Thursday, January 29, 2009

Clonezilla Live 1.2.1-37 Improves Microsoft Windows Cloning

Now based on Linux kernel 2.6.26-13

Steven Shiau announced a few minutes ago the immediate availability of Clonezilla LiveCD 1.2.1-37, a Linux-based minimal operating system that can help you clone systems. The new version of Clonezilla is now powered by Linux kernel 2.6.26-13, based on Debian Lenny repository (01/26/2009), two new languages were added and the Microsoft Windows cloning implementation was greatly improved. "We are happy to announce this new stable release. In this release, we have 2 more new languages, and some improvement about cloning MS windows." - said Steven Shiau in the official release announcement. Without any further introduction, let's see what exactly has changed since the latest stable release, Clonezilla 1.2.1-23:

· Updated Linux kernel to version 2.6.26-13;
· Now based on Debian Lenny repository (01/26/2009);
· Added Italian language;
· Added Spanish language;
· Updated French translation;
· Updated Chinese translation;
· Updated Japanese translation;
· The hardware collect tool is now much faster;
· Added the -j2 and -j3 options in ocs-sr and drbl-ocs, for restoring/saving hidden data;
· Added the -j2 option in ocs-onthefly, for cloning hidden data;
· Added the -z2p option for Parallel BZIP2;
· Added the -e1|--change-geometry option to drbl-ocs and ocs-sr;
· Added for restore/save functions for hidden data between MBR and the first partition, in ocs-onthefly and ocs-sr;
· Added -e1 auto option in order to use the ntfsreloc tool to fix CHS based on the value of EDD;
· Added the get_RawCHS_of_HD_from_sfdisk function, which can be used as a backup plan for partclone.ntfsreloc;
· Enabled by default the -V option of ntfsclone restoring, in ocs-onthefly;
· The mounting warning of NTFS-3G, in prep-ocsroot, is now disabled;
· The user must enter now y/yes/n/no before saving or restoring;
· Hard drive's serial number can not be found in batch mode;
· The create-ocs-tmp-img utility received some options and it is now faster;
· Added the "clone-multiple-usb-example.sh" example, to help cloning an image to several USB sticks;
· The SWAP partition will not be restored when choosing "restoring partitions only";
· Swap or extended will not be listed when choosing the partition (because the "file -Ls" command will not show any "extended" info about a partition in Debian Lenny. Therefore, the developers replaced file with ocs-get-part-info);
· Fixed an issue with ocs-get-part-info (the input parameters were wrongly parsed);
· Fixed an LVM issue when parsing the partition table with ID=83. Therefore, the partition table will no longer be parsed based on partition ID;
· Fixed ocs-live-dev and ocs-iso;
· Fixed the -m option for ocs-live-dev;
· Fixed various parameters for ocs-sr.

The Clonezilla LiveCD is a minimal Linux distribution based on Partition Image, ntfsclone, DRBL and udpcast. It allows you to massively clone computers simultaneously. Unlike the Ghost for Unix/Linux LiveCDs (G4L/G4U), Clonezilla saves and restores only used blocks in the hard drives, which increases the clone efficiency. The Clonezilla LiveCD was born to bring more power and competence to your hard disk partitioning and cloning tasks.

Clonezilla LiveCD supports the following filesystems: ext2, ext3, reiserfs, xfs, jfs, fat16, fat32, ntfs and hfs+. Therefore, you can clone Linux, Microsoft Windows and even Intel-based Apple Mac operating systems. For other filesystems, Clonezilla uses dd to dump the whole partition. However, we are looking forward to seeing ext4 support in the next versions of Clonezilla LiveCD.

Download Clonezilla LiveCD 1.2.1-37 right now from here.