How to make an image with Symantec Ghost software

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Ghost imaging software will save you hours of work!

On a previous page I told you why you need to make an image of your hard drive. Here I will show you how to do the deed!

Before you start you will need a couple of things:
1) A bootable device
2) A place to store your image, it should be 10 gig or larger
3) The software, Symantec Ghost.

Preliminarily information:
Note: If you build a DOS boot device or if you use a windows boot device such as ERD or Bart's PE. You have two choices when you use Ghost. One is called a DOS command line program - Ghost.exe (16 bit program) and the other is a Windows program called Ghost32.exe (32 bit program). The advantage of ERD or Bart's PE is that they are 32 bit Preinstalled Environment bootable live windows CD or DVD, you will have a Windows type interface.

Once you have your tools, start the system with the bootable device. Then start the program, when it is running the interface is the same, the difference comes with the options. Ghost being a 16 bit DOS program has to conform to DOS constraints. That being the naming convention: 8.3 which means the name can only be eight characters and the extension can only be three characters. Where as Ghost32 is a 32 bit program and the naming convention is the same as any Windows name, 256 characters and any extension you want. I do stress that if you do not use .GHO for the extension the program will not restore the image when you need to use it!

My version of Symantec Ghost software is about four revision old so the interface will look a little different but the functions are the same.

Start splash screen, this is Ghost32, behind the splash screen is the DOS command line box, If you close the DOS box it will close out the program, leave it open. Click Ok.
The next screen is the main menu screen. I have opened the menu down to create an image of a partition.
Once you select your image type the program will open up to your hard drives. Be sure to select the correct drive. If you don't know which drive or are unsure use the Storage manager to get the properties of the drive you want to image. Select your dirve
Now you will see all the partitions on the drive, select your partition you are making the image of, here I have selected the C: drive
Select your storage drive and then name your image. If you are going to make an image of more than one partition name them by the drive letter. I try to use the date of the image, once you have more than two images it is hard to keep track of the latest one.
Next you need to select how you want the image created, I use High compression because of space constraints, you may have very large storage space and want to create the image in the least amount of time, select Fast. No will not compress the image at all.
Select yes, the image process will start. The completion time will depended on a couple of things: The size of the data on the partition, the fragmentation of the partition, and the device you are using to store the image.

Creating the image, the top bar is an estimate of completion. The menu will show you amount of data copied and the time elapsed
Almost completed
Finished
Continue or Restart

When you complete your image you would do well to check the image by verifying the image. To do this from the menu go to local / check / Image file. This will insure that when you go to restore the image it will restore for you.

Select check / image, Menu to check your image.

Select the drive where the image is stored, Go to the drive the image is stored on.

Select the image. When you click on the file it will go to the next screen.

Confirm you want to check the image. This is a non-destructive check of the data and file structure. Confirming that you want to check the file.

Progress while the check is under way. Progress indicator.

Check complete. If there was a problem with the image an error would be displayed and text file written to the A: drive (you can change the path) Read the text file it will tell you why the image is bad. Fix the problem and create a new image. Good image!

Now store the image in a safe place, I suggest you put a copy on a cd if small enough if t is to big a DVD.

To restore your image the tutorial is here: Image Restore.

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