Backup, Help please.

[jolancer]

note- im a noob to HD cloning.

situation...

im goin to help a friend backup his HD installation. this is what i was thinking... i'd use norton ghost to copy a backup image of his OS partition onto his Data partition. then creat a boot disk that could run the backup image to restore all installation/os information on the OSpartition.

1. iv never used norton ghost

2. iv never backed up a HD

so can notron ghost do what im thinking? and would it be pritty self explanitory. its not hard for me to learn software just by looking threw it. but if theres stuff i should know beforhand to make things easyer, please post it.

also, if its possible to creat a boot disk to restore the entire OS partition threw the ghost backup image on 2nd partition(even if the OSpartition is totally erased for example). please post a checklist on creating such a disk, because ima noob at boot disks aswell.

unless the ghost image can be activated withouta boot disk, please let me know... because i dont have norton ghost, im not going to have access to it till i get over to his place. and the more i know b4 hand the better. Thx.

 

[Inaris]

hope this isn't too late...
Norton Ghost is very cool and extremely function for situations like what you are explaining. I use it all the time, as it's the best solution for backing up and creating images that I have seen.
The backup process is very simple. You are just cloning off the drive you select. If you run through the command line, you have to understand how partition tables work, as well as disc I/O. Meaning which is disc 0 and 1... and which partition you are wanting to work with. the gui mode is a lot easier to start out on, but I can walk you through creating a batch or whatever for you. Also, the image process, Restore, is about the same. you just need to make sure you know what is the backup partition and which is the area you want to over write.
There is one thing you have to remember. Ghost is a dos based application, so if you save the image to an NTFS parition, you will need to boot up using an NTFS system. If you are just loading the image from one drive to another for backup reasons, there dont' worry about that.
if you want more than this, let me know...

good luck

 

[Osiris]

This is what I do. If he has 2 harddrives, he can backup all his data, software, etc to the other drive by using backup2000. I have mine set to backup every 2 minutes. My complete harddrive, using hardly no resources, and it works great.

 

[Inaris]

it's not the same thing throough. From what I understand of Backup2000 it's only a copy of the files from the machine. It will only work with a systme that still has windows working on it. or reinstalled. Ghost is a complete backup. everything, not just some files and such. and it's a portable format. meaning you can take ghost from one drive, and put it on another and it's auto spans out onto the large drive, or tries to shrink to fit a small drive. it's very cool and incredibly powerfull.

 

[jolancer]

Thx for the info.

my main consern was if Ghost would beable to restore the OSpartition even if it was badlydamaged/formated/or nonexistent... and if that required a bootdisk. (specificaly talking about an XP OSpartition).(backing up to the same drive, but a different partition)

im familiar with some of the commands in the console such as 'diskpart/listdisk/etc'

Ghost is a dos based application, so if you save the image to an NTFS parition, you will need to boot up using an NTFS system.

does this mean i should creat the 2nd partition in Fat32 instead? or can NTFS be booted by a floppy even without an existing XP installation?

 

[Inaris]

it's not a restore. it's more like a reimage. You take a snapshot in time, and ghost will beable to reapply that directy to the disc, as long as the disc is working and it will be just like you had it at the moment you took the image. that incluced the partition and everything. Ghost handles all the partition stuff automatically.
if you are creating an IMAGE file, then yes, Fat32, so that dos can read it. if you are imaging another drive with to act as the back up, then it doens't matter.

 

[jolancer]

t's not a restore. it's more like a reimage. You take a snapshot in time, and ghost will beable to reapply that directy to the disc, as long as the disc is working and it will be just like you had it at the moment you took the image

yes thats what i was refering to, not for example - windows restore lmao.

Ghost handles all the partition stuff automatically.

if you are creating an IMAGE file, then yes, Fat32, so that dos can read it. if you are imaging another drive with to act as the back up, then it doens't matter.

remember i dont have access to the softwere yet, so i dont now exactly what u mean.

do u mean it handels partitions for creating a backup automaticaly(respectivly depending on user options of course), or it only handles partitions when restoring the image autmaticaly?

and i dont know what u mean about how it doesnt matter what format the drive is for the image if its on a seperate HD? wouldnt it function exactly the same as if it were on a seperate partition?

 

[EricB]

if you can, get drive image 7 or 8 from powerquest. it's simpler, faster and better

 

[jolancer]

why would u say drive image is better?

and would it be more suitable for the kind of backup im perposing?(complete reinstalation from a second partition)

 

[EricB]

for one you can back your files to seperate partition on the same hard drive

with ghost it will overwrite everything and leave you with 1 partition.

drive image is faster, you can save it over a network (when you boot from cd it will still find it)