Norton Ghost question
 

Hi all, probably a quick short answer to this but i would be interested to know if anyone's done it, if it can be done.

OK, I have a ghost image of my hdd from my fresh install, XP Pro, after all the recent ( at the time ) updates, all my software etc etc. Is it possible to load another version of windows, make a ghost image, and switch between the 2 versions ( or more if I wanted to ) using ghost to load the chosen image.

I'm assuming that it is, but will ghost V9 run on the hdd and reload a different version from another drive ??

Thanks for any input, the reason behind this is purely experimental, I want to try other 'flavours' but be able to come back if I don't like it.

Re: Norton Ghost question
 

Ghost will recover to the os disk in dos. Ghost 8 used pc dos and you have a gui and an explorer tree that allows you to browse all dos compatable drives for images.
Ghost 10 uses its own live cd to recover outside of windows, Ghost 9 I never used but the answer will be the same yes you can :)

Edit you will need to ensure any drive you intend to use for images is visable pre windows most machines are able to see sata drives for example nowadays where as previously sata needed a driver pre windows and you would have needed to install this driver for ghost to work ghost 8 wasnt able to do this but ghost 10 allows you to so again ghost 9 I dont know :)

Re: Norton Ghost question
 

Hi ya mate, that sounds promising, I'll create some additional space and play a bit :D

Thanks :tu: knew it would be a short answer, from the right person of course :tu:

Re: Norton Ghost question
 

Why not do what I do and have your boot HD in a caddy and then you can swap drives at will when you want to try a new OS? I have XP on my main drive and a second drive caddy which I have a 40Gb test drive in that I play with Ubuntu, vista, linux etc.

Re: Norton Ghost question
 

When ive dual booted normally with drives installed to play ie linux or vista ,(other windows based installs are simply removable from the boot ini) The base of is always XP. Both linux and vista have there own boot programs which can be cleared by the fixmbr command in operating system recovery(normal might screw you up if yoru not careful warnings) The safest way is with the caddy but good alu ones are expensive :)

Of course just having a recent ghost image of primary hdd as long as this is system will also wipe all other boot sector configurations

Re: Norton Ghost question
 

OK, education time :dunce:

Isn't that what I'm doing in effect, but instead of having my OS in a caddy, I'll have it as a ghost image, sure it means having to load it each time but Ghost's quick enough, and with my fumblings, its probably safer to not go into the guts to often ???? :D

Re: Norton Ghost question
 

Pretty much it is will you be just playing with other operating systems or do you want to keep them?

Re: Norton Ghost question
 

I have no idea really mate, untill I install, play and play a bit more, I had thought of trying Linux, vista etc etc, early days for those, the one I'm wanting to install just now is XPBLACKUSA, meant to have a few goodies in it.

Re: Norton Ghost question
 

you gonna dual boot while you do it ? so xp still exists?

Dont spose you got an nfo for that do ya ;)

Re: Norton Ghost question
 

Wasn't planning that far mate, could I suppose :shrug:

And on its way :tu:

EDIT: sent via pm ;) not a true NFO but you'll see :tu:

Re: Norton Ghost question
 

How do you create a ghost image nowadays? I want to create an image i can stick on a DVD and then restore it for the DVD should i need to. Long time since i've used Ghost but 6 or 7 years ago you could do this. With Ghost 10 it appears you cant or am i missing something

Re: Norton Ghost question
 

I'm using ghost 9 IIRC, IIRC when you cranck it up and go through the steps it asks you where you want to back up to, the file / dvd option is available there.

HTH

Re: Norton Ghost question
 

have you downloaded the iso file - tbh, imo Ghost 3 was the ''last known good' ;)

Re: Norton Ghost question
 

yes

Re: Norton Ghost question
 

having said that, I have my back ups on a separate HDD, when I feell like a format / re-install, I just crank up Ghost and point to the file. If you where to back up to a second HDD and your primary went down you would need to run the Ghost recovery disk IIRC