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+ | ====== Symantec Ghost ====== | ||
+ | {{ : | ||
+ | Symantec Ghost is a drive cloning application currently maintained by Symantec. Ghost is an acronym for **G**eneral **H**ardware-**O**riented **S**ystem **T**ransfer. I am not a big fan of Windows-based versions of Ghost, as it defeats the overall goal of the program. | ||
+ | Ghost makes a bit-by-bit copy of an entire drive (or partition) and saves it to a file. This file can be transferred to a different computer, or kept on the same computer. Ghost images (.GHO or .GHS extension) are generally large in size. If not compressed they are approximately the size of the files on the disk. For instance, if you have a 200GB drive with 22GB used, your disk image will be roughly 22GB. You can restore images, thereby making a duplicate of the original partition. | ||
+ | |||
+ | Ghost 8.2 (shown right) is a very popular version of Ghost used in corporate environments. It is a DOS executable. View [[howto: | ||
+ | |||
+ | Ghost is used to solve two main problems. How do I backup my own drives in case of a virus or dataloss? How do I quickly installed the same OS on multiple machines with similar hardware? | ||
+ | |||
+ | ====== Ghost for Backup ====== | ||
+ | |||
+ | How do I backup my own drives in case of a virus or dataloss? | ||
+ | |||
+ | Most consumers use ghost for simple backup purposes. Lets build an example... You have just built a brand new computer, you've got a Windows Installation Disk, and you'd like to backup your OS. How do you proceed? Generally if you plan on creating new images and restoring images on a regular basis, you want to create a new partition for Image storage. | ||
+ | |||
+ | Imagine the following Partition Table: | ||
+ | ^ Drive Name ^ Used ^ Total ^ | ||
+ | | System (C:) | 22.3GB | 50GB | | ||
+ | | Games/ | ||
+ | | Ghost Images (E:) | 0GB | 200GB | | ||
+ | |||
+ | After you install your Operating System, configure it EXACTLY how you want it. Install all your games and any program that update often to " | ||
+ | |||
+ | Start your computer, boot it using your flash drive (or other method for running Ghost), start Ghost and create an image of your C: Drive, saving it to your E: Drive. | ||
+ | |||
+ | Now, anything that was on your C: Drive is not contained in the .GHO file saved to your E: Drive. In the future, if something happens to your system which makes it unusable (or undesirable) you can simply boot Ghost, open your Ghost Image, and restore it to your C: Drive. Any data that is on the C: Drive will be overwritten with the data that was on the drive at the time of Image creation. | ||
+ | |||
+ | Consider this situation: On Monday you create an image. On Tuesday you write a term paper and save it on your Desktop. On Wednesday your machine crashes and starts getting BSoD Errors. Wednesday night you decide to restore your Ghost Image from Monday. Your C: Drive is erased, and data from Monday is copied to C:. Your term paper is now lost, unless you've backed it up. | ||
+ | |||
+ | On the other hand, it can be used to restore deleted files. Consider this situation: On Monday you write a term paper and save it to My Documents. On Tuesday you create an image. | ||
+ | |||
+ | ====== Ghost for Multiple Systems ====== | ||
+ | |||
+ | How do I quickly installed the same OS on multiple machines with similar hardware? | ||
+ | |||
+ | This problem is most prominent in a corporate or large organization' | ||
+ | |||
+ | Once they arrive you have your staff set all the machines up at their stations in the new building. You keep one computer in your IT Department and set it up exactly how you want it. You update everything, install the appropriate learning software, limit what users can run and view, etc. You create an image of the entire drive and save it a secondary physical drive in the same computer. From here you have two choices, GhostCast, or manually distributing the image. | ||
+ | |||
+ | ===== Manual Image Distribution ===== | ||
+ | |||
+ | This is perhaps the most tedious of the choices, but is also the most reliable. You can plug the physical hard drive that contains the Ghost image into the machine and run Ghost manually on all 30-40 computers. Another option is to use a USB External Hard Drive, configure it to be bootable from USB (somewhat advanced and requires some hacks), copy the image to this external, and go from computer to computer and restore the disk image on each. Other options include installing Ghost and the Image (if it is small enough) on a DVD or series of DVDs and running the DVDs on each machine. Remember that you can neither save nor restore an image on the same partition which its data or image resides. IE backup C: to an Image on C:, or Restore an Image on C: to C:. | ||
+ | |||
+ | ===== GhostCast ===== | ||
+ | {{ : | ||
+ | This is by far the quickest and most preferred method if Image Distribution, | ||
+ | |||
+ | Network traffic can be a HUGE concern. Lets say you have 30 clients, all trying to receive a small 20GB Image. You're looking at transferring 600GB. ALL this data must be sent from the server, which means you are limited but the server' | ||
+ | |||
+ | You may want to considering running separate GhostCast sessions to reduce network load and speed up your deployment. Running two 15-client sessions after each other is going to be faster than running 30 clients all at the same time. |