Backing up Drivers and Imaging concerns

[Addikt]

Alright, well I have a laptop that has been leased to me through my school. It is an IBM R52 and it's a CTO (custom to order) model on their site so basically their support serach just gives me all the drivers that are in the database and it would be a wild goose chase of matching hardware with the corresponding drivers. I was wondering if there was a utility I could use to back up and restore all my new drivers.

Also, I have been given an imaging CD that uses Symantec Ghost. Bascially whe my computer is can't even install and play media files at the same time I usually consider re-imaging the thing, which is often. I don't know what this is, I have tried scanning for viruses and I just think that it must be all the bloatware and startup scripts that are run on the system. I just want to do a nice clean install and get rid of all of that stuff.

The thing is that I want to return the computer to the same state it is now. Currently there are two partitions however I want to reformat and use a single partition. For this reason I'm assuming that running Symantec Ghost in the future with their utility will not be an option for two reasons. First, I am not completely sure but I don't know if Symantec Ghost will repartition your drive when you re-image the system. Second the backup file is on the D drive, if I'm going to get rid of this drive then the back-up disc that the IT department gave me won't work.

I was just wondering if there was a way that I could avoid this, does Symantec Ghost actuallly restore partition structure? Also is there a way that I could make a new image using Symantec Ghost that WOULD restore the partition structure and restore the current image? I am just at wits end with their configuration, it's slow and bulky it has a lot of errors and I'm sure new security holes are created blocking the old ones. The fact of the matter is that the people are incompetent and I have pretty much been at war with them since I got this expensive piece of garbage. Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks in advance,
Mark

 

[Tarrant64]

Well I have worked with Symantec Ghost for a little bit. Depending on how the image was made, it may just repartition your hard drive. However, if it's just an image that will restore your laptop to it's original state it won't. I tiwll just install the image onto whatever partition is available. Check with this and see if you cant get information about it. Have a second partition on the hard drive though(especially for a laptop) isn't such a bad idea.

Yes, Symantec Ghost does have the ability to to partition hard drives. I can't remember off the top of my head, whether or not you had to set it up before creating an image or not. When I do it, I set up Ghost to use sysprep and change settings so that it will partition things how I want it or just install the image on the current partition.

 

[logicmaster2003]

norton ghost recovery disc SUCKS... the boot up time takes forever on any machine !! and the GUI is even more primitive-looking than window 3.10 !

 

[Pirotech]

Hi guys,
I've been using Acronis True Image for several years. I regularly make backups and use a CD for restoring.
To my mind it's the most convenient and reliable software.

 

[Addikt]

Well I was thinking of just getting Symantec Ghost and making a new image CD for the machine. I will restore their image and then make my own image using symantec ghost and hopefully it will repartition the drives for me. Then once restored I can again restore their image, this is a little confusing so:

1. Backup current files
2. Restore their image
3. Make an image of the restored image
4. Reformat

Use the laptop with a single partition for the summer then when it comes time to return it, I will:

4. Reformat using the image that I created
5. Restore the computer with their image

Anyone see any hitches to this plan that I might not be aware of? Another thing I would like to do is backup the current drivers on the system so that when I reformat the proper drivers will be loaded. Does anyone have any information on this?