Hardware Reference
In-Depth Information
Insert an SD card and make a note of the corresponding drive letter (for example, E:).
Make sure that the card does not contain any data you want to save because it will be
completely overwritten.
Go to https://launchpad.net/win32-image-writer and download the binary
version of Win32DiskImager from the Downloads section on the right side of the
web page. Unzip the program.
Start Win32DiskImager.exe as Administrator. Depending on how your system is
set up, this may require you to double-click the program name, or require you to hold
down the Shift key, right-click the program icon and select Run As.
In the Win32DiskImager window, select 2012-10-28-wheezy-raspbian.img .
In the Device drop-down on the right, select the drive letter you noted in step 2 (see
Figure A-1).
Figure A-1:
The Win32
DiskImager
window.
Images
When talking about downloading the OS for the Raspberry Pi, you may hear it called an
image, which may be slightly confusing. It is an image of the underlying storage. (Imagine
an aerial photo of the entire sports field of storage blocks, even the blank ones, rather than
separate files! If you were to print this photo at the same size on another sports field, you'd
have an exact copy of all the files stored on the original one.)
It is possible to store an image as a single file in another filesystem, but this arrangement is
not suitable for a running Raspberry Pi. As such, a Raspberry Pi will not work if you just copy
an image onto a FAT formatted card. Instead, you must tell your OS that you want to trans-
fer it at the block level, so that every block on your card matches those of the person who
made the image. That way, Linux interprets these underlying blocks on the disk to provide
a filesystem that is identical to the person who made the image.
In summary, filesystem images provide an easy way of cloning an entire filesystem such
that all the files, their permissions, attributes, dates, and so on are identical.
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