Possible to Ghost an entire Harddrive Image on a bootable CD?

[FFIV]

Dear Ghost Experts:

As the title suggests, I have Ghost Enterprise 6.5, is it possible to CLONE/Image
an entire Harddrive on a CDW that is bootable. Basically, I want to just boot from
the CD and press enter and Forgettabouit!

I want to do this entirely from Ghost if possible. Prefer not to have to copy
boot files and them the image.

I come back and the Entire HD is as good as if it was a brand new install.

Thank you very much for your time and patience.

 

[cloudchief]

You can make a bootable cd while in ghost, but that will just emulate a floppy boot, you would still have to go through the steps in ghost to restore. If you want to take the time you can make a bootable disk that will automaticly restore the drive after one click. Step by step instructions can be found here. It looks more complicated than it is.

 

[overmars]

I've noticed that Ghost is about the only program that anyone ever mentions when it comes to disk copying and imaging. Just wondering if anyone else has tried different programs like Drive Copy, Drive Image, or Image Cast IC3. They probably do the same thing, but why nobody mentions them?

Is this just because Norton is a big name, or are those programs truly inferior?

 

[Rob G.]

Yes, you can make a bootable Ghost CD that will automatically start the image restore - you just need to do a little extra work first.

Any Ghost operation can be run from the command line rather than use the menu system. What you need to do is add the command to the config.sys file on your bootable floppy - the one Ghost picks up and applies to the CD.

The command will be something like this:

ghostpe.exe clone,mode=pload,src=X:\IMAGE.gho,dst=1:1

Where 'X' = the drive letter allocated during the DOS boot and 'IMAGE' = the name of the image file. This command would load an image file onto the first partition on disk 1 (the 1:1 part determines disk : Partition)

You'll need to examine the Ghost documentation for other options, but the above should give you a good indication of what you need to do.

 

[corkyg]

I use Drive Copy 3.0 and completely clone my HDD to a duplicate. It is instantly available by switch. No need to restore anything . . . I have Drive Image, and always hear about Ghost . . . both of which are grossly overrated because they require restoration. My way doesn't.

I can clone a 20 gig drive completely . . . an exact dupe . . . in 15 minutes. It is then interchangeable with the main drive.

I put them in mobile racks and use the external switches . . . can boot from either one. It's cheaper and faster than Ghosts, Phantasms, or whatever.

 

[Rob G.]

You can do that Ghost too Corky, with partitions or drives (and with partition resizing on-the-fly). Restoration is only require when you dumped to an image file.

 

[Webdd]

My situation: I have a single HD with one partition. Ghost won't let me burn an image to C:.

So, I went to http://www.ping.be/satcp/ghostresq01.shtml and made the boot disk on floppy, and created the ghost.bat file. The rest of the directions assume you have an available image to burn- I don't. So, I'll burn one from dos to CDRW, using Ghost.
I have created ghost.exe -split=640 -autoname and placed it in C:\ghost. I also made a duplicate called ghostpe.exe, cause I'm not sure which one will be referenced.

Reboot using boot disk.
Run ghost, create image to my CDRW

Ghost asks for a boot disk to copy from (a, when creating the image file. Now, if I use the boot disk that I created from above, with the ghost.bat onto this floppy, do you think it will work properly?

Content of ghost.bat:
GHOST.EXE -clone,MODE=pload,SRC=%CDROM%\IMAGE.GHO:1,DST=1:1

Do I need to copy this line into bootdisk a:config.sys before I burn image?
Do I need to change this command line to GHOSTPE.EXE -clone,MODE=pload,SRC=%CDROM%\IMAGE.GHO:1,DST=1:1
For this to work, I will have to name my created image "image.gho", correct.

Thanks for any assistance, I'm almost ready to load up the 6 coasters...