Imaging from Lacie External HD 1

[eaglefan2000]

I partitioned my Lacie External HD 30/90. 30 for the OS 90 to hold my images. I installed through my 14 inch G3 ibook.
I am able to go to a users computer, plug in the fire wire drive and hold down the option key to choose bootable system (Firewire Lacie).
I can then use Net restore to force my image onto disk. (User already backed up).
Problem: I have no problem imaging another g3 ibook (12" or 14") but when I try to boot to the Lacie drive from a G4 ibook I get a Circle with a line through it (Ghost Busters sign). I assume this will happen when I go to image an eMac as well but have not tried yet.
Question: When I installed the Osx onto the Lacie drive did it load drivers or something to attach it to a G3 ibook and when I try with a g4 it thinks I am swapping the Hd with the g4 and won't let me boot to it. Seems to be backward compatable. Should I try to load the system through a G4? What is stopping me from using my EX Lacie drive as a portable imager?


Joseph Kunder
Technical Systems Specialist

 

[jmgalvin]

You have to put an image of the G4 on a partition on the drive. Most people prefer Carbon Copy Cloner for this, but you can usually get away by dragging necessary elements, including necessary parts of User folders to the partition.

Another way to try it is to use disk utility to image the G4 drive, put it on the outboard drive and uncompress it there.

By the way - handy piece of info learned the hard way. If you download any OSX updates from Apple make sure that a firewire drive is NOT connected to the machine being used for the download.

 

[eaglefan2000]

My images do include g4 images, imac images emac images. All 10.3... but they are on the 2nd partition. Are you saying that I have to install from a G4 or just have the image. Remember, I want to be able to image imacs, emacs, ibooks(g3, g4 12 and 14 in.) Possible to do all of these?

Joseph Kunder
Technical Systems Specialist

 

[jmgalvin]

I'm sorry, but I don't exactly understand what you want to image. If it's the entire system + everything else, I would assume you would have problems simply because of the different machine configurations you describe. I simple example wouold be that the iBook will not have a screen contrast control whereas the eMac will - sort of like a Dell Inspiron and Dell Optiplex.

You really sound like Apple Remote Desktop would suit your needs better - to manage the various machines from yours. It only costs 3-500 dollars depending on # of users and it would probably make your life easier. You might go to Apple's site and take a look.

If you just want to image various folders - fonts,etc - you can make a Restore disk image of the particular folders and use that without any need to boot from an outboard drive.

To set up user privieges, network and sharing, etc. I just record an Applescript, put it in my machine's public folder, download it to the other machines and run it.

 

[eaglefan2000]

Maybe I should elaborate. I work in a school district with approx 1000 imacs, emacs, ibooks. We use osx server to hand out permissions for teachers and students. The X server is not the dhcp server so we cannot use it accross the network. We image all computers over the summer to give all the updates. What I want to do is on an individual basis. I would like to reimage a computer when it has ongoing problems. I have Os 10.3 installed on a Lacie 120Gb firewire drive. When I go to a computer on site I can boot to the Firewire drive from their computer. Back up their user and format their drive. Then I can reimage their Hd with an image I already have (ex Hs teacher). My problem is that I cannot boot to the firewire drive to format their drive if it is on a g4 computer. I used my g3 to install os10.3 on the firewire drive. Did the install use drivers for my g3? Is this why I can't boot to the drive?

Joseph Kunder
Technical Systems Specialist

 

[jmgalvin]

This is only off the top of my head but, if I were in your shoes, I think I'd load a good osx on each TYPE of machine I had: iMac G3, iMac G4, eMac, ibook, etc. and set each up the way I wanted. Then I"d image each on its own partition on the outboard drive with a partition name for each that I can remember (my weakness is I giove things names and forget the name).

I'd then use each image for each type of machine. I would probably be a PITA at first, but I think it could make life easier later on, especially during the school year when things could be hectic.

I've tried installing various Mac OSs directly on oputboard drives in the past and tried to use a boot volumes. I found it to be hait and miss. I've really never tried to use the Image from one type of Mac to boot another. I have used it to boot the same type of machine.

 

[eaglefan2000]

Thanks. That is what I origionally thought. Will need a boot for each image.

Joseph Kunder
Technical Systems Specialist

 

[eaglefan2000]

Just an update. I ran all the updates and whalla it worked. Must not have liked to boot to an os that was lower than the 1 that came from factory.

Joseph Kunder
Technical Systems Specialist