Backing up/Restoring a disk image from/to floppy disk

The dd(1) command in Linux is used to do direct dumps from one device (or file) to another. It is an excellent tool to create a disk image or to make a diskette from an image file (*.img). The command is invoked as follows

1. dd if=imagefile of=/dev/fd0 bs=72k

20+0 records in 20+0 records out

The records counts are dd(1)'s output to indicate how much was read and how much was written. In this example, a full 1.44MB floppy was written (20 * 72k). If you get a smaller block count, the image did not transfer correctly. If this is the case, it will usually be accompanied by a disk error.

Remember to label disks according to their contents if you want to keep track.

Under Windows, RaWrite fulfills similar duties.

CategoryDiskNotes