How do you clone a bootable flashdrive? What Linux software can clone a flash drive. I tried doing a sector by sector copy using a Windows application which worked but the Linux flash drive doesn't boot up.
02 Answers
Why not just clone using command line, eg.
sudo dd if=/dev/sdc of=/dev/sdd bs=4M && sync
which datadumps from input file (if=) device sdc to output file (of=) device sdd, bs= is the number of bytes copied at a time.
After it completes it syncs (forces write out of any unwritten buffers [still in memory]) to allow removal.
Of course change sdc & sdd to be what is appropriate
note: the sync shouldn't be necessary; I probably use it to make me feel safer :)
As another answer says, you should use dd for this. Get the devices' file paths (they will be something like /dev/sd[letter of the alphabet]). You can do this using lsblk, which will show a tree of devices, partitions, and their respective sizes. If you're copying between two disks that are the same size, unplug one and see which disappears to make sure you don't mix the source and destination up.
After you have the devices' paths, use
dd if='/dev/[path of input (source) device]' of='/dev/[path of output (destination) device]' bs=4M.
The bs=4m tells dd to read 4mb at a time. This is generally a good number, but you might change it to fit your devices' read and write speeds when you're moving huge files. The greatest common denominator of the two write speeds should be used. But for small operations 4mb is probably fine.
In summary:
- Run
lsblkto get the file paths of your devices - Use
dd if='/dev/[source file/device path]' of='/dev/[destination file/device path] bs=4m - Change the
bs=4mto suit your needs if you're copying a huge file.
