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carsten888 · 2017-05-22, 11:40

I got a nice working system with pi1b. I want to make a copy for a friend.

So I copied the files to another sd card and tried that in another pi1b. But then the kodi on the second sd card got all the default settings and none of the adons are installed.

I checked the files on both sd cards with winmerge and they are exactly the same!
Where is the kodi config saved? How to copy to another pi? Huh

**DaVu** · 2017-05-22, 12:20

just install whatever distro you are using on your friends RPi and then copy the complete .kodi folder (and all its subfolders) to the other RPi. Everything which is needed should be in there.

Note: This only affects Kodi. If you are using where you are able to apt-get and installed additional software, this won't be copied while using the method above.

carsten888 · 2017-05-22, 14:16

I don't have a .kodi folder. Just a 'overlays' folder on the sd.

**DaVu** · 2017-05-22, 17:11

the folder is hidden.

Which distro are you using on your RPi?. Check your home folder:

Code:
ls -al ~/

There must be a .kodi folder.

bricktop · (This post was last modified: 2017-05-22, 17:15 by bricktop.)

wouldn't cloning the SD card be the easiest way?

https://thepihut.com/blogs/raspberry-pi-...is-sd-card

MetalChris · 2017-05-22, 17:48

(2017-05-22, 11:40)carsten888 Wrote: I got a nice working system with pi1b. I want to make a copy for a friend.

So I copied the files to another sd card and tried that in another pi1b. But then the kodi on the second sd card got all the default settings and none of the adons are installed.

I checked the files on both sd cards with winmerge and they are exactly the same!
Where is the kodi config saved? How to copy to another pi?

You can use the Backup addon to backup your existing configuration, and then restore your friends RPi.

**DaVu** · 2017-05-22, 18:45

sure, many ways lead to Rome Wink

**DarrenHill** · 2017-05-23, 09:42

(2017-05-22, 14:16)carsten888 Wrote: I don't have a .kodi folder. Just a 'overlays' folder on the sd.

The SD card contains two partitions. The first one is the small boot partition, which is what you see if you take the card out of your Pi and put it into a Windows machine (for example). The other partition is larger, but is in Linux format and is not (as standard) readable on a Windows machine.

The simplest way to view it is either to enable SMB access on your Pi set-up and access it over the network that way, or to use a Linux OS (you can make a temporary bootable live image on a USB key or DVD and use that if you don't want to do a full install) and that should be able to mount and see both partitions.

The overlays folder is in the boot partition, whereas the .kodi folder is (amongst many other things) in the other larger partition.

carsten888 · 2017-05-23, 12:12

I booted with a linux dvd. I can't see the other partition. I do see a hidden folder 'system volume information'.

I tried copy pasting that to my friends sd card, but no joy.

Rereading your post I thought maybe I need to do that smb setting also for viewing the partition in Linux. So I searched for that, but not sure where and what to set.

trogggy · 2017-05-23, 12:28

On your linux screen you're looking in the 537MB volume. That's the small partition windows sees.
Looking at your screen I'm guessing the storage partition is the '3.5GB Volume' above that.
To see the whole storage partition over the network you could either edit samba.conf.sample (and make it into samba.conf) that sits in the Configfiles share or connect using WinSCP or similar.

I'm with bricktop though - the easiest way to clone an installation is to clone the card. Win32diskimager or usbit (or probably dozens of other programs I've not used) will do that easily in windows. As long as the new card is at least as big* it should just work. Stick it in your pc, use one of those 2 programs to 'read' to an image. Stick a new card in the pc and 'write' the same image back. Test new card in pi. Give new card to friend.

* Sometimes cloning to a card that's nominally the same size fails because it's actually a few bytes smaller, so a full partition doesn't fit. Something to worry about if it happens.

carsten888 · 2017-05-23, 14:34

I tried cloning with Win32diskimager, but the second card is smaller so it did not want to write.

I watched a few youtube vids about how to do that and concluded it is just too much hassle. The time I spent trying to do this is already more then manually reconfiguring Kodi from scratch.

Anyway. Thanks for all the help.

I have now learned that all my sd-card backups of kodi where totally useless, because each backup is exactly identical. Smile

o well, live and learn.