Ghost question

[Muse]

I've seen it asserted that you can effectively (I suppose, entirely) defrag an NTFS partition by making a Ghost image of it and then restoring the partition from the image file. Is this true?

Thread link

The above-linked thread includes the following statement about 1/2 way down the first page of posts:

If you couldn't defrag your NTFS drive, it's because there wasn't enough free space left to do so, and you had ignored it past the point of no return.

You could have Ghosted it to an image, and then restored the Ghost image and your disk would no longer be fragmented. Total elapsed time: 20 minutes.

My impression of what Ghost does is make a sector by sector image file creation and restore. I'd think that any fragmentation would persist after a restore. Maybe there's a way to do it with newer versions of Ghost within Windows where defragmentation could take place. I've always used Ghost from a DOS boot disk, generally from Ghost 2001. I now have Ghost 2003 (6.0).

 

[bsobel]

Also answered in your other thread. Ghost takes a file by file image of the file system (unless you use some special switches to force a true sector image, by default your not). So when Ghost puts the files back, they are by nature of the operation layed out in order.

Bill

 

[Muse]

Originally posted by: bsobel
Also answered in your other thread. Ghost takes a file by file image of the file system (unless you use some special switches to force a true sector image, by default your not). So when Ghost puts the files back, they are by nature of the operation layed out in order.

Bill

That's nice to know. Thanks, Bill. Then it could be a good way to defrag your partitions. Especially NTFS partition, which can be very difficult to defrag otherwise, or so I'm told.

Someone asserted in the thread the other day that OS partitions (NTFS, I believe) if restored from Ghost images are NOT bootable! Is this baloney pure and simple? I've never had a problem except in instances when I tried to restore them to a different physical HD.

 

[bsobel]

The partition will need to be set as active/bootable but that is part of the restore process. But, no, the other poster you referenced is definately wrong.
Bill

 

[Nothinman]

Then it could be a good way to defrag your partitions.

Not really, it's a lot more work than just running diskskeeper or speeddisk.

Especially NTFS partition, which can be very difficult to defrag otherwise, or so I'm told.

It's no more difficult to defrag than any other filesystem.

Someone asserted in the thread the other day that OS partitions (NTFS, I believe) if restored from Ghost images are NOT bootable! Is this baloney pure and simple? I've never had a problem except in instances when I tried to restore them to a different physical HD.

Ghost should restore everything necessary for the machine to boot, the only problems you should run into would be caused by Windows not working with different hardware or whatever has changed.

 

[prometheusxls]

Originally posted by: Muse

Originally posted by: bsobel
Also answered in your other thread. Ghost takes a file by file image of the file system (unless you use some special switches to force a true sector image, by default your not). So when Ghost puts the files back, they are by nature of the operation layed out in order.

Bill

That's nice to know. Thanks, Bill. Then it could be a good way to defrag your partitions. Especially NTFS partition, which can be very difficult to defrag otherwise, or so I'm told.

Someone asserted in the thread the other day that OS partitions (NTFS, I believe) if restored from Ghost images are NOT bootable! Is this baloney pure and simple? I've never had a problem except in instances when I tried to restore them to a different physical HD.

I have had trouble in this respect before. What happened is that the image was not being restored to an active partition. The casue was I either used the wrong options when making the image or there was something slightly awry with the original drive when I made the image e.g. I had pulled the plug rahter than shutting down properly etc... I had to go in with PQ magic and set the partition to active again. That was all. There were no other problems. This sort of thing is infrequent. But its good to have PQ magic floppy arround just in case you make a boo boo.

 

[Muse]

"But its good to have PQ magic floppy arround just in case you make a boo boo. "

I have a free download called aefdisk.exe, that you can use to do the same thing. I set a few partitions active and inactive just this week with it. Runs at a DOS prompt.