Ghosting

[jcift]

Hey everybody:
If someone could assist me, I would like to know a little bit more about the ghosting process. (just a general overview)

[Bana]

Ghosting is basically copying an exact copy from one hard drive to another in one step, you can use a program such as Norton Ghost to do this. It's basically makes an image file of the drive and transfers it that way you don't loose anything.

[jcift]

Originally posted by Bana:
Ghosting is basically copying an exact copy from one hard drive to another in one step, you can use a program such as Norton Ghost to do this. It's basically makes an image file of the drive and transfers it that way you don't loose anything.

Thanks a ton!! I have never had to do it before. Done lots of other things, but not that. My biggest things with this was if I actually needed to have the software to do it, or if you could get a blank CD and configure it yourself. Again, thanks and good luck in all your endevours....
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[Hafizullah]

There are problems with ghosting, however. There is between a five and fifteen percent failure rate on ghosted operating system installations. For one thing, all versions of Windows 9.x and NT (incl. Windows 2000, which is really NT5) modify the boot record. Even if the ghosting software duplicates this, there are still, sometimes very subtle, differences in hardware --- even between production runs of the same model and manufacturer --- that are sensed by the Windows installer and written to the installation.

Ghosting application installations is also a crapshoot. The biggest problem here is that not all the relevant Registry keys may be recorded and written to the target system.

Microsoft does not support ghosted installations. This is not because of licensing/pirating issues, but just because they are unreliable and troubleshooting problems with them is time-consuming or impossible. There are probably some of you out there who believe you have succeeded in ghosting something, and perhaps you have. There are also plenty of perfectly competent hackers who have all sorts of problems with ghosted installations and believe it's because of buggy software.

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[bootay]

This is absolutely not true. Microsoft fully supports cloning of OS installations (Ghosting - named after the first popular utility that did this, Ghost). MSFT has a tool, SYSPREP, that is specifically made to prepare the OS (NT or Win2k) to be cloned.

Cloning works EXTREMELY well, as evidenced by the fact that most major computer manufacturers and large companies deploy their machines in this way (either by hardware cloning of disks, or software such as Ghost or Drive Image Pro).

Use the tool for the right purpose (mass cloning of an OS image for similar hardware, or copying one HD to a replacement HD for the same system), and you're in business. Try to image a Win9x machine on an old 486 to a new AMD, SCSI-based system with a new network and video card, and you've got issues.

Applications are generally not a problem at all, as the cloning tools take a bit-level image of the disks - they, generally, could care less what is on the disk (Linux, NT, Win9x, DOS), they just clone the drive. Therefore, the registry issue is completely not an issue.

Good luck, and good cloning!

[scada]

Bootay is correct except for one detail.

When Ghosting a NT system you will need to get a second program to change the SID of the computer.( This "SID changer" is freeware) If you are not connecting your NT workstations to a server, then a "SID changer" is not needed. However if you do need to connect to a server. You must change the SID for ever computer that you ghost.


Hope this helps http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif

[jcift]

Thanks!! You all have been a big help! I will save all of this information for my future reference. Good luck to you all in whatever you do. http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/wink.gif