Verify after Restore

USB Image Tool support forum
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GThreepwood
Posts: 3
Joined: Tue Feb 11, 2014 4:16 pm

Verify after Restore

Post by GThreepwood »

Hello,

First of all I want to thank you for your very helpful tool.

Now to my problem:
I use usbitcmd.exe V1.58 with a self written script, always using tar.gz images.
I have a custom linux board (fat,swap,ext3) booting and operating from SD card. Have used your programm the last few years a few hundred times to clone the SD card.
I never had any problems, system always booted the way it should. Now the SANDISK I used all the time are not available anymore and I switched manufacturer.
Sadly from 60 cards I restored 3 failed to boot. So I switched to industrial SD cards(very expensive). Received 5 samples today and restored it.
2 failed to boot. After programming them with another card reader all 5 boot up correctly.
Not sure if this is related to your tool or a problem with cards or reader but I need a way to be sure that images are correct because I can't test every card manually.

TLDR:
Is there a way to verify the complete image after restoring? I saw that there is an option to generate md5 but I don't think this will help. Size of SD cards is different(larger than image) so making a backup+md5 after restore won't help me.
Alex
Site Admin
Posts: 272
Joined: Fri Jul 29, 2011 11:59 pm

Re: Verify after Restore

Post by Alex »

There is currently no built-in solution in the tool, but I will add it to the todo list. For now, you can do a raw backup from the not booting SD cards and do a file compare with the original image, uncompressed from the gz. Because your new SD-cards are a little bit larger, you could cut them to the right size. The software Total Commander f.e. can do both of this tasks. If there are differences in the files, there might be a chance, that the first card reader is not working correctly. This would fit to you saying, that after your tried the 5 cards with another reader, all of them worked correctly.
GThreepwood
Posts: 3
Joined: Tue Feb 11, 2014 4:16 pm

Re: Verify after Restore

Post by GThreepwood »

Thanks a lot for the fast answer.
Had the same idea but this is more a workaround than a solution. As I give script and image to others a solution without doing a 2nd backup would have been great but it should help for now. Will try to add this to my script and check if it detects not booting SD-cards.

Have you ever thought about making USB Image Tool open source? If you are using C, C++ or C# I could try to implement it myself.
Just asking, I know that not everyone is a friend of open sourcing his/her baby. ;)
Alex
Site Admin
Posts: 272
Joined: Fri Jul 29, 2011 11:59 pm

Re: Verify after Restore

Post by Alex »

Have you checked the not booting SD cards with the workaround above? I'm curious, if there has been really a byte difference between SD-card and image after the restore, and if it has been an issue with the controller.

Open source: I have been asked that before, but for now I'm happy with USB Image Tool's current licence. If I ever decide not to maintain USB Image Tool anymore, it will go open source. However, the verify option is on the next versions todo list.
GThreepwood
Posts: 3
Joined: Tue Feb 11, 2014 4:16 pm

Re: Verify after Restore

Post by GThreepwood »

Adapted my script to do a backup after restore and wrote a small tool to compare the two raw files byte per byte.
Verify always worked so it was most likely due to Win7 or readers or hub or all together. All ~70 SD cards I programmed booted.
Only problem now is that verify takes very long. Having 4 processes comparing 2 2GB files eats disk i/o for breakfast. 5400rpm notebook hdd doesn't help too.

If you need beta testers for this feature I could give you a hand.
nawaz70
Posts: 1
Joined: Wed Nov 12, 2014 8:36 pm

Re: Verify after Restore

Post by nawaz70 »

In the beginning the problem appeared only on this specific CF card, and not only using USB Image tool but with other tools and windows utilities too.
The old model of CF card had no problem. :(
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