Drive imaging or backup

T

thekiefs

Limp Gawd
Joined
Jun 16, 2005
Messages
480
So I am pretty much setup my main harddrive (system). I created a 70gb partition soley for backup, is there a program that will make an image of the drive and be able to restore it in an extreme emergency situation where the drive fails or whatnot?

I know the ultimate backup solution is RAID0 but I didn't do that. Any programs you guys use to backup your main drive?
 
RAID 0 is the opposite of what you want, your thinking of RAID 1. 1 mirrors data on 2 or more drives, 0 stripes it and if you loose 1 drive you loose everything.
 
If you want to restore the entire drive, you would have to store the image on another physical drive or storage device. Any attempt to restore a volume from an image on the same volume would be like a snake swallowing its own tail.

However, you can restore a partition from an image stored on another separate partition on the same drive. Many people create a dedicated partition for Windows, and image that partion to another separate partition for quick recovery in case Windows get clobbered.

I like Terabyte 'Image for Windows', which also includes 'Image for DOS'.

Hope this helps!
 
As a precaution, make sure the software you use supports imaging to a drive that isn't the same size as the source drive. I've encountered multiple instances where the image was put on a drive that was much larger than the source drive, and it wouldn't go back. It's a configuration thing, and easily avoided, but I just wanted to give a heads up as the problem can arise for the unwary.
 
LOL, I totally described that like a nub. Let me rephrase....

I have a 74 rapter that I use soley for Windows games and apps. Another 320 drive is split into a couple partitions, one partition containing backup. (my bad, I meant RAID1, and that wasn't an option because I don't have identical drives).

I would like to store the entire drive, so lets say the Raptor fails.... *shudder*... I just pop in a new one (theoretically). At this point, would I have to reinstall windows, or pop in a backup CD, locate the backup image, and restore, voila! exact same state as before?

Image for Windows, does this do that?

Thanks :)

I really hate all those articles I read about how backing up is such a necessity. :eek:
 
I run Ghost from a CD similar to the free BartPE disc, that let's me ghost my Raptor drive to a file on my larger storage drive. It also let's me ghost to an image file to an external USB drive as well.
 
Thanks, I think I'm going to look at Acronis, since I heard some bad things about Norton Ghost.

Thanks again!
 
whiteboy said:
Thanks, I think I'm going to look at Acronis, since I heard some bad things about Norton Ghost.

Thanks again!
Click to expand...

I could give you some very bad experiences with Acronis, so don't go by word of mouth.
 
I agree wholeheartidly, but innumerable problems that I kept seeing other people were having was a little bit of a retractor from getting Ghost, as well as other experiences from Symantec products I have had. If something does goes wrong however, you can trust Ghost is next in line for me.
 
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