Acronis True Image Home 10 @ Bjorn3d

Vikingod · Mar 31, 2007, 12:50 AM

Source: Bjorn3d
____________
Imagine if you will the following scenario: It's a Friday afternoon and you've had a long, hard week at work. You come home and after doing your honey-dos you settle in to killing as many aliens as you possibly can in your favorite game to rid yourself of the week's frustration and prepare for the glorious weekend ahead. About 15 minutes into the carnage you begin to hear a high pitched squeaking noise coming from your trusty computer. Probably a fan that you can change out later, right? You continue your activity and all of a sudden you hear a noise that is reminiscent of crunching corn flakes in a blender and your system freezes. You're a computer enthusiast and built this rig from scratch and can easily troubleshoot and fix what's wrong! Well not exactly, your hard drive has just gone from 7200 RPM to around 100 RPM and your operating system, programs, and most importantly years worth of data have just been destroyed.

~~DudeBoyz~~ · Mar 31, 2007, 01:24 AM

So does this thing work like Norton Ghost for DOS does - where you can boot to a floppy or CD and both create and restore full images without the need to load anything or partially install Windows?

Vampyromaniac · Mar 31, 2007, 03:44 AM

Yes, it can do that.

~~DudeBoyz~~ · Mar 31, 2007, 04:50 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Vampyromaniac

Yes, it can do that.

So I can totally format a partition and restore image files directly to that partition just like I can with Ghost for DOS?

If so, that be cool.

Don't suppose you could kinda tell me the procedure for that, could you?

I'd appreciate a little Guidance. Thanks.

My C: drive and D: drive are both FAT32 partitions. I use the Norton Ghost created Win 98 SE boot floppy and run GHOST from my D:\GHOST\ folder. I image the drive (Local > Partition > To Image) to that same D:\GHOST\folder and then boot back into Windows and burn those image files to DVD. Ghost defaults to 2 gig split files for the image, so I just burn 2 image files per blank DVD and I'm good to go. It compresses so my 20 gig partition with about 10 gig of data on it usually fits down to two image files (it doesn't archive the pagefile)

When I want to restore with Ghost, I boot to the 98 floppy, go to D:\GHOST\ and run the GHOST app and tell it to do a LOCAL > PARTITION > FROM IMAGE and point to the first image file and it wipes out what is on C: and puts the image set I pick back on that drive. Then it's 100% bootable and life is good.

It works very well, and since it is done 100% outside of Windows, it gets every open file, every protected file, you name it. Nothing is missed.

But since the last TRUE Ghost was the 2003 version, I guess I may have to start looking for alternatives, or make a boot disk that lets me read and write the very latest NTFS version from the command line.

PangingJr · Mar 31, 2007, 05:57 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DudeBoyz

But since the last TRUE Ghost was the 2003 version,

Are you refering to the Symantec's Ghost in the DOS executable format?

if so, then no, the ghost.exe DOS executable program that included in Norton Ghost 2003 is not the last TRUE Ghost,
Symantec still continue developing the Ghost program, it is a much newer version than the version 8.x that included in Norton Ghost 2003 available in its corporate version.
and i believe Symantec will continue developing the program, and it is going to be for a very long time yet.

~~DudeBoyz~~ · Mar 31, 2007, 08:11 AM

The newer "ghost" versions are based on a different product that Symantec purchased, I believe. PowerQuest Drive Image or something.

PangingJr · Mar 31, 2007, 08:48 AM

that's why i asked you... if the "TRUE Ghost", were referring to/as the ghost .exe, the standalone DOS executable application?
then nope, the ghost .exe in mode DOS program has just a little to do with the way Symantec has integrated PQ's Drive Image technology into its Norton Ghost product..

~~DudeBoyz~~ · Mar 31, 2007, 09:15 AM

Ghost 2003 comes with both the Windows and DOS version. It is the last one before they switched over to the PQ Drive Image thing. That's what I meant about it being the LAST TRUE one.

Oh well.

PangingJr · Mar 31, 2007, 09:37 AM

i think i know what you mean by the TRUE Ghost now. you are just don't understand what i mean lol.
the ghost.exe for DOS itself, which i think it's actually should be called as the TRUE Ghost, is still based on the original ghost's technology.

Vampyromaniac · Apr 1, 2007, 01:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DudeBoyz

So I can totally format a partition and restore image files directly to that partition just like I can with Ghost for DOS?

If so, that be cool.

Don't suppose you could kinda tell me the procedure for that, could you?

Sure, it can do that. It's pretty much the same major steps Ghost has.

You can boot with an Acronis CD, and you get a regular interface with all the common tasks available. Below, I chose to do a Restore job:

You browse to where your image is stored, and then choose what kind of restore you want to do:

Usually you want to do a full image of a disk/partition.

Then you choose what you want to restore:

In this example, the image was of a whole disk, so you can choose if you want the whole disk or just one or more partitions.

(Pics were of Acronis TI Server 9.1. Ignore the weird sizes/partitions, this was all inside of VPC.)

Then you just choose the destination disk/partition, a couple other misc options, and then it dumps the image there in whatever filesystem the image was taken of. There's no need to "separately" format the partition.

Oh, the server versions of Acronis can create images from within Windows, too. It uses some magic to get all the open files. (Not sure whether or not the Home versions can do this too.)

~~DudeBoyz~~ · Apr 1, 2007, 02:08 AM

Great post! Thank you very much. That helps me understand what it can do.

I've been hammering away at Ghost 2003 to figure out how to image a system with only SATA drives, and also making boot floppies from the Ghost program in Windows. Then I open up Nero, create a bootable CD and base it on that Ghost floppy, and such.

I made one boot CD for normal systems which works great, and one other one for SATA-ONLY systems that also works fine. In the AUTOEXEC.BAT file on the boot disk, I have to add the -noide parameter.

Now I just run Ghost off the floppy or CD directly instead of a local hard drive, which is slower, but it can write to NTFS drives that way even if you can't see those drives at the command line after you exit Ghost.

So I am still able to make Ghost do all that I want, even with a Vista system, and I feel better about things after exploring all the options, making the boot disks, etc. and testing the heck out of it. So no matter what file system is in use, FAT, FAT32 or NTFS, I'm covered, at least until Microsoft changes the NTFS file system and makes it incompatible.

Still, if I can find that Acronis app on sale, I may snag a copy, cause I'm not happy with any version of Ghost after 2003.

Thanks again for the post. Always cool to learn new stuff.

PangingJr · Apr 1, 2007, 02:19 AM

Home version can also do live backups, incremental and differential backups.
AFAIK, most of today's well-known system backup, disk/partition imaging products will support live backup.

~~DudeBoyz~~ · Apr 1, 2007, 02:42 AM

One thing I am concerned about is the ability of an app to do a TRUE image of a drive while inside Windows.

There are files that are locked that normally don't get backed up. I'm not sure how those will be handled. Will some of them be skipped because they are active? There are some files in the temp folder that can't be deleted from within Windows, for example. Sometimes they can't be manually copied with a file manager even.

So how is Acronis or any other app running inside Windows going to be able to ensure that every single byte, every single file, is truly imaged?

Then, how would it be able to truly restore an image, byte by byte, from inside of Windows as well?

Vampyromaniac · Apr 1, 2007, 02:44 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DudeBoyz

Great post! Thank you very much. That helps me understand what it can do.

No problem, glad to help. It also (at least the version we use) handles FAT/NTFS, SATA, and Windows network shares all automatically. Just make sure to check the website that the Home version does everything you need, of course.

Quote:

Originally Posted by PangingJr

Home version can also do live backups, incremental and differential backups.
AFAIK, most of today's well-known system backup, disk/partition imaging products will support live backup.

Thanks Panging.

I think Backup Exec still has some trouble with open files, though it's not image-based backup software.

Vampyromaniac · Apr 1, 2007, 02:52 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DudeBoyz

So how is Acronis or any other app running inside Windows going to be able to ensure that every single byte, every single file, is truly imaged?

It uses some kind of magic! I was a little skeptical of this before too, but Acronis can do this. We do scheduled live images for all of our clients, and have recently had to do a full restore from image for one them. Windows Server 2003 is back up and still running perfectly fine to this day. I don't know how it works, but it works.

~~DudeBoyz~~ · Apr 1, 2007, 03:04 AM

With Acronis, you can make a physical recovery CD that boots and runs completely outside of Windows, right?

If so, I'd have no worries. I'd just create that boot CD and uninstall the app from Windows and use it off the bootable CD.

That would be cool.

PangingJr · Apr 1, 2007, 03:20 AM

the Norton Ghost 9/10 (Symantec's consumer version of Ghost) is the upgrade version to the Norton Ghost 2003 version, however, the Ghost for DOS version 8 (Ghost 2003) that is found in Norton Ghost 2003 is still included in the Norton Ghost 9/10's software package.

a full system backup and restore, or disk cloning and disk and partition imaging, all of these can be done via the Ghost for DOS version 8,
so if that is all you need, and that's if you only use Windows XP, then i think you won't need to upgrade the Ghost software.
however, if you also want to create a full system backup and restore of Vista, then the Ghost for DOS version 8 may not have a full support of the Vista system.
i have not tried the Ghost for DOS version 8 with Vista, so i can't be sure. AFAIK, the Symantec Ghost (Symantec's corporate version of Ghost) 11 is the version that is fully support Vista system.

anyway, for anyone who are looking to buy this kind of software, for a very reasonable price, for a full Vista and XP x64 support, then the True Image Home is the one you're looking for.

Vampyromaniac · Apr 1, 2007, 03:21 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DudeBoyz

With Acronis, you can make a physical recovery CD that boots and runs completely outside of Windows, right?

If so, I'd have no worries. I'd just create that boot CD and uninstall the app from Windows and use it off the bootable CD.

That would be cool.

Yes, that is exactly what is happening in those screenshots. I booted from the CD (inside Virtual PC.)

~~DudeBoyz~~ · Apr 1, 2007, 03:28 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Vampyromaniac

Yes, that is exactly what is happening in those screenshots. I booted from the CD (inside Virtual PC.)

Wicked. Thanks.

~~DudeBoyz~~ · Apr 1, 2007, 03:31 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PangingJr

however, if you also want to create a full system backup and restore of Vista, then the Ghost for DOS version 8 may not have a full support of the Vista system.

I'm testing a buds laptop that has Vista Home Premium on it, native NTFS, and I was able to get Ghost 2003 for DOS to work via the Norton Boot disk as I mentioned above.

It worked perfectly, as far as I can tell, thankfully.

PangingJr · Apr 1, 2007, 03:38 AM

resize the restore's parttition size while restoring Vista, or change primary slot at the same time and Vista is still a bootable OS after without any additional works by the user, or if you need for a number of different types of the Vista's disk drives other than basic disk,
then the Ghost for DOS version 8 (Ghost 2003) may not support this.

~~DudeBoyz~~ · Apr 1, 2007, 03:47 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PangingJr

resize the restore's parttition size while restoring Vista, or change primary slot at the same time and Vista is still a bootable OS after without any additional works by the user, or if you need for a number of different types of the Vista's disk drives other than basic disk,
then the Ghost for DOS version 8 (Ghost 2003) may not support this.

I'm totally confused by what you just said.

I think I need a nap.

Vampyromaniac · Apr 1, 2007, 04:03 AM

And here, just to show a quick test of making a live image, I did a back-up of my C: drive while I had Outlook open, and the .PST file is locked. I mounted the image afterward as Q:, and did a file compare between the file in the image and the real file. No errors:

~~DudeBoyz~~ · Apr 1, 2007, 04:18 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Vampyromaniac

And here, just to show a quick test of making a live image, I did a back-up of my C: drive while I had Outlook open, and the .PST file is locked. I mounted the image afterward as Q:, and did a file compare between the file in the image and the real file. No errors:

Thanks for the image. I don't understand why Windows LOCKS files and refuses to allow them to be read-only for a copy process.

I wonder how Acronis gets around that?

Still, I think it would be safer to just do it off the boot CD, don't you? Better safe then sorry.

Vampyromaniac · Apr 1, 2007, 04:42 AM

1. No idea
2. No idea

3. For a home user's C: drive, yes I'd boot the CD since it's not a major hassle. All other drives, I wouldn't bother.
For servers that need to be up all the time, I don't have any doubts about its integrity. A regularly scheduled automatic live back-up is the way to go.

~~DudeBoyz~~ · Apr 1, 2007, 05:13 AM

Wicked. If you know of any good deals on the software, please post 'em so geeks like me can check it out, k?

Thanks, mate.

PangingJr · Apr 1, 2007, 11:48 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DudeBoyz

I'm totally confused by what you just said.

example of an outdated version of Ghost and Vista problem.

Quote:

Vista and Symantec Ghost 8.x - http://forums.microsoft.com/MSDN/Sho...&PostID=181082
Ever since build 5231, I've found myself unable to use Ghost (8.0 or 8.2) "as I've always been able to". By which I mean with 5219, XP, 2000, etc., I can just create a partition backup, restore a partition backup, no muss, no fuss, all successful.

(I have an XP-compatible boot manager, have four independant partitions that are always hidden from one another, and I restore just one partition based on what OS/test/scenario I need to create.)

Now with 5231 and later, creating a Ghost image of a partition always results in the "unable to access \windows\winload.exe" (or whatever that exact full-screen message from the Vista boot manager is). Regardless of whether I'm restoring back to exactly the same partition as I backed up from, etc.

If I perform a DISK backup and then perform a DISK restore AND use the -FDSP switch, I can bring back my Vista 5270 image successfully. But still cannot just bring back Vista into a single/specific partition.

What is the "unable to access \windows\winload.exe" error actually trying to tell me? I've been scrolling through all the BCDEDIT data and options trying to put together a scenario that makes sense. Is SysPrep going to get me out of this, or is there something more simple I could do given that I'm not restoring to a different machine or anything; just trying to bring back a partition that was working for me previously.

FWIW, I guess since Ghost has it, there is some scenario where -FDSP was necessary even previously. In my own experience, I've never had to modify Ghost's default behavior. I just perform a partition backup, restore the partition backup, without any special/additional switches, and this works great for XP, 2000, NT 4.0, etc.

Thanks for any insight. Yes, I've been playing with XIMAGE too, but only concerned with what approach might work with Ghost in this thread.

Answer Re: Vista and Symantec Ghost 8.x - http://forums.microsoft.com/MSDN/Sho...&PostID=181082
An update on where things currently stand.

Indeed this appears to be a condition specific to the new BCD-based boot manager. i.e. It's the boot manager failing to find and execute the Windows boot files under circumstances where Windows itself can otherwise successfully boot, and not a change to the boot configuration/dependencies of Windows itself.

(Windows of course also keeps partition and disk information of its own, even prior to Vista. But in my experience this never resulted in a boot issue for the situation described, and Windows automatically updated and corrected if a different partition / disk signature was used.)

The cause of the Vista load failure previously described, to the degree I understand it, is that by default all of the BCD entries use "PARTITION"-type device references where applicable. In the BCD data stored for these "PARTITION"-type device references (visible in the BCD section of the registry, and in a BCDEDIT /EXPORT), both the drive signature and the partition number appear to be part of the information stored. And based on the results, both must match the current environment else the boot manager will declare the OS loading application cannot be found.

(Even if I force the drive signature to be the correct signature, if I'm restoring to a different partition than the image was previously using, the restored partition will still fail to boot because the partition number stored in the BCD still doesn't match the current environment.)

The solution that appears to be most suitable (at least for the situation I previously described and was intending to solve) is to change the BCD entries to use "BOOT" device references rather than explicit "PARTITION"-based references. Presumably thereby implying "whatever device/partition I booted from, that is the device/partition I want to use".

Preparing a Vista installation prior to creating the Ghost image then becomes a task of setting the DEVICE and OSDEVICE entries of the BCD entries you intend to use:

Logon as Administrator and from a command prompt invoke the following changes:
BCDEDIT /set {bootmgr} device boot
BCDEDIT /set {default} device boot
BCDEDIT /set {default} osdevice boot

Note you can "fix" a previously restored (and currently failing to boot) installation using a PE boot disc and executing these same actions against the restored partition's BCD entries.

There may be more entires that you need to fix if you intend to use them ({memtest}, {legacy}, etc.). The above is just the minimum for my own scenario where there is just a clean Vista-only OS installation on the partition.

Once the BCD entries are no longer referring to specific disk signatures and partition numbers, there is no need to use -FDSP with Ghost anymore, either. The disk signature can be reset as it is by default with a Ghost disk restore, and "nothing special" is required during image creation or restore (from a Ghost perspective).

Presumably this could have also been corrected by resetting/updating the "PARTITION"-type device entries with current information (current partition number and disk signature) post-Ghost restore, if for any reason the use of "PARTITION"-type references is needed. For the purposes of making an image that can be restored via Ghost to any partition on my test box, the "BOOT" device reference appears most desirable by not being fixed to any one partition or disk signature.

Quote:

Originally Posted by DudeBoyz

It worked perfectly, as far as I can tell, thankfully.

Just a couple of questions, may be you can help me by answering them...

have you ever restored Vista partition image that you have created it to different partition/drive than the original Vista's partition/drive using the Ghost 2003?
and what about using the Ghost 2003 to restore the Vista's image onto a newly created partition which has its size larger or smaller than the original Vista partition, have you ever tried this?

PangingJr · Apr 1, 2007, 12:18 PM

---

GutterPunk · Apr 1, 2007, 02:10 PM

We have had numerous problems of throwing an image on computers using ghost. About 60% of the time a problem will showup in the first month. We then switched to acronis and now the first problem comes up after 6 months. Nothing compares to hand "building" for installing the os and programs. But acronis has given us much better images than ghost.

~~DudeBoyz~~ · Apr 1, 2007, 02:33 PM

Historically I have had incredible results with Ghost. It has been the fastest and most reliable imaging tool I have ever used.

However, it may well be that Acronis, while not as fast or efficient, is simply doing a better job in keeping up with the latest configurations.

I do not think Acronis was superior to the actual Ghost product, but the replacement product that Symantec is pushing now does indeed seem a step backwards in terms of reliability.

I'm going to order Acronis. It's on sale at Newegg:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...MP=OTC-Froogle

$26.99 + 4.99 shipping.

I'll just burn a bootable CD and use it outside of Windows. It may be slower than the old Ghost, but it is keeping up with the latest hardware and partitioning schemes, and the old Ghost is no longer being updated. Gotta move on, sadly.

Edit: Order placed. Newegg is cool.

Mar 31, 2007, 12:50 AM	#1
Vikingod Int'l Fish Liaison Join Date: Jul 2004 Location: By the light of lamp I sit and type... Posts: 16,197 Rep Power: 111 System Specs	Acronis True Image Home 10 @ Bjorn3d Source: Bjorn3d ____________ Imagine if you will the following scenario: It's a Friday afternoon and you've had a long, hard week at work. You come home and after doing your honey-dos you settle in to killing as many aliens as you possibly can in your favorite game to rid yourself of the week's frustration and prepare for the glorious weekend ahead. About 15 minutes into the carnage you begin to hear a high pitched squeaking noise coming from your trusty computer. Probably a fan that you can change out later, right? You continue your activity and all of a sudden you hear a noise that is reminiscent of crunching corn flakes in a blender and your system freezes. You're a computer enthusiast and built this rig from scratch and can easily troubleshoot and fix what's wrong! Well not exactly, your hard drive has just gone from 7200 RPM to around 100 RPM and your operating system, programs, and most importantly years worth of data have just been destroyed.

Mar 31, 2007, 03:44 AM	#3
Vampyromaniac confutatis maledictis Join Date: May 2002 Location: somewhere dark Posts: 5,974 Rep Power: 77 System Specs	Yes, it can do that. __________________ *Digitalis 3.3* Athlon 64 3000 // ASUS K8V SE Deluxe // 1024MB PC3200 (2-2-2-10 1T) ATI All-In-Wonder 9700 Pro // 20" Dell 2005FPW (DVI) M-Audio Revo 7.1 + Philips Acoustic Edge // Klipsch ProMedia 2.1 320/16 Western Digital WD3200KS + 120/8 Seagate 7200.7 NEC ND-3550A 16x DVD±RW + Lite-On 52x24x CD-RW Antec Sonata case // 480W Antec TruePower personal bests \|\| Aq'3: 46796 \| 3D'01: 20461 \| 3D'03: 6336 \| 3D'05: 2677 \| PC'04: 4605 \| PC'02: 7691,9092,1250

Apr 1, 2007, 03:38 AM	#21
PangingJr Member Join Date: Mar 2003 Posts: 5,989 Rep Power: 70	resize the restore's parttition size while restoring Vista, or change primary slot at the same time and Vista is still a bootable OS after without any additional works by the user, or if you need for a number of different types of the Vista's disk drives other than basic disk, then the Ghost for DOS version 8 (Ghost 2003) may not support this. Last edited by PangingJr; Apr 1, 2007 at 03:45 AM.

Apr 1, 2007, 04:03 AM	#23
Vampyromaniac confutatis maledictis Join Date: May 2002 Location: somewhere dark Posts: 5,974 Rep Power: 77 System Specs	And here, just to show a quick test of making a live image, I did a back-up of my C: drive while I had Outlook open, and the .PST file is locked. I mounted the image afterward as Q:, and did a file compare between the file in the image and the real file. No errors: __________________ *Digitalis 3.3* Athlon 64 3000 // ASUS K8V SE Deluxe // 1024MB PC3200 (2-2-2-10 1T) ATI All-In-Wonder 9700 Pro // 20" Dell 2005FPW (DVI) M-Audio Revo 7.1 + Philips Acoustic Edge // Klipsch ProMedia 2.1 320/16 Western Digital WD3200KS + 120/8 Seagate 7200.7 NEC ND-3550A 16x DVD±RW + Lite-On 52x24x CD-RW Antec Sonata case // 480W Antec TruePower personal bests \|\| Aq'3: 46796 \| 3D'01: 20461 \| 3D'03: 6336 \| 3D'05: 2677 \| PC'04: 4605 \| PC'02: 7691,9092,1250

Apr 1, 2007, 04:42 AM	#25
Vampyromaniac confutatis maledictis Join Date: May 2002 Location: somewhere dark Posts: 5,974 Rep Power: 77 System Specs	1. No idea 2. No idea 3. For a home user's C: drive, yes I'd boot the CD since it's not a major hassle. All other drives, I wouldn't bother. For servers that need to be up all the time, I don't have any doubts about its integrity. A regularly scheduled automatic live back-up is the way to go. __________________ *Digitalis 3.3* Athlon 64 3000 // ASUS K8V SE Deluxe // 1024MB PC3200 (2-2-2-10 1T) ATI All-In-Wonder 9700 Pro // 20" Dell 2005FPW (DVI) M-Audio Revo 7.1 + Philips Acoustic Edge // Klipsch ProMedia 2.1 320/16 Western Digital WD3200KS + 120/8 Seagate 7200.7 NEC ND-3550A 16x DVD±RW + Lite-On 52x24x CD-RW Antec Sonata case // 480W Antec TruePower personal bests \|\| Aq'3: 46796 \| 3D'01: 20461 \| 3D'03: 6336 \| 3D'05: 2677 \| PC'04: 4605 \| PC'02: 7691,9092,1250

Mar 31, 2007, 01:24 AM	#2
~~DudeBoyz~~ banned Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: USA Posts: 1,677 Rep Power: 0	So does this thing work like Norton Ghost for DOS does - where you can boot to a floppy or CD and both create and restore full images without the need to load anything or partially install Windows?

Mar 31, 2007, 08:11 AM	#6
~~DudeBoyz~~ banned Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: USA Posts: 1,677 Rep Power: 0	The newer "ghost" versions are based on a different product that Symantec purchased, I believe. PowerQuest Drive Image or something.

Mar 31, 2007, 08:48 AM	#7
PangingJr Member Join Date: Mar 2003 Posts: 5,989 Rep Power: 70	that's why i asked you... if the "TRUE Ghost", were referring to/as the ghost .exe, the standalone DOS executable application? then nope, the ghost .exe in mode DOS program has just a little to do with the way Symantec has integrated PQ's Drive Image technology into its Norton Ghost product..

Mar 31, 2007, 09:15 AM	#8
~~DudeBoyz~~ banned Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: USA Posts: 1,677 Rep Power: 0	Ghost 2003 comes with both the Windows and DOS version. It is the last one before they switched over to the PQ Drive Image thing. That's what I meant about it being the LAST TRUE one. Oh well.

Mar 31, 2007, 09:37 AM	#9
PangingJr Member Join Date: Mar 2003 Posts: 5,989 Rep Power: 70	i think i know what you mean by the TRUE Ghost now. you are just don't understand what i mean lol. the ghost.exe for DOS itself, which i think it's actually should be called as the TRUE Ghost, is still based on the original ghost's technology.

Apr 1, 2007, 02:08 AM	#11
~~DudeBoyz~~ banned Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: USA Posts: 1,677 Rep Power: 0	Great post! Thank you very much. That helps me understand what it can do. I've been hammering away at Ghost 2003 to figure out how to image a system with only SATA drives, and also making boot floppies from the Ghost program in Windows. Then I open up Nero, create a bootable CD and base it on that Ghost floppy, and such. I made one boot CD for normal systems which works great, and one other one for SATA-ONLY systems that also works fine. In the AUTOEXEC.BAT file on the boot disk, I have to add the -noide parameter. Now I just run Ghost off the floppy or CD directly instead of a local hard drive, which is slower, but it can write to NTFS drives that way even if you can't see those drives at the command line after you exit Ghost. So I am still able to make Ghost do all that I want, even with a Vista system, and I feel better about things after exploring all the options, making the boot disks, etc. and testing the heck out of it. So no matter what file system is in use, FAT, FAT32 or NTFS, I'm covered, at least until Microsoft changes the NTFS file system and makes it incompatible. Still, if I can find that Acronis app on sale, I may snag a copy, cause I'm not happy with any version of Ghost after 2003. Thanks again for the post. Always cool to learn new stuff.

Apr 1, 2007, 02:19 AM	#12
PangingJr Member Join Date: Mar 2003 Posts: 5,989 Rep Power: 70	Home version can also do live backups, incremental and differential backups. AFAIK, most of today's well-known system backup, disk/partition imaging products will support live backup.

Apr 1, 2007, 02:42 AM	#13
~~DudeBoyz~~ banned Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: USA Posts: 1,677 Rep Power: 0	One thing I am concerned about is the ability of an app to do a TRUE image of a drive while inside Windows. There are files that are locked that normally don't get backed up. I'm not sure how those will be handled. Will some of them be skipped because they are active? There are some files in the temp folder that can't be deleted from within Windows, for example. Sometimes they can't be manually copied with a file manager even. So how is Acronis or any other app running inside Windows going to be able to ensure that every single byte, every single file, is truly imaged? Then, how would it be able to truly restore an image, byte by byte, from inside of Windows as well?

Apr 1, 2007, 03:04 AM	#16
~~DudeBoyz~~ banned Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: USA Posts: 1,677 Rep Power: 0	With Acronis, you can make a physical recovery CD that boots and runs completely outside of Windows, right? If so, I'd have no worries. I'd just create that boot CD and uninstall the app from Windows and use it off the bootable CD. That would be cool.

Apr 1, 2007, 03:20 AM	#17
PangingJr Member Join Date: Mar 2003 Posts: 5,989 Rep Power: 70	the Norton Ghost 9/10 (Symantec's consumer version of Ghost) is the upgrade version to the Norton Ghost 2003 version, however, the Ghost for DOS version 8 (Ghost 2003) that is found in Norton Ghost 2003 is still included in the Norton Ghost 9/10's software package. a full system backup and restore, or disk cloning and disk and partition imaging, all of these can be done via the Ghost for DOS version 8, so if that is all you need, and that's if you only use Windows XP, then i think you won't need to upgrade the Ghost software. however, if you also want to create a full system backup and restore of Vista, then the Ghost for DOS version 8 may not have a full support of the Vista system. i have not tried the Ghost for DOS version 8 with Vista, so i can't be sure. AFAIK, the Symantec Ghost (Symantec's corporate version of Ghost) 11 is the version that is fully support Vista system. anyway, for anyone who are looking to buy this kind of software, for a very reasonable price, for a full Vista and XP x64 support, then the True Image Home is the one you're looking for.

Apr 1, 2007, 05:13 AM	#26
~~DudeBoyz~~ banned Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: USA Posts: 1,677 Rep Power: 0	Wicked. If you know of any good deals on the software, please post 'em so geeks like me can check it out, k? Thanks, mate.

Apr 1, 2007, 12:18 PM	#28
PangingJr Member Join Date: Mar 2003 Posts: 5,989 Rep Power: 70	---

Apr 1, 2007, 02:10 PM	#29
GutterPunk I = Greatest Dood Join Date: Nov 2003 Location: Nebraska Posts: 5,949 Rep Power: 71	We have had numerous problems of throwing an image on computers using ghost. About 60% of the time a problem will showup in the first month. We then switched to acronis and now the first problem comes up after 6 months. Nothing compares to hand "building" for installing the os and programs. But acronis has given us much better images than ghost. __________________ Rock On \m/ Thank you Mousey for the Sig! --------------- Intel Core2Duo E6660 (3.4GHZ) ~ Tuniq Tower 120 ~ Enermax Galaxy 1000W ~ Corsair Dominator @ 1090MHZ 5-5-5-15 (OCZ XTC Modded Cooler)~ EVGA 8800GTX W/ HR-03 Plus 120MM ~ Asus DVD-RW LiteScribe ~ LG DVD-RW ~ Corsair Voyager 2GB ReadyBoost Drive ~ Vantec Nexus Fan Controller ~ ThermalTake Armor 25CM fan ~ Personal Finance Blog: Dent Your Debt

Apr 1, 2007, 02:33 PM	#30
~~DudeBoyz~~ banned Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: USA Posts: 1,677 Rep Power: 0	Historically I have had incredible results with Ghost. It has been the fastest and most reliable imaging tool I have ever used. However, it may well be that Acronis, while not as fast or efficient, is simply doing a better job in keeping up with the latest configurations. I do not think Acronis was superior to the actual Ghost product, but the replacement product that Symantec is pushing now does indeed seem a step backwards in terms of reliability. I'm going to order Acronis. It's on sale at Newegg: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...MP=OTC-Froogle $26.99 + 4.99 shipping. I'll just burn a bootable CD and use it outside of Windows. It may be slower than the old Ghost, but it is keeping up with the latest hardware and partitioning schemes, and the old Ghost is no longer being updated. Gotta move on, sadly. Edit: Order placed. Newegg is cool.