Now that floppy drives are totally obsolete, it's no longer feasible to use CTAR and similar programs to backup and restore an SCO OpenServer installation. So I'm now looking for a simple commercial USB solution. I'd like to image the whole system to a bootable USB and then, if a reinstallation is necessary, boot on the USB and restore the image to the hard drive. Surely someone has software to do this.....
I have found that Microlite Edge, and I presume Ctar can be used to backup to a USB stick mounted on a Windows or Linux client running a ftp server.
SCO 6.0 directly supports USB sticks, but I have found that removing the stick while the system is running can result in a system crash (one or two percent).
How to install a USB Pen Drive Hard Disk on SCO Unix?
and 5.0.7
How do I install a SCSI USB pen hard disk on OpenServer 5.0.7?
I have no experience using USB sticks with 5.0.7
Yes, Microlite will work for SCO OpenServer 6 but not 5.0.7 to backup to a USB stick. I think I will have to boot to a USB stick with the Reflect Windows PE Environment and backup an image of the SCO drive to another USB stick. Any other ideas?
You haven't mentioned any of:
your budget
your current hardware configuration
your current software
the amount of disk space used.
While a disk image backup will protect you from a catastrophic disk failure, recovering from the more likely occurrence of the loss of a single file is complex; you will need to restore the disk to a previous point, copy the required file to another system, restore the system to its current state, and then copy the required file back from its saved location.
The budget should not be much of a problem. The current setup uses Unitrends CTAR and an HP LTO SCSI tape drive. The SCSI drive is 73 GB but only 7 GB are used. The Adaptec 39320 is the SCSI host adapter. I'm trying to move away from CTAR and a tape drive and a 2.88 MB floppy diskette drive. I'm disappointed that Microlite doesn't have a version for 5.0.7, just 6.0.
You might try one of these:
https://www.amazon.com/Drives-3-5-Sfr1m44-u100k-Updated-Version-Emulator/dp/B07BS85CN9/ref=sr\_1_8?crid=1VTR7Z775O1H8&keywords=usb\+to\+floppy\+drive&qid=1582926940&sprefix=usb\+to\+fl%2Caps%2C289&sr=8-8
Just change /etc/default/tar appropriately.
Microlite Edge does work on 5.0.7, just attach the USB stick to a FTP server (Windows with IIS) or Linux.
That's a curious device--but it's still just 1.44 MB--which won't work. If there were a USB floppy drive for 2.88 MB diskettes--that would help--but I've never found one. According to Microlite's own Web site, their USB flash drive version will not work for 5.0.7.