norton ghost or system restore?

[mcgirk]

i just recieved my new pc parts. before i install everything i was wondering what would be the best method for backing up my data once everything is installed. i have norton ghost 2002 and am also using winxp pro. my new hard drive is an 80GB drive. i was thinking of using winxp setup to create a 10 or 20 GB partition where i could then use for my ghost image and various files i want to back up. or should i use the whole drive as a single partition and use xp's system restore like the one described in the relax to righteous guide?

i have used ghost in the past using cd-r for backups. i found this to use too many discs. i also normally disable system restore to save drive space.

my system will be as follows:

P4 2.4B
MSI GNB MAX
Muskin Hi per Level 2 512MB ddr
WD 80GB (8MB)
ATI Radeon 9100 128MB
Plextor 24/10/40


which is the fastest and most reliable way of backing up my data?



: peace2:

[rugbydude]

Well i wanting to be safe made three partitions. First is the boot. then i have a backup.and finally a restore disk incase everything dies:cheers: The choice however is up to you:thumb:

[Firewalker]

If you are spending the money for a system like that, why don't you just buy another hard drive and use ghost to image your drive? I can get a 1.6 gig image on one CD with compression. I use ghost for everything... I have it on my server... I can image anything on the fly... the windows XP sysrestore is trash... it can restore to s period of time, but if your op system is hosed, then that restore program won't do jack for you... I've seen it done time and time again.... I would not partition your main drive... A 20 gig drive on ebay is like 10 to 20 dollars... you can even get a 60 gig ATA/100 for a little ove 30 dollars.... (ebay)... why not use that... Also, whatever you download from the net, put into your my documents, when its about 600 megs, burn it to CD, dump it, and start over... label your cd and when you need to access those files, put the cd in the drive and go....

How have you been using Ghost in the past? Do you have it make a boot disk for you? If not, have it make a boot disk for you and ghost an image to your second hard drive... so if the main drive crashes, you can still restore it like it was brand new...
:snip:

[mcgirk]

why do you recommend not partitioning the hard drive Firewalker?
i probably won't be getting an additional hard drive for some time and will have to use just one for the time being.
my knowledge of norton ghost is very limited. i have made a few images before and used a floppy to boot into ghost. are there any tutorials out there that would be a useful guide?
Rugbydude, i'm assuming you are using a single drive? a boot drive, a backup drive, what is the other partition used for?

thanks for the replies!

:cheers:

[rugbydude]

Yep yep its all one drive as it shows in my sig. The first partition is Boot which has Windows on it and then a backup which has copies of my most important files and drivers and finally a restore which has vital files for getting my computer running at its very basic(mainly contains drivers and some windows compononts). I did this useing the windows Xp install disk. Hope this helps you.:thumb:

[mcgirk]

Yep yep its all one drive as it shows in my sig. The first partition is Boot which has Windows on it and then a backup which has copies of my most important files and drivers and finally a restore which has vital files for getting my computer running at its very basic(mainly contains drivers and some windows compononts). I did this useing the windows Xp install disk. Hope this helps you.:thumb:

my vid card has finally arrived. i will be putting my system together today.
i will use win xp's format and partition features to set up my ststem as well. if i decide on "x" amount of partitions and later reformat using "y" amount of partitions. can i use the same win xp unattended floppy i have?

: peace2:

[Firewalker]

Just remember this...if your hard drive gets bad sectors and dies, your F@ked.... that is why I say don't use partitions... I've seen it done so many times... plus it uses more resources.

[mcgirk]

firewalker, do you use multiple drives instead of partitions? or do you just back up onto cdr?

[Firewalker]

Well, I am a little different... if you see my sig, you would understand why... I currently have 5 servers running at my home... and one is my backup server which is backed up every night by a tape... basically, once I loaded my pc, I used ghost and made an image and uploaded that image to the file server... I then update that image after every install... takes me about 20 minutes... now in the past when I had only 1 pc, I had 2 hard drivers... I would backup one to the other... reason why is because I've had my main drive die while partitioned and the next thing you know... you have lost everything!!! also it makes it a hell of a lot easier when you need to reimage your computer... when you have your drive partitioned, and you put the windows disk back in and you want to format and reinstall everything, its better to have all your stuff on a different drive where you know there is no chance of its partition being corrupted or messed up after a format of the main drive...

its just food for thought... I know if you can't afford the second drive, then what are your choices but to partition your drive...



good luck...

[mcgirk]

ok thanks firewalker. in the future i'll look into getting a backup drive.