Setting up for Successful Recovery...

[m_pav]

Timeshift is obviously much improved since the first time I tried it, and back then, I used my 20GB / partition for the backups, not the best method I have to concede, so as a result I went the route of keeping 2 Live USBs around that are a close match to my Daily Drivers setup.

This serves a dual-purpose wherein I use the Live USBs almost daily for my computer repairs and I remaster them about once a month to keep them updated. One is MX23.3_Xfce with AHS, the other, a standard MX23.3_x64, and I've recently added a KDE version to the mix.

I have always used a kept my / and /home on different drives and/or partitions, so this initial configuration serves as my first level defense, for want of a better term. My chosen path is for a quick reload to the / partition while re-using my homedir and existing user profile folder. This has made recovery and other operations like cross-generation upgrades a breeze.

My monthly investment of updating my MX Linux Snapshots has been replaced by monthly remastering of each drive, all built from the 19th May MX 23.3 releases made into a Live-USB. I make changes that reflect my preferred apps, tools and utilities which I use regularly, and I've tested and can verify this option is a solution that will take me from zero to go in the space of 10 minutes for most scenarios while retaining my homedir and re-using my account name. It's also useful for loading up my other machines so I can share the load when I get a massive job like a video production from multiple sources.

The benefit of this approach is my host drive is not being used as the location wherein my recovery data is stored. I keep separate backups of my /homedir on a 1TB USB HDD I've reserved specifically for only this purpose.

[davidy]

Having 5 or more backups when all a user usually wants is to go back before the problem existed is a waste of space.

Timeshift backups are a waste of space, but keeping an identical copy of literally everything on a second partition isn't?

Obviously not as I already stated. A waste of space to me is space not used. Data itself is never a waste. And as I tried to explain I am not talking about a copy of your data, I was speaking of an exact clone of a bootable system as the "backup" itself (dual-boot) using 1 drive partitioned into 2. If you have a desktop with multiple drives you could use a separate drive completely for all I care. Whether or not you want a separate part for home is irrelevant. I just like the straight-forward boot, backup or restore, boot setup that Clonezilla provides. Simpler. Having a spare drive on hand is probably a good idea too.
I really want this to work too. I just have to boot live, gpart my disc, and then snapshot both parts with grub seeing both. If I can get that far all I have to do is configure on exactly how I will transfer one set of files to match the ones on the other partition making sure they are still both seen in grub and bootable. My skills are lacking but my logic is perfectly sound. Space is like knowledge. It's worthless if never actually put into practice. I'm only using ~7% of a tb drive. I think I have enough room and it would be awesome if it actually worked.

Timeshift IS really cool. Apparently it creates a virtual volume, "backup", you can browse and thus restore individual files and whatnot. I reinstalled it and once I create a backup I delete the old one so I keep the data I need and not the data I don't. I tried Lucky again but it behaves weird and I canceled. Timeshift is very polished and I love it's simplicity and speed. I'm amazed by the amount of people who start threads trying to get help and have no backup at all. Many times the very thing they needed to fix the problem in the 1st place. A successful recovery is the easy part. So either timeshift, or snapshot, or clonezilla but you better use something.

[jstark]

Noob here ....

This is one area I struggled with on my initial foray into linux (MX17) and still do... recovering from when things go bad.
A poke-yoke recovery/restore my system is exactly what a noob like me wants. {Thx for the post OP ! ]
As noted by Davidy, this is me: "Most people I think who require recovery don't even know what went wrong much less how to fix it and just want to go back when the issue didn't exist."

Having just installed MX 23.4, I noted the much more noob-friendly installation process (much appreciated MX team!). This time I was careful to READ the manual ( ha ha! ) I took to heart the section recommending backing up and 'tried' to follow what was written.

I have a USB drive with TimeShift and LuckyBackup set to backup to it.

I like OP's idea of creating a separate partition for back-up. Seems fast & easy. Backing up to USB makes sense if using an older HDD which might fail (my case).

Ideally, when MX23.4 gets installed, process would auto-install back-up with most common settings. [My 2 cents...]

[LinuxSpring1]

@CharlesV thanks for the tip. One quick question. Instead of having a partition for say MX Linux 21, in the other partition can we put in say AntiX or SystemRescueCD or Tiny Core Linux ? Because if the aim is to do system rescue then there are distros which are tailor built for this.

[CharlesV]

@CharlesV thanks for the tip. One quick question. Instead of having a partition for say MX Linux 21, in the other partition can we put in say AntiX or SystemRescueCD or Tiny Core Linux ? Because if the aim is to do system rescue then there are distros which are tailor built for this.

Certainly you can use AntiX or something else. I was specifically after 3 things when I did this:
1) chroot rescue
2) TimeShift
3) MX - because I both love it, AND it is now almost second nature to me and I wanted to stick with something 'known' and not have to futz with something else if I needed it.

[dreamer]

Cool! A chance to test my new recovery system! I rebooted into the recovery partition, started TimeShift, canceled out of the setup, and the last 10 timeshift backups were listed. I chose this am’s 9:00 backup, and hit restore.

I tested this setup and yes if you save TimeShift snapshots on your "recovery partiton" they will indeed show up automatically if you run TimeShift from that partition/OS.

Now, your results may vary, but I can tell you this was the best restore I have ever had from a 100% OS down! Planning it out was simple, implementing it was a little more work, testing it was easy… and recovery this morning proved how good it can be!

I always urge people to use TimeShift and have a good, known backup as well. And, if you really want to kick recovery into high gear… save yourself with a simple, quick ‘recovery partition’.

This almost seems like a no-brainer if you have two MX installs on the same computer. I like to think that TimeShift might work even better if you restore an OS that isn't in active use during the process. You get the benefits of grub-btrfs, but with a simple approach and a simple file-system. Thanks for sharing.

[CharlesV]

Cool! A chance to test my new recovery system! I rebooted into the recovery partition, started TimeShift, canceled out of the setup, and the last 10 timeshift backups were listed. I chose this am’s 9:00 backup, and hit restore.

I tested this setup and yes if you save TimeShift snapshots on your "recovery partiton" they will indeed show up automatically if you run TimeShift from that partition/OS.

Now, your results may vary, but I can tell you this was the best restore I have ever had from a 100% OS down! Planning it out was simple, implementing it was a little more work, testing it was easy… and recovery this morning proved how good it can be!

I always urge people to use TimeShift and have a good, known backup as well. And, if you really want to kick recovery into high gear… save yourself with a simple, quick ‘recovery partition’.

This almost seems like a no-brainer if you have two MX installs on the same computer. I like to think that TimeShift might work even better if you restore an OS that isn't in active use during the process. You get the benefits of grub-btrfs, but with a simple approach and a simple file-system. Thanks for sharing.

Your very welcome. And by changing the location in Timeshift , and running it from chroot rescue ... you can actually reach over and grab your existing timeshift files and properly restore them as well. (I believe you dont even have to chroot.. just choose the right location for where you old TimeShift files ARE located... and it will do the rest (ie restore to the proper device etc. )

[rokytnji.1]

I just use the snapshot tool and keep it as backup on usb drive for my Chromebook and IBM t530 installs.
Gparted live session was all I needed to fix /home sd card when it slipped out. To do a file system check. On the chromebook.
Backup usb gets refreshed from time to time.

I used the T530 snapshot (read only) when I swapped out platter drive for ssd drive,. No show stopping glitches found.
50 gig was backup iso size.
Big improvement with speed with ssd running now.

I do this mostly in antiX 23 runit full iso installs though.

[ThemetresAtrometos]

I tested timeshift at 2021 and it was terrible!
The snapshot tool has never failed me.
It's not so hard to have a little usb in your wallet.

[LinuxSpring1]

There is just one big gaping hole in this. What if the issue is with the drive itself. If the recovery partition is on the same drive as MX Linux then there are chances of it getting impacted. One of the best way would be to have SystemRescue on a 16/32 GB flash drive along with the latest MX Installation ISO. Always keep this flash drive in the laptop bag and we are set to go.