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INDI Library v2.0.6 is Released (02 Feb 2024)

Bi-monthly release with minor bug fixes and improvements

Create An Image File Of Existing Astroberry Setup?

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Is there a simple way to make a disk image of my existing Astroberry drive? I was downloading all the plate solve files for EKOS when I realized the 32 gig MicroSD card was getting maxed by the large plate solve files.

Also, if use a program like balenaEtcher to put it on a larger MicroSD card (I bought a 128 gig card), will it fit the old system on the full space of the new disk, or will it make a partition? I would rather have one large partition.

Hopefully I can do this, as it took 100 years to download all those plate solve files, only to have it crap out the largest and longest to download file. If I have to, I'll just start from scratch, I just want to have one large partition.
2 years 9 months ago #71852
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I've always used Win32 Disk Imager but assuming Balena Etcher is quite similar and creates a single partition that is only the size of the original 32GB SD card then you can use the raspi-config tool to expand the filesystem out to the full size of the new SD card.

Personally, I've kept my boot SD card on the smaller side at 16GB. I use a USB3 500GB SSD for the mass storage. I use symbolic links from the astroberry home directory to the SSD for large sets of files like the plate solving files and my actual imaging. This lets me make and save backup images of the SD card to my PC. It particularly comes in handy when Astroberry/KStars/Ekos is updated and you go to do a night of imaging and find out the update broke something. If you have a backup either in an image file or on a spare SD card you can quickly roll back without losing a night trying to figure out what broke.

You can do this with your 128GB SD card too. Backup/Restore is just slower and the cards are a little more expensive.
2 years 9 months ago #71854

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IMO there is a down side for imagers backup apps as you mentioned above;
1- it creates identical size of the active partition, 64GB in my case for a 64GB SD card
2- repeated picking up and inserting the SD card can cause the connections to become loose between the card and RPi (happened in one card before to me)

So I’m using on the fly back solutions over the network called hot backup, where image is created at the size of the used space and not the entire card and I don’t have to touch the card from its place. Also I can compress the image file as in my case from 32GB to 17GB using winzip.

I wrote a script to help automate this process and I have using it successfully for more than a year now

I can share it if you are interested
2 years 9 months ago #71856

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Thanks for your replies. I decided to just start from scratch and burned the 2.0.3 image to the 128 gig MicroSD. However when I ran the update I got an error, and not knowing anything about Linux, I have no idea why or what I would have to do. I'm gonna post it elsewhere as a separate topic, but I'll include it here as well, and you can see it below. 
2 years 9 months ago #71861
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You don’t need to use a boot SD card when using an external SSD drive, it will boot fine from the SSD
also if you run from an SSD, then just put an SD card in the slot and use the built in back up tool to create a complete back up on the card then it the SSD fails or gets curupt you can be goi g again in minutes....
just make sure the SD card if as big as the used space on the SSD drive...
2 years 9 months ago #71888

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Please read carefully: Run "journalctl -xe" to see the error message of gpsd.service.

OTOH, you can "sudo apt uninstall gpsd" and try it again later, iff you've got a gps device attached. Else it doesn't matter, because you're using virtualgps anyway.

I believe the Astroberry image is equipped with facilities to expand the partition, if necessary. At least this happened after flashing the Astroberry to the SDCard and on first boot. I would expect this to run also, when you flash your 32GB image on a 128GB SDCard. Thing is, you probably can't go back...
2 years 9 months ago #71900

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Well, I downloaded the Astroberry image file from the mirror site and reinstalled the OS on the 128 gig MicroSD card, and then I was able to run the update. Not sure I was getting those errors. Spent another 10 hours or so re-downloading the astrometry files, and was able to fit them all of course.

Now that I finally have all this data, how do I make a backup image file of the present Astroberry system I have to an external USB drive? I'd hate to have to go through all those downloads again.

Thanks.
2 years 9 months ago #71938

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No, put a USB SD card reader in the PI with the card you want to back up too, then use the SDcopy tool in the menu and choose the internal card to copy from, and the external card to copy to and press start....it should auto add the copy from and to cards in the correct boxes...mines always does....and then when finished you will have an identical back up copy....
2 years 9 months ago #71943

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