Multi-boot: Making windows partitions bootable?

[Daniel B. Thurman]

Tony Nelson wrote:
> On 09-11-23 12:35:00, Daniel B. Thurman wrote:
>  ...
>   
>> I know this is a Fedora site and I am a diehard Fedora user,
>> but I also have a multiboot system...  apologies to the purists.
>>
>> Is it possible to backup and restore Xp/Vista to a different
>> drive/partition in the case of imminent drive failure?  How is this 
>> to be properly done?
>>
>> I tried to use rsync from the original to a different partition
>> but this does not seem to work.
>>
>> Help please?
>>     
>
> There are various -ghost apps, but I've just used dd to a new drive, 
> copying the entire drive to a drive as large or larger.  If it is 
> larger, I just extend the last partition to the rest of the drive.  
> IIRC, I usually haven't had to do anything else, but it might be 
> necessary to do a "Repair Install", at least with XP (I haven't used 
> anything more recent).  A Repair Install is tedious but hasn't done any 
> harm when I've used it.
>   
Just need a little more info:

How exactly did you use `dd'?

1) Did you have to mount the two partitions and: dd if=/mnt/a of=/mnt/b
    I got an error saying they were directories
2) .. or did you use the RAW devices such as: dd if=/dev/sda1 of=/dev/sdb1

Was there any options you used, such as block size or whatever?

Thanks!
Dan