Backup Solution For This Specific Setup

Question

I've been thinking about how I'm going to backup my setup but I'm sort of stuck.
My setup: 2 Drives
80GB Intel SSD - boot disk, dual boots Windows 7 and ArchLinux
500GB HDD  - only for files, not going to be of any concern
Here's the fdisk -l for the SSD (/dev/sdb)
Disk /dev/sdb: 80.0 GB, 80026361856 bytes, 156301488 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x9b9dcc69
Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sdb1 * 2048 206847 102400 7 HPFS/NTFS/exFAT
/dev/sdb2 206848 103811071 51802112 7 HPFS/NTFS/exFAT
/dev/sdb3 104015872 156301311 26142720 83 Linux
/dev/sdb4 103811072 104015871 102400 83 Linux
Here's what I'd like: If the SSD fails, I'd like to be able to have an exact clone bootable USB HDD ready to use (so it must be able to dual boot). Basically, I'd like to minimize down time as much as possible. Then I'd like to be able to transfer everything again to a new SSD.
I understand that I can use rsync for backups: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Fu … with_rsync but I'm not sure how to adjust it for dual booting. Should I be cloning with dd instead? From what I've read dd will copy everything including the partition table of the old one so that might not be a good idea if I'm planning to move the whole thing to a new SSD?
Appreciate any input!
Last edited by devrepublic (2013-02-22 01:32:15)

Answer 1

Use rsync as it will then only write what has been changed instead of the whole damn thing like dd.  There is a wiki page about how to back up your entire system with rsync... you should probably have a look at that. 
This of course will work just fine for your Arch Linux, but I don't know enough about windows to be able to recommend a way to do it with that partition.  I guess you could dd the partition everyday, but that doesn't seem very practical.  I would have to imagine that there is probably some kind of a incremental windows backup solution that you could use, but I don't know.
You will of course then have to have a bootloader installed on the second drive, set up and ready to boot into either system.  Then just make sure you are booting the right drive all the time and you're good to go. 
Are you implying that you want to back up to the 500GB drive?  Or are you saying that you want to use an external?