If you can get the hard drives both plugged in at once, you should be able to partition/mkfs then copy everything to the other drive. cp -a --one-file-system /* /mnt/newdrive (and repeat for each partition). Then it should be as simple as booting with the rescue disk, and re-running lilo. (after removing the old drive and changing whatever settings are required on the new one to replace it).
I've done this (not with a laptop) but with desktops numerous times, without a problem. Kai Martens wrote: > > Hi there, > > Got an old but nice SONY VAIO PCG-Z505F (Japanese model). Thinking about > just plugging a bigger hard drive in means reinstalling my debian system. > First time around I happily partitioned the disk and erased the > preinstalled windoze system only to find out that it cannot copy the > kernel it is running from the rescue floppy to the hard drive... Had an > old Toshiba laptop to get a system on that disk at the time, but not any > more now. In the meantime the kernels have USB support and I can use the > USB floppy as a SCSI device. > > If I put my hand-rolled kernel with the required USB support onto the > rescue disk - will I be able to install a new system on the new harddrive? > > If not: Any other ideas? I have a PCMCIA SCSI card and SCSI disk that > could be used, but no CD! > > Thanks in advance, Kai > >
