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I have a 500gb external hdd that I'm using to boot Ubuntu. I don't need 500gb it was just so I didn't mess up my internal drive running OS x. I just bought a 64gb usb that I would like to make bootable with all the stuff from my external drive(only using lk 18 gb). Everything website I've found says I need 500gb(same size) or bigger to clone the drive and settings. Is there any way to make the 64gb drive bootable by cloning from my external drive?

KamikazeStyle
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  • Why dont you just install the OS onto the 64gb USB drive and then transfer the files from the 500gb drive to the newly created OS. I have found tutorials on how to do what you are asking but have never been able to get them to work. I can't find those tutorials now but I will keep looking and link you when i find them. Just beware it will be quite the effort to do as you are asking – Dylan Mar 18 '15 at 00:03
  • Yea seems like the more I look the bigger pain it is. You think I can install the os then transfer the settings somehow? – KamikazeStyle Mar 18 '15 at 00:13
  • What OS are we talking about and what settings exactly? – Dylan Mar 18 '15 at 00:14
  • Ubuntu 14.04. And pretty much all the battery tweaks I got the new 3.18 kernel, cpu-freq, tlp, enabled p_state. media is easy but programs like compiz, tweak took and stuff that would be a pain to refind everything and reinstall it all. – KamikazeStyle Mar 18 '15 at 00:17
  • yea I can't see why that wouldn't work actually, thanks for the link. – KamikazeStyle Mar 18 '15 at 03:04

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You really have two options:

  1. You could copy all the deb files for the packages you have installed from /var/cache/apt/archives just so long as you haven't ran sudo apt-get clean to specifically remove these files

  2. I have always used aptoncd which is my recommendation.

Just open a terminal and run the following command: 

sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install aptoncd

From their webpage:

Create a removable repository with all packages downloaded with Synaptic, apt-get or aptitude.

This gives you a fancy GUI to make backups of all your programs, it is capable of others things as well but this is what I have always used it for. Here is their website.

Dylan
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  • ok just so I understand, as far as settings those are kinda out the window, but everything I've installed is basically backed up right? – KamikazeStyle Mar 18 '15 at 00:40
  • You could look up the location of the config file for each application and copy them over to the corresponding place in the new OS. For most apps I don't think this would be worth it but for a couple it might be, such as: Conky, Unity Tweak that kind of thing. – Dylan Mar 18 '15 at 02:16