Backing up SD card

[solo2500]

Ok... I'm at the point where I need to back up my perfectly running Rpi3b. (after weeks of tweaking and finally a stable platform!)
I'm on a windows machine so I intend to use Win32DiskImager. However I have a few questions.
1. Does the "replacement" SD card have to be the same size?
2. Can the image be used on an identical Pi model... Or will there be serial number problems? If so, is there a way around this?

Next project is to set up a RAMDISK to try and minimise SD card failure! any thoughts?

THANKS ALL!!!!!

[RaTTuS]

1) yes - though you will probably never find a SDcard the same size
2) yes - no

re- 1) either shrink your sdcard a bit and back that up
or backup the individual partitions
or backup across the network to a remote drive using rsync

[fruitoftheloom]

Ok... I'm at the point where I need to back up my perfectly running Rpi3b. (after weeks of tweaking and finally a stable platform!)
I'm on a windows machine so I intend to use Win32DiskImager. However I have a few questions.
1. Does the "replacement" SD card have to be the same size?
2. Can the image be used on an identical Pi model... Or will there be serial number problems? If so, is there a way around this?

Next project is to set up a RAMDISK to try and minimise SD card failure! any thoughts?

THANKS ALL!!!!!

If you are using Raspbian Jessie as your OS, it now includes a SD Card Copier Utility:

https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/anothe ... e-raspbian


Alternatively maybe rpi-clone will suffice:

https://github.com/billw2/rpi-clone/blo ... /README.md


FYI the RPi can boot from USB Drive: https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/pi-3-b ... orage-boot

.

[solo2500]

Just so I understand this...

I need to resize my my "current" SD card an exact size that will fit on a replacement card... (is this done with Win32diskimager?)
And this new card will not work in any other machine. Only the original!

Thanks for indulging my ignorance.

1) yes - though you will probably never find a SDcard the same size
2) yes - no

re- 1) either shrink your sdcard a bit and back that up
or backup the individual partitions
or backup across the network to a remote drive using rsync

[RaTTuS]

Just so I understand this...

I need to resize my my "current" SD card an exact size that will fit on a replacement card... (is this done with Win32diskimager?)
And this new card will not work in any other machine. Only the original!

Thanks for indulging my ignorance.

no the resize is done via linux
and it will work on any new machine
but see fruits answer as a better method

[solo2500]

Oops... I didn't even see fruits reply... THANKS!!!

[fruitoftheloom]

Oops... I didn't even see fruits reply... THANKS!!!

You will have better results using Linux Tools.

Also be aware that not all SD Cards are the same size, even from the same Manufacturer, they can vary by a few bytes in size, which is why with Win32Formatter you need to reduce the partition size before cloning.

[solo2500]

THANKS!
I think I will avoid the windows app.

Oops... I didn't even see fruits reply... THANKS!!!

You will have better results using Linux Tools.

Also be aware that not all SD Cards are the same size, even from the same Manufacturer, they can vary by a few bytes in size, which is why with Win32Formatter you need to reduce the partition size before cloning.