|
|
|||||||
Drive imaging, to image or not to image..................Diy-Computer-Repair can help!Consider this:If your computer failed right now do you have a backup of your data? If you do great, if you don't how much will it cost you to recover that data? I am not saying to do an image of your computer at the end of each business day. The usefulness of a image of you hard drive is in case of a catastrophic hardware failure, your power supply goes south and takes your hard drive with it. Or your hard drive fails. With an image of the partition(s) that have your data stored on them you can recover faster with less work or heartache. To go along with the image you have to have a comprehensive data back up plan and schedule. How it works: Along with your comprehensive data backup program you create an image of your operating system and data partition(s). Example number one, a personal system: Lets say you have a brand new computer (works with an old one too!), it either comes with the OS installed or your install it. Then you install your programs (with all those nagging key codes, activation codes, anti theft programs, etc....) and you customize your desktop to your liking. Now you have invested at least four hours if not more into just getting the darn thing where you can actually do some work! Ok how much did that cost you? I mean how much is four hours of your business day worth?
With the imaging program you can create a complete image of the hard drive. You can either create an image of the hard drive itself or of each of the partitions on the hard drive (partition image is recommended because you would have to have the same drive from the same manufacture with the same specifications as the original to recover with a hard drive image). So your hard drive has failed, you get the new one, it is installed now what? Well if you had a image of the original hard drive partitions you could put the images on your new hard drive and be back up and running in less than an hour. Once you have the image on the hard drive, you go to your latest backup and restore your data. Done, looks just like the old one, eh? And as a bonus you don't have to find those key codes, call or contact the program publisher to unlock the activation again, it is all ready installed! Example number two a business with multiple systems: Before I get into the why and how this only works on computers made by the same company and have the same model number, differences between companies and models of computers will cause the image to fail on startup! Lest say you have a business, you are going to expand or buy new equipment. The local computer store or shop wants $XXX per hour to setup and install all your systems with the OS and all the software you have for each computer. You will need to check with the program's publisher about licensing your software, if you have a corporate or enterprise license you will not have any problems installing all your software on one computer and creating an image to deploy to all the other computers.So to save your self a lot of $$$ you decide to buy Norton Ghost, create an image on one of the new computers. To do this you or the tech will setup one system, load all the software, Optimize the OS! Then using ghost create the image. Ok where will you put the image once you decide to do this? The fastest way is to create a separate partition on the image computer and not format it. You will have to either boot the system from dos or use a program like ERD Commander (see my review of this fine program!) or Bart's PE and then format the partition and create your image there. Once created you can then copy it to a CD or a DVD. This makes the image portable and tamper proof.Before you begin: You will need two things before you can create your image: 1) A way to start the computer and not be in the installed OS. 2) A place or storage device for the image. How do you start the darn thing with out the hard drive? Well there are thee ways to start the system besides using the installed OS. You can use: A Floppy A CD (See my page on boot devices for more info on the how to boot your system) So now you have it started and are ready to create the image, where are you going to store it? You can't use any of the boot devices they are to small, your image(s) may be over 1 gig, the OS partition will be that or more by itself. You could use the hard drive in the computer if there is enough space to create another partition of say five gig or a little more. You could use an external USB drive, or if you have a second drive in the system use that. Another place could be the second partition if you have two partitions on the hard drive, this will only work for the OS partition. Note: if you are using the hard drive in the computer you should move the OS image off the second partition before you image it, leaving it on the partition then creating an image will increase the size of the image by the amount of space the OS image occupies, say it is 1.3 gig, then the image you are creating will be the data on the partition plus the OS image of 1.3 gig. Now you have your images what next? Well you need to store them in a safe place. Look at the size of the images, will they fit on CD's? or maybe a DVD? If you used a external hard drive is it reliable? Do you carry it with you when you travel? Hard drives are extremely reliable but they are vulnerable to shock, electro magnetic discharge, and voltage spikes. They will fail. Put the images on a CD or DVD as soon as possible. Tutorials for creating and restoring a ghost image:Creating a Symantec Ghost image Restoring a Symantec Ghost image Remember: Your backup is only as good as the last backup! Backup regularly!
More help for you!
Return to previous page This website is not intended for children under the age of 18 Home Support About owner Site Map Why I use SBI Privacy Policy Return to top
|
Hard Drives, Internal or External, All available at Newegg.com |
||||||
|
Lower your cost of Ownership
|
|||||||
|
|
|||||||
