title: how to clone an Amazon EBS volume into another one of smaller size
body: <p>I have two amazon ec2 instances, (1) using SLES and running my current site, and (2) a new one using Amazon Linux. I am simply trying to move my site from the SLES and then retire it. </p>
  
  <p>I have a 100GB EBS volume attached to the SLES server of which only about 20GB is actually used. What's the best way to bring the data over to the new instance?</p>
  
  <ul>
  <li>create a new EBS volume of about 30GB and attach to new instance, use unix cp?</li>
  <li>create a new EBS volume of about 30GB and attach to new instance, temporarily also attach the 100GB original volume the new instance, use unix cp?</li>
  <li>something smarter/simpler, such as create a snapshot(?) of the 100GB EBS volume, somehow? create a new 30GB EBS volume out of it, and then attach that to the new instance? The extra benefit will be that I won't have to take down my site</li>
  </ul>
  
  <p>Thanks a lot</p>