ip350 -Backing up the whole disk (image)

[robby]

Hi,

I've got a nokia ip350 without a valid support contract.
As mentioned before several times on this forum, when my hard drive would crash I'm on my own because replacing it with a new one would not restore the boot manager.

To be able to restore the boot manager + ipso on another hard drive I would like to make an image of the disk using ghost.
Because the file system used by nokia is not recognized by ghost I could encounter problems with the restore on another drive with a different geometry.

Has someone done this before with hard drives shipped by nokia and has some advice?

Kind Regards
Robby

[scottyb-cpug]

Newer version of ghost (8.x, 2003...) support "any" file system and therefore UFS through by what is called a Sector-by-Sector image process. Essentially, its a bit copy of the WHOLE disk, even the empty space so its slow and big and I believe must be restored to an identical geometry disk.

See the Symantec web site for the following document related to Sector switches for Ghost - Document ID:2001111413481325

Scott.

[RobertGraham]

Actually, the recreation process of a Nokia drive requires very little. Detailed below is how to create spare Nokia disks in case the ones you have fail. Do not use this for recreating complete installations. Use the proper Nokia back-up tool to save configurations and the CHKP methods for that side.

All you have to do is image the boot partition, which is type a6 I believe in fdisk(beware, I'm writing this from memory after doing this 80 sum times when we had a bad batch of IP120s). The rest of the disk should be of partition type a5. This can all be printed via the fdisk command by connecting the Nokia drive to a regular PC and booting up with your favorite *nix - never did it with Windows.

Then you can image the boot partition with dd on *nix or Ghost on Windows. WARNING: The Nokia BIOS as of Q1/2005 supports disks no larger than 20GB. Once you get the boot partition copied to a fresh drive, put it in the Nokia machine, then you can use it to get into the boot sequence and ftp down the latest and greatest IPSO.

It will then install and you can boot up with a proper IPSO installation. It's clean and easy (once you know how it works).

If anyone has questions on this, please post them.

[GreboUK]

Do you happen to know where you found out how to do this and if there is a step by step guide out there?

[RobertGraham]

Let me try to list the steps for those that are more apprehensive about experimenting:

1. use ghost or dd to image an existing functional Nokia IPSO disk to a blank disk that is smaller than 20GB.
2. Install the new disk in your Nokia.
3. Turn on power and it should boot.


If you are a little more savvy, you can try the following:

1. Image the boot partition (the really small one) from a working Nokia drive to a blank new drive
2. Install the new drive in a Nokia box and power it on
3. At the prompt type install, give it an IP and use FTP to download the ipso.tgz file (the proper IPSO version image file that you get from nokia.com) from your local file server on which you have configured an FTP server.
4. Follow the prompts to enter its serial number etc.
5. You now have a virgin IPSO install that should boot up and wait to be configured like when you buy one new or delete the /config/active file.

You want to do this when you have a bit of time and are preparing disaster recovery kind of stuff. Don't wait until you think a production machine disk is in trouble.

[inetd]

Has anybody done this recently?

[bennychan730]

use any ghost version that support RAW clone with -IR options.
I've try it many times..work fine.

never do any checking on the cloning process

[nkapinos]

I've gotta put a new drive in my ip350 tomrorow to replace a failing one and have a couple questions. I have the boot partition ghosted (~ 4 meg), but the rest of the drive is so bad it won't ghost the large partition(gets 90%).

I pulled three .tgzs from the drive - ipso, wrapper and docs, and will put these on a FTP server for when reinstalling from the boot manager. Also have an export_upgrade backup and the backup .tgz of policies.

I don't have any of the original documentation or license information - is there anything else I need for starting from a fresh drive? Does it ask for a license key? After ghosting the boot partition to the new drive, does the install procedure create the other larger partition? I plan to use teh same name, IP and pulled the initial file from my \config\db\ directory, can this just be copied to the new drive after initial install? Any help and experience would be greately appreciated

[tdvit]

has anybody ever completed this excercise with a disk bigger than 20GB? Mine is 80 GB

[rtfmoz]

Seeing as I have just done this based on the information here and elsewhere, thought I would document the procedure.

Nokia IP350 Build New Disk Procedure

It should work for the IP380 as well but need confirmation from people who have done it.
I should be doing this on a IP380 soon.

Environment
This entire procedure was done under Windows XP SP2.

Hardware Requirements
- Nokia IP350 and console cable
- Crossover network cable
- 20GB 2.5" ide Hard disk. The BIOS in these models do not support drives
larger than 20GB. You can try but it probably wont recognise more than 20GB.
- USB External 2.5" drive case for reimaging drive
- CR2302 battery or compatible.

Software Requirements
- SecureCRT or another terminal program such as TeraTerm for console access.
- FTP server such as Titan FTP for the IPSO install.
- Win32 DD tools dd-0.5 or use the one provided with the image.
- Boot manager image. I have included ours here. (2.78MB)

Before you start
Replace the battery on the Motherboard.
Remove the hard disk from the IP350 using Nokia's hard disk replacement instructions.

While the USB drive is disconnected from your computer use the command dd --list to see a list of device names. Note the dd command should be run on the Windows machine and not the Nokia device. If you cannot run the command then you should be in the same directory you extracted the Win32 DD tools. The list of devices you see are the ones you don't want to modify. Note the HarddiskN names you see. These are your system drives so make sure you dont use them in any commands below.

Creating your own boot image (optional)
If your existing drive is not completely dead you can pull the Nokia bootmgr image from the existing hard disk. Take the hard disk from the IP350 and put it in your external USB drive case, connect it to your PC and use dd --list to see what NEW devices appear in the list. My USB drive comes up as Harddisk1 so the command to get the first 5MB of data from the drive is

dd if=\\?\Device\Harddisk1\Partition0 of=mybootmgr.img count=10240

You only need the first 5MB as this contains the bootmgr and partition
information. The data dump (dd) command comes from the Unix world. 
The parameters used here are if=infile, of=outfile and 
count=number-of-blocks. One block equals 512Kb

Preparing a replacement hard disk
To write the Nokia image to the hard disk put the replacement 20GB drive in your USB drive case and connect it to your PC. Use dd --list to get a list of devices. If the USB drive appears as Harddisk1 then the command you would use is

dd if=bootmgr.img of=\\?\Device\Harddisk1\Partition0

If you created your own boot image the command is 

dd if=mybootmgr.img of=\\?\Device\Harddisk1\Partition0

When this is done. Disconnect the USB drive, put the replacement drive into your Nokia device and boot it with the console cable connected. Now you need to install the Nokia IPSO image and boot manager allows you to install the image from an FTP server.

Installing Nokia IPSO to an IP350 from the boot manager

Hardware Requirements
- Nokia IP350 and console cable
- Nokia IPSO Image <= version 4.1. Version 4.2 or higher do not support IP350s.
- Crossover network cable

Software Requirements
- FTP server
- SecureCRT or another terminal program such as TeraTerm for console access.

Before you start
- Note the serial number from the casing before you start.
- Connect to the Nokia with the console cable.
- Connect to the Nokia with the network cable.
- Test the access to your FTP server.

Procedure
- Open your terminal program.
- Power on the Nokia device.
- Press 1 for bootmgr.
- Read the example below to see how the image is installed.

In this example my IP address was 192.168.1.2. I was connected to the Nokia with the console cable and the crossover network cable. The network cable was plugged into ETH1 on the Nokia.

Loading boot manager..
Boot manager loaded.
Entering autoboot mode.
Type any character to enter command mode.
BOOTMGR[1]> install

################### IPSO Full Installation ####################
You will need to supply the following information:
        Client IP address/netmask, FTP server IP address and filename,
        system serial number, and other license information.
This process will DESTROY any existing files and data on your disk.
#################################################################
Continue? (y/n) [n] y

Motherboard serial number is 0.

The chassis serial number can be found on a
sticker on the back of the unit with the letters 
S/N in front of the serial number.
Please enter the serial number:  XXXXXXXXXXXXX

Please answer the following licensing questions.

Will this node be using IGRP ? [y] 

Will this node be using BGP ? [y] 

1. Install from anonymous FTP server.
2. Install from FTP server with user and password.
Choose an installation method (1-2):  1
Enter IP address of this client (0.0.0.0/24): 192.168.1.1/24
Enter IP address of FTP server (0.0.0.0): 192.168.1.2
Enter IP address of the default gateway (0.0.0.0): 192.168.1.2

Choose an interface from the following list:
1) eth1
2) eth2
3) eth3
4) eth4
Enter a number [1-4]: 1

Choose interface speed from the following list:
1) 10 Mbit/sec
2) 100 Mbit/sec
Enter a number [1-2]: 2
Half or full duplex? [h/f] [h] f

Enter path to ipso image  on FTP server [/]:  .
Enter ipso image filename on FTP server [ipso.tgz]: 

1. Retrieve all valid packages, with no further prompting.
2. Retrieve packages one-by-one, prompting for each.
3. Retrieve no packages.
Enter choice [1-3] [1]:  3

Client IP address = 192.168.1.1/24
Server IP address = 192.168.1.2
Default gateway IP address = 192.168.1.2
Network Interface = eth1, speed = 100M, full-duplex
Server download path = [./]
Package install type = none
Mirror set creation = no

Are these values correct? [y] 

Building filesystems...done.
Making initial links...done.
Downloading compressed tarfile(s) from 192.168.1.2.
Hash mark printing on (1048576 bytes/hash mark).
Interactive mode off.
100%  29168 KB    00:00 ETA
Checking validity of image...(no system signature file found, continuing)...done.
Installing image...done.
Image version tag:  IPSO-4.1-BUILD016-05.19.2006-052320-1515.
Checking if bootmgr upgrade is needed...
Need to upgrade bootmgr. Proceeding..
Upgrading bootmgr....
new bootmgr size is 1474560
old bootmgr size is 1474560
Saving old bootmgr.
Installing new bootmgr.
Verifying installation of bootmgr.

Installation completed.

Reset system or hit <Enter> to reboot.

[rtfmoz]

Hiya,

I just tried this with a 40GB drive. These devices only support 20GB so wasnt sure if this would work. The dd tool listed above did not work. When it tried to load boot manager it said "Invalid compressed image" and aborted. So I backed up the entire original drive with Acronis True Image Home 10.0 and then restored it back to the new disk. Acronis left the partition size the same. This time boot manager worked. Next thing was to install the IPSO image using the procedure above.

After IPSO was installed I wanted to do some diagnostics. From boot manager I went into single user mode and checked all the file systems. Then checked for any bad sectors on the new drive. To check for bad sectors under unix the simple way to do this is use data dump (on the Nokia) to copy the entire drive to /dev/null. If there are any read errors then we know we have a problem.

Commands used

boot -s (boot into single user mode) 
fsck (file system check)
dd if=/dev/rwd0 of=/dev/null (check for bad sectors)

Regards

Z