Does Clonezilla clone deleted files?
A partition and disk imaging/cloning program
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I have a hard drive that I want to clone using Clonezilla Live, but I want to make sure that it will clone the unused/deleted files as well as the ones it does use. If it does, does it do it by default, or is it an option that you have to choose?
PS: I would like a response within a day, as I am on a time crunch. Thanks!
Last edit: Napalm Jelly 2020-12-06
If the files are in a "Trash bin" or similar I'd expect them to be cloned. But if you have actually removed files it would be impossible to clone them. Empty space in a file system isn't actually cloned - but it is regenerated on the target.
Yes, as Jeremy mentioned, that's the way Clonezilla does. One thing I'd like to say is basically Clonezilla "clones" the used blocks on the file system, not the files. So even the files are in the trash dir, they are used blocks on file system.
Steven
To get unused blocks unmodified, you would want to use the dd type of clone instead of partclone; dd will not know if the disk contents are relevant or not so blocks left behind from deleted files will be captured as is too. It will take more time for partially used disks as it won't know that for the same reason: it blindly copies all blocks as is.