BACK UP of the SD

Hello,
in the last 2 months, when I did the update of the software, has occured an error, so the sistem didn’t start (It stops with the sad face), so i had to reinstall the new version from the begin, but this operation start to become
annoying.

Is there the possibility to make a back up of the sd to restore if the system seems to be broken? I saw something similar in MyOSMC menu, but if the system doesn’t boot, from where can I load an eventually back up?

Thank you

Put it into a pc and make an image with win32diskimager software to store for later.

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Thank you for your reply
And if I need I have justo rewrite the image in the sd? Do you know if there is something for linux too?

For linux you can use dd to make and write back images to sdcards. But I think there are also other programs.

Do you want an image backup, or fresh install with all customizations restored? If the latter, use backup add-on to create a backup to nas. I use a single backup that has my osmc skin customizations, settings, Pandora/ustvnow/ted add ons and logins . I also save the config RPI codec file here . makes fresh installs a 2 min affair post first boot :slight_smile:

I use rsync. Command can be run during system is “active”. For dd the concerning device/harddrive/sdcard needs to be unmounted so backup isn’t possible while running system. Also with dd it’s bitwise copying of everything, meaning you copy the whole sdcard everytime, also all currently empty space on it.(takes more time)
If you use rsync command with --delete on a previous backup target directory, it just backs up the files that changed since that last backup.

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I don’t undestand: you make this backup, and after?
If the system doesn’t boot how you restore the back up?

And to restore it? You format the sd card and put the image inside as a normal copy of file?

@dr_capins.

From my Vero, after I have all settings tweaked, OSMC skin customations, and my couple of add-ons I install the Kodi Backup Add-on. From this I create a full backup to my NAS.

On fresh installs (Vero, Pi2, PiB+) I boot up from a fresh install, install the backup-add on, then restore. I have been using the same backup image from nearly a year ago and it works great on everything else!

Gets new units, or the occasional bad update up and running again to my liking in minutes!

There are 2 different ways of backing up/restoring the system, image based and file based.

One is an image based backup where you take a raw image of the entire filesystem. If the system dies and you want to restore you then have to restore the entire image back to your SD card. This image is large and needs to love outside of OSMC itself so put it on an external drive or something.

The second way of backing up is to just backup Kodi/Settings. This can be done a few ways but lots of folk just like using the Kodi backup addon. This wil create a much smaller file to store elsewhere but it only contains Kodi information and not files/folders/programs stored elsewhere. To restore from this you perform a fresh reinstall of OSMC to give you a vanilla install and then using the backup addon you reload your backup file (Which you have kept safely elsewhere) and Kodi will restore itself.

I myself favour the image based backup method but also have instllation instructions where i can do everything manually and i do this most of the time.

I prefer full sd backups as I have a lot of system customisation.

you just format the sdcard in same filesystem and restore also with rsync command.
Best to read a wiki or documentation about rsync to understamd the options etc…

Agreed, if I had dome stuff outside of Kodi then full image backups would be my preference too.