Hi,

I used to use Ghost (DOS floppy, up until 2003) back in the day to do full backup images (full drives and/or partitions, Windows, Linux, etc) to an external USB HDD.

Basically, I'm looking to do same thing:
- Don't have to install anything. (Except, maybe to just make bootable CD/DVD, then can uninstall "main" program.)
- Able to boot the backup program from a CD/DVD, external of any OS.
- Make manual backup images of drives and/or partitions to an external USB HDD.
- Able to backup Win7/Vista/XP and Linux ext2/3 partitions.
- Able to backup any "unknown" partition in RAW (sector) mode such as FreeBSD.
- I have no need for any "incremental" or "scheduled" backups or any other automated gee-wiz stuff.

Just wondering what the best animal is these days. Too much confusion out there. Things used to be simple. From reviews of current Norton Ghost, wouldn't let it (or anything Symantec) anywhere near my computers. LOL.

So far, looking at:

- Acronis True Image
- Macrium Reflect
- FarStone DriveClone Express

FarStone DriveClone Express looks promising, but lack of large user base is worrisome. Anyone using this animal?

Don't care if it cost $ or is free as long as it is easy to use and reliable.

Thanks!

i would say acronis true image for workstations.

another option could be r-drive image http://www.drive-image.com/

I still use ghost. I've just made it into a boot cd instead of a floppy tho. If you have an old 32mb flash drive that works a treat too for booting.

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SETI@home classic workunits: 93,865 CPU time: 863,447 hours
Join the [url=http://tinyurl.com/8y46zvu]BP6/VP6 User Group[

I use Keriver Image.

Good program & easy to use IMO.




Kurt

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right click, copy, paste to another hd. my documents...(33 Gb)49,000 files.... but that just me with 2 external hd's and a secondary internal HD.

reminder, system restore via windows doesn't keep/backup any documents, only system files.

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I recommend Secunia PSI: http://secunia.com/vulnerability_scanning/personal/
Go Georgia Tech.

reminder, system restore via windows doesn't keep/backup any documents, only system files.

... and system restore doesn't work - It is the most unreliable way of restoring your system when things go wrong, because it doesn't actually restore everything to the way it was. It is a useless piece of ****.

Acronis True Image Workstation - I wouldn't use anything else.

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1.Q9650@4.05GHz,Rampage Formula,4Gb OCZ Blade,2x 9800GTX+
2.Q9650@4.05GHz,P5Q Deluxe,4Gb Kingston HyperX,9800GTX+
3.Q6600@3.2GHz,P5E-VM SE,4Gb Kingston HyperX,GTS 250

Just wondering what the best animal is these days.

Best animal might be a different approach. Running something like VMWare Server makes it braindead simple to cleanly sandbox & backup all your complete OS images (once you've rebuilt them under VM). Lets you easily flip between Win32, 64, Linux, etc, etc, or have them running concurrent. Lose a box, no problem, bring up VMWare someplace else and restart. Allows you to easily clone & experiment.

Cons:
-- It takes some getting used to if you've been running dedicated local machines your whole life
-- Overhead thefts cycles, but not as bad as you might think. Still, if your goal is to squeeze every possible credit out of the box, don't go VM.
-- Running multiple OS's on same box really eats RAM
-- I've no idea if VMWare does the right thing with CUDA, or multiple images fighting for CUDA device access.
-- You still need a backup for the primary OS, but the only thing it has are a few hardware drivers and a copy of VMWare Server.

Also, for me at least, no real value in backing up S@H programdata stuff ... it's simply too dynamic (and disruptive to restore). I'd put that stuff on a big thumbdrive.

Not that you'll switch gears on this post alone, but perhaps some fuel for future thinking.

I use Active@Disk Image, it runs under Windows but can make a raw disk image of any disk reguardless of what's on it. You can also back up to almost any kind of media. The copy I purchased is good for three licenses, which is economical. I have it do scheduled backups every night of three systems to a NAS, it's pretty fast, too, which I like.

-Dave

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