Hello,
I have an mksysb image in my disk, created like:

# mksysb -i /mnt/backup/lpar2.image

I want to know if this image could be copied to a tape and make it a boot image.

Thanks

Enzote

Yes, it can. But I'd recommend that if you have multiple AIX servers, you can set one of them up as a NIM server and do restores of that image from NIM via your network. I used to do mksysb restores from tape, but it can be a real pain to do restores/builds from tape.

Tapes go bad
Tape drives get dirty and fail
Shortage of tape drives

Use NIM!

BTW, to copy your image to tape, do:

dd if=/mnt/backup/lpar2.image of=/dev/rmt0 bs=4194304

BTW, I've never copied from disk to tape and performed a restore. You should test a restore before relying on it for a DR.

To be honest i doubt that it will work. If the "mksysb" does not write to a tape device or a NIM server it does not include the boot code to the image as far as i know. Therefore the tape will not be bootable if you transfer it that way - the boot code would still be missing. One would have to provide this boot code via a floppy disk or CD-ROM to boot off the tape.

I'd like to second, though, what you said above: using NIM is the right way to do it.

I hope this helps.

bakunin