Optical-disc preservation tools for **openSUSE Leap 16.0** and **Tumbleweed**, for **Ubuntu 26.04, 24.04 and 22.04**, and for **Debian 13** and **Debian 12**, on **x86_64 and aarch64**: **redumper**, **DiscImageCreator** (DIC + EccEdc + DVDAuth + unscrambler), **Aaru** (v6 plus the version-pinned stable **aaru5**), **MPF** (mpf-check + mpf-cli + mpf-gui), and **Redumper-GUI**.

Two of the packages are version pins, not alternatives: **redumper-mpf** is the build MPF bundles, **redumper-rgui** the one Redumper-GUI bundles. Install them only if you use that frontend; the rolling **redumper** is the one you want otherwise. They have fixed names and a moving version and upgrade in place.

## Drive access

**Verified on real hardware** (2026-07-14: a Plextor PX-760A USB optical drive and a NEC USB floppy, passed through to a clean VM per distribution). A plain desktop user in **no** drive group -- not `cdrom`, not `floppy`, not `disk`, not `plugdev` -- dumped both media, and `sudo` was never invoked.

Two independent mechanisms carry that:

* `cap_sys_rawio` on the dumping tools makes vendor SCSI commands (Plextor `0xD8`, etc.) work without root. openSUSE sets it through the **permissions framework**; the Ubuntu and Debian packages set it in their **post-install script**.
* systemd-logind grants a `uaccess` ACL on the device node to whoever holds the **active local seat** -- for optical drives (`/dev/sr*`) via systemd's own rule, and for USB or legacy floppy drives via a udev rule these packages ship. It appears the moment the package is installed; the drive does not need to be re-plugged.

The capability sits on the **dumping tools** only (redumper, redumper-rgui, redumper-mpf, aaru, aaru5, DiscImageCreator) and deliberately **not** on any GUI or on the MPF frontends, which drive those tools rather than a drive: a process holding file capabilities is non-dumpable, so the desktop portal refuses to authorise it and every file dialog it opens dies.

Only headless / SSH / cron sessions, which have no seat, need more. For optical drives, add yourself to the `cdrom` group. A headless floppy dump needs root: the floppy node stays `root:disk`, and the `disk` group would expose every block device on the system, so it is not a safe substitute.

**aarch64 / arm64 is built and published, but not hardware-tested.** The drive-access results above were measured on x86_64 only. Nothing in the packaging is architecture-specific -- the permissions profile, the postinst setcap and the udev rule are the same files on both arches -- but nobody has run a dump from an ARM machine, so it is deliberately not claimed as verified. Reports welcome.

**Tumbleweed on ARM uses a second repository**, `openSUSE_Tumbleweed_ARM`: Factory's x86_64 and ARM ports are separate OBS projects (`openSUSE:Factory` vs `openSUSE:Factory:ARM`), and one repository cannot serve both. Every other target carries both arches in one repository.

Two things that look like permission errors and are not:

* The desktop may have **auto-mounted** the medium (GNOME does, KDE does not), so the dumper cannot take its exclusive lock. Release it without root: `udisksctl unmount -b /dev/sr1`. Aaru reports this as "Could not open device, error EncodingUnknown", which names everything except the cause.
* **Aaru asks a GDPR consent question on its very first run.** Until it is answered once, `aaru media dump` stops there. Run `aaru configure` in a terminal, then dump.

**Redumper-GUI** needs rustc 1.92 or newer (eframe/egui): available on openSUSE, Fedora/EPEL, Ubuntu 26.04 and Debian 13 (via trixie-backports, rustc 1.94.1). Not on Ubuntu 24.04/22.04 (top out at 1.91) or Debian 12 (1.63, no backported rustc).

Unofficial third-party packaging -- a hobby project, not affiliated with any upstream tool author.

Packaging recipes: https://github.com/gmipf/packaging-media-preservation

Upstream: [redumper](https://github.com/superg/redumper) - [DiscImageCreator](https://github.com/saramibreak/DiscImageCreator) - [Aaru](https://github.com/aaru-dps/Aaru) - [MPF](https://github.com/SabreTools/MPF) - [Redumper-GUI](https://github.com/Deterous/Redumper-GUI)