Can Ghost or Acronis True Image do this?

[scustalow]

I want to make a image of my hard drive to clone to a new system..can I make a image of the backup that my pc has that is to be used when there is a need to restore the pc to factory out of the box setting?

[JSB1]

You can do that only if the hardware is the same. (read issues below)

Corporations do it all the time... we get 400 new Dell Optiplex xyz's and the PC tech guys load up the OS and main apps to one PC... run Ghost to create an image... burn image to the other 399 pc's... load apps per user as needed.

I am not sure if some programs, like maybe XP, might look at a hardware ID... I am sure corps have a way arround this.

So the short answer is I think this will fail for your application.

JSB

[Seeker47]

You can do that only if the hardware is the same. (read issues below)

Corporations do it all the time... we get 400 new Dell Optiplex xyz's and the PC tech guys load up the OS and main apps to one PC... run Ghost to create an image... burn image to the other 399 pc's... load apps per user as needed.

I am not sure if some programs, like maybe XP, might look at a hardware ID... I am sure corps have a way arround this.

I believe you are right, on both counts.

So the short answer is I think this will fail for your application.

How do you xfer an elaborate, existing Win boot partition intact (as opposed to laboriously rebuilding everything from the ground up, in a clean install) to other hardware or different partition, or larger drive ? Wishing to retain the installed app.s, desktop, and Preferences, too. That is the $64K question. I've heard very mixed reports about AlohaBob PC Relocator, and a couple of its competitors. Acronis has another program that has "Migrate" as part of its name, and maybe in consumer level and Pro versions (?). Some 1st-hand reports of what works and what doesn't would be very welcome. So, if any of you reading this are corporate IT dept. types, please clue us in !

[ozymango]

Well, sometimes you can create an image (using Ghost or True Image, any imaging software actually) that will "port" across different computers (slightly different hardware), but it's kind of hit and miss. And of course it'll miss on the PC you need it on right now.

The trick is, use Sysprep (comes from Microsoft, it's on your XP Pro disc in a folder but I'd download the latest version from MS), and run the command "sysprep.exe -bmsd" -- this does a little trick that "builds mass storage devices" and it'll do an advanced version of plug and play when the image is run on a new computer.

As long as the HAL layer is the same -- and that's where the hit and miss part comes in -- this can work across different manufacturers and different computers, we've got an image built on a Dell P4 1.8 that has worked on at least a half dozen other makes and models of computer, though sometimes you have to add a bunch of drivers after-the-fact to get everything to behave properly. But the programs will all work, and it's a lot quicker than building it from scratch.

We work with a lot of computers so it's worth it to us to try this on various PCs before doing a scratch build; worst case scenario, the new computer won't boot and you have to start from scratch, which is where we were in the first place.

If this sounds at all interesting, doing a google search on "sysprep bmsd" and you'll get some very helpful pages on the process. It can look intimidating but it's not too bad, though it may not be worth it (timewise) unless you're doing a bunch of machines. But it's fun to try!

[tonyp12]

As we mostly all have Nero, you could look in to that.

http://ww2.nero.com/nero7/eng/Nero_BackItUp_2.html