinced it's the source, the installed to drive, (and
visa versa) by swapping their Drive Letter & Volume Label Assignments
in the registry of the destination. Believe it or not this can be be
easily done manually, I've described the procedure here several times.

This editing of a non-running registry has recently allowed me to
actually boot a clone on a USB connected drive. Would have said that
was impossible until it worked. Windows can be tickled into becoming
mobile, literally!

Sounds like you're mostly there: DES

[Greegor]

Response in line below.

On Dec 23, 8:04 am, DES <des...@Cox.net> wrote:
> Hi, let me put in my 2 cents worth and probably re-address a few
> points already commented on.
>
> Windows 7 it's self doesn't seem to have any more software copy
> protection schemes etc. than XP. In fact it contains more drivers and
> will transfer to more different hardware in my opinion. But much
> software; primarily security suite stuff, firewalls, etc. do key their
> installations to the disk VolumeID. I've found that duplicating that
> solves most transfer problems.

I thought that was a nice "Cool Tool" in XXClone Freeware.

> A new item (for me) has just arisen. Both a Thunderbird and a Firefox
> Add-on refuse to operate on a clone. This appears to be the add-on
> it's self's problem, they're not registering their chrome packages and
> hence don't appear in the registry. The installed to version will
> operate fine but the add-on is disable on a clone. Re-installation of
> the add-on easily fixes the problem.
>
> I used to have a multipartion (6 actually) system setup. Kan himself
> admonished me at one point, and I took affront at the time. But
> discovered over time that he was correct. All it did was cause
> problems. Many small but subtle things that finally convinced me to
> let folders correctly play the role of my partitions.

WinXP or Win7?

I am guessing that you are talking about a system where
windows boots in one partition and PROGRAMS are on another
drive. Having a large archive of Documents, downloads,
MP3's and Videos in the middle (large) partitions seems
to cause no problems in XP Pro. I consider software to
be MARRIED to the Windows system, but archives not.

WinXP Pro and all installed programs we use (not many) are
all completely contained on the bottom partition to avoid
problems with spreading those across different partitions.

Part of the reason I like the modular system and programs
partition (and clone at top) is that I won't have to go
through the rediculous 4 hours of installing updates
in clumps and REBOOTING for them to fully install on boot.

If I could have figured out how to slipstream all of
the updates and upgrades I still think I would have
wanted to clone the system partition in this modular way.

By the way, when going from SP2 restore CD to
SP3, it doesn't look like Microsoft Update kills
off any SP2 specific updates. I would have
expected that at least a FEW SP2 security updates
would have been completely superceded by a
corresponding SP3 counterpart.

> Let me state my understanding of "clone". I think it means a "bootable
> copy". Creating a clone can even be divided into the separate
> operations, creating a copy, and making that bootable. Some of the
> catches are what all to include\exclude in a copy and including the
> system open files. I don't know how xxclone does that but Windows
> includes the Volume Shadow Copy Service for the task. Not to take
> anything away from xxclone, but SyncBackSE\Pro can copy anything you
> have (and includes a very good default exclude filter). It does suffer
> from the "32bit software redirection" problem. In 64 bit Windows all
> calls to C:\Windows\System32\ are redirected internally to C:\Windows
> \sysWOW64\. Talk about confusing, the 64 bit system files are in
> System32, and the 32 bit system files are in sysWOW64
> (systemWindows(32)OnWindows64)! But there are a couple of work a-
> rounds allowing whole disk\partition incremental updates. A 64 bit
> version should follow before long and remove this inconvenience.
>
> Imaging the disk, including MBR and VolumeID, will create a bootable
> copy if that physically\electrically replaces the original. Booting a
> copy in place (test booting) requires a bit more. If both source &
> destination are to be simultaneously connected, it's necessary for the
> copy to be convinced it's the source, the installed to drive, (and
> visa versa) by swapping their Drive Letter & Volume Label Assignments
> in the registry of the destination. Believe it or not this can be be
> easily done manually, I've described the procedure here several times.

I'll look for that to study some more.

> This editing of a non-running registry has recently allowed me to
> actually boot a clone on a USB connected drive. Would have said that
> was impossible until it worked. Windows can be tickled into becoming
> mobile, literally!
>
> Sounds like you're mostly there: DES

It sounds like external USB boot drives would
be good for some people when Windows 7 becomes
de rigueur or routine.

I was explaining my simple modular approach to
cloning the windows partitions and I explained
it as a quick way to recover when I try out
a lot of downloaded software, installing and
uninstalling, which leaves remnants/tracks in
the registry and some files behind.

But it also applies when a family member slips
up and snarls up the system somehow.
Getting to a CLEAN BOOT is still a solution
if they run a program that gets sloppy
with files or registry.

I guess in the back of my mind I'm moving toward
the stage of having the 2nd, 3rd and TOP partitions
all stashed on a portable archive USB drive.

A big drive hung off the local router and secured
with access control appealed to me until I found
that several of those actually require that
you go through that maker's web site on an
ongoing basis for access. Yuck.

I noticed in reading that developers at some
big conference were given evaluation copies
of Windows 8 on a large USB Flash drive.

I also saw that MS or others are considering a
change in paradigm such that each users "system"
would be like that, just a flash drive, and
systems themselves could get to be diskless
and generic with the focus being the system
drive a person carries around in their pocket.

Laptops and notebooks for portability would
in theory basically be replaced by
some form of flash drive.

I's guessing that Digital Rights Management
would be crucial to Microsoft's business model.
Maybe they can charge by the minute? (LOL)