I use to use Drive Image 4 from Powerquest. It ran in DOS from boot disks, was very easy to use and 100% reliable.
I've used that version for years with the same results. However it doesn't image NTFS formatted drives. So when I got my new laptop, I also bought a copy of Norton Ghost 10.0.
I HATE IT!
First of all it makes every attempt to be as intrusive as possible. It loads in the system tray, and wants to stay there. (I just want to make an image every week or so, not have it running in the backround all the time.) It wants to phone home every time I open the program, even though I've already activated it. (I can see this in Zone Alarm.) And to top everything off, some of the recovery points that I made and can see in Windows Explorer on the backup drive are not visible to the Ghost program, so there's no way to restore them. Dealing with this beast has been very time consuming and frustrating.
There, I feel better after that little Norton Ghost rant.
OTH, I downloaded a free backup image program called DriveImage XML. runtime.org It has a simple, slick interface I like, with none of the intrusiveness of Norton Ghost. You can even browse an image file, and open a file from within it in the native program the file was created in. Great for deciding which file is which.
Here's some drawbacks (or features depending on your point of view) No incremental imaging. No boot cd for those times when your system is completely hosed. But if you create a Bart's PE cd, they provide a plug-in for it. I've tried it, works great. It wouldn't start creating an image of a FAT32 partition. But it is working well on NTFS. I'm guessing it would have no problem making one of FAT32 if you use the Bart's PE cd instead of creating the image in windows.
I realize this is more information than anyone probably wanted, but there it is.
Esteban |
