backing up os X to ipod for pather upgrade

[laruechris]

I have pre-ordered panther and am planning to install it on my pismo laptop and my beige g3 with a sonnet g4 500 card (768 ram) and an orange micro card. Apple says the beige g3 is no longer supported, but I am thinking they are covering themselves after saying 10 will work with legacy machines and it did not. I have a 30G ipod that they said would not work either, and it is working fine with no modifications. I would like to back up the hard drive of the beige computer on the ipod before I install panther. I have done this with some success, but get a message after it is done saying that some files could not be copied because of permissions. I have tried the following:

-change permissions manually using file info and changing them to my name (administrator)
-run repair permissions from the CD
-logged in as root user and backed up on the ipod

After doing these things, I still got a message saying that SOME files could not be copied. I am worried that if all doesn't go well with panther and I try to reinstall from the ipod, that I will not have files that will allow the computer to function normally.

Do you have any suggestions?

Thanks a lot for your help. You have a great site.
Chris

[mclbruce]

I think your worries are valid. May I suggest Carbon Copy Cloner:

http://www.bombich.com/software/ccc.html

It will "clone" a bootable copy of your HD to your iPod, which can be cloned back if necessary.

[batcam]

In certain upgrades of the iPod software installation would fail if you had at any point in time installed X onto the iPod. You had to erase the disk on the iPod to get it working again.

I'm not sure if this would currently pertain, but its something to be cautious about.

[DeltaMac]

suggestion: re-think trying for Panther on the Beige G3. This is not a 'legal' position that Apple is taking. (this is just not the same as the 'minor' problem with support of hardware DVD decoders). Your Beige G3 does not have the New World Rom on the Logic Board, which is a requirement for support for the installation of Panther (also provides hardware support for on-board USB, which is the main item telling you that Panther will not run): No on-board USB (no New World Rom), no Panther.
This could change through the efforts of the folks at XPostFacto, whose software provides OS X installs on non-supported systems, but latest I've read, there's no code released for Panther for those folks to start working with. It could be several months (my guess) before you'll see Panther on a beige G3

[laruechris]

Thanks for your help. I will postpone the upgrade until I hear something on xpostfacto.

Chris