Whats a good Ghost or Clone application for new PC's???

[IhateComedians]

I am in charge of setting up 14 new Gateway PC?s on our NT 4.0 Domain. All the new PC?s will come with Win XP Pro and MS works 2002. Can anyone recommend a good ghost type software or application that will enable me to setup each PC with identical software, and Printer setups? The software I need to install on all 14 is Lotus Notes 5, MS Office Pro 2000 and 1-3 network printers.

I REALLY don?t want to have to do 14 times the amount of work, to prep each machine for the network, if a good application exists that can clone, or ghost one basic configuration for all the new PC?s.

Anyone have any ideas?

Is there software I can load onto our NT servers that will automatically install the new configuration for all the new client PC?s? Anyone who can help me out or suggest something, I?d greatly appreciate the help.

 

[mrbios]

I would highly recommend PowerQuest Drive Image. I have version 5 at work, and it was MUCH easier to use that Ghost. The images I tried to make with Ghost didn't want to seem to work. Drive Image, as far as I know, doesn't have special server-side software to send out images to your computers, but you can set up a DOS boot disk that will connect to the network and grab it. As a final note, make sure that you run SysPrep on your box that you are going to clone. Otherwise, you will have lots of problems, due to Security ID conflicts. SysPrep can be found on the Windows XP CD. I'd tell you the exact location right now, but I am at school and I don't have my XP CD available. Good Luck.

-Russell "Mr.Bios" Sampson

 

[nightowl]

I have used Ghost 2002 before to create a bootable CD image which has worked out well for me. I did put a SCSI burner in the machine I was going to image. I used the floppy that Ghost made for creating CD images and booted from it. After selecting the drive to image I told Ghost to make the CD bootable and copy the system files from the floppy (key). If you do not copy the files from the floppy the CD will boot but you cannot access it from Ghost since it cannot see the CD drive. Ghost will also autmatically span the image across CDs. Now, all I do if I have to redo a machine is pop the CD in the drive and go from there. Ghost loads and copys the Image to the drive when you are finished you have a clean machine to work with.

 

[Bglad]

I highly recommend DriveImage. Ghost will do it but remember that you cannot store a Ghost image on an NTFS drive. You can get around this but if you have to buy software, why not get the one without limitations. DriveImage also seems to have better error checking, doesn't require a serial # entered each time, and can be set for unattended backups in the future.

 

[Bglad]

But wait, what is going to happen with the XP activation if you get 14 machines with the same serial number?

 

[thatsright]

Good Point about the XP. I don't want to wipe clean each HD and then install the OS, and apps from an image; just the apps and printers from a single image. I'll need to leave the os on all the machines, though. Is there any way I can just 'image' the apps and printer drivers, and other drivers I will need to install X14 for all 14 PC's; WITHOUT imaging the O/S as well?? I can't believe I left this part out.

Thanks a lot, again. If anyone can help me work around this one, i'd REALLY appreciate it.

 

[SaigonK]

The serial number issue is only on the personal edition of Ghost, not on the Corporate version.
buy the corporate for about $20 more and you dont have to worry about thet entering it each time problem.

I have used Ghost without and hassles with Windows XP, if you are using a Select version of XP then it doesnt require activation and you should be fine.

 

[Bglad]

There has got to be a way to do this but I don't know what it is. You need something that will track the changed files when you install the first machine so you can replace the same files on the others.

Hmmmm

 

[Daniel]

<< I highly recommend DriveImage. Ghost will do it but remember that you cannot store a Ghost image on an NTFS drive. You can get around this but if you have to buy software, why not get the one without limitations. DriveImage also seems to have better error checking, doesn't require a serial # entered each time, and can be set for unattended backups in the future. >>



I'm not familiar with drive image but I've used ghost quite a few times and always kept the images on a ntfs drive, am I just misreading your point?

 

[Bglad]

Danial read here and here.

 

[mrzed]

Link no work, but I think I know what the confusion is.

You can store a ghost image on NTFS. You just can't use Ghost to save directly to an NTFS partition as it is a DOS program.

I use a removable hard drive to create a ghost image to. Sometimes I reboot the machine into Windows and transfer the image to a network location. It does work.

 

[bignick]

if you want to keep the os, but install the apps separately you don't create an image. you'll need a tool like delta deploy from powerquest or wininstall to repackage the applications. for instance you run delta deploy, it takes a snapshot of the computer. you install office xp. then run delta deploy again. it compares the two snapshots and creates a package (it's just a big executable) of all files, folders, registry settings, etc. that has changed. now you can just run the package on any computer that has a similiar OS and the software is installed without the need to answer any installation questions.

also delta deploy has delta deploy center which is a server component for pushing out the packages automatically.


wininstall is on the win2k cd, don't know if it's on the winxp cd. it does basically the same thing, except it creates an msi file, and several other files and folders with all the changes in it.

 

[Daniel]

<< Link no work, but I think I know what the confusion is.

You can store a ghost image on NTFS. You just can't use Ghost to save directly to an NTFS partition as it is a DOS program.

I use a removable hard drive to create a ghost image to. Sometimes I reboot the machine into Windows and transfer the image to a network location. It does work. >>



Ahh ok, I was referring more to using ghost multicasting from a server with a ntfs drive onto a workstation with a ntfs drive also.