Making a re-install image

[Darth Bubba]

Is there a software that would allow me to make a burnable, bootable image of my basic XP setup? After losing my most recent XP setup (and living through XP reinstallation, reactivation, and software reloading /-/3LL!), I began to wonder about automating the process. Although I know about Norton Ghost, I was wondering if anyone knows of a software that would create a bootable .ISO image that I could burn to a DVD, which would contain FDISK, Format, etc, and then a small program to write the stored image (or container file) back to the HD with little intervention beyond merely booting it.

Surely, this is do-able by one of you clever souls out there...

Darth Bubba

[Ferrit]

Symantec Ghost 10 should do
all of that except the fdisk format files.
I am not sure why you need those as Ghost will image to a raw drive.
And allow resizeing

[Platypus]

I use Acronis TrueImage in the same fashion, although I don't know if there's any way to script an automatic re-install. There's not much to doing it though, just burn a bootable recovery disk with the option in Acronis, image the drive or partition in its desired condition - the image can be stored on the bootable disk itself or on another including another hard drive or partition. If you need a recovery, just boot from the recovery disk and indicate which image to restore.

[Darth Bubba]

Thank you for your replies, Ferrit and Platy.

What I was hoping for is something along the lines of the Preconfigured Environment tools I've been seeing lately (made with Bart's PE, WinPE, and so forth), that would use Mkisofs.exe to build a self-booting .ISO image containing some repair files that could be burned to a DVD for future rescues. The whole affair would be free (for home use in the case of BartPE, I think), and would save some steps in the recovery process.

Anyway, it's a thought - and a challenge to anyone out there looking to make a lot of friends :-)

[Low_Level_Owl]

Well I have a setup I use for my home PC.

I created an image of Windows with all the apps I wanted using Ghost. I then save the Ghost Image to my little file server. Once that's done I create a BartPE DVD with the Image included and create an "Autorun" batch file to load Ghost and reimage the PC. All this is done without intervention other then pressing a key at "Press any key to boot from CD"

I don't know of any free software that would create an image of a harddrive like ghost does. Does mkisofs.exe have that capability?

[IT Len]

I started the same search for an "easier way" in exactly the same circumstances. I rebuilt the entire system from case up in two hours, and then the dang OS/Sftwe reload, settings, tweaks and updates took two days!

After trying a number of different ways to make the process easier, a bunch of backup software, ghost, imaging tools, I found one that is perfect for me.

Not free, 40 bucks. Casper XP . I had a spare HDD, same size and manufacturer as my root drive, although it's not necessary that they should be the same. Copied all the contents of the root drive to this HDD, removed it from the system. It's really a couple of clicks. Your copy is then a bootable HDD with all your programs installed. Works with external drives, too, and will copy to HDD's of different sizes if you have any laying around. Will do backups, too.

Granted, you have to have a spare or external drive, and it's not free, but it couldn't be easier!

Took out the current drive, inserted the copied drive and tested it right after I did the copy, and the PC boots right up with all my originally configured software ready to go.

The spare sits on a shelf waiting for the next time I need a reload, in pristine condition...and I know it'll work. All I need is to keep backing up documents.

I have no vested interest in this company or program, but I've tried it and it does what I need and what they say it'll do. It'll be worth ten times more than I paid for it in my time if/when I have to do another system rebuild and recovery. Last note: When I placed the copied drive in the PC, I had also installed a USB/FW PCI card that I'd forgotten about...and the standard "new hardware" dialogue came up with the copied drive...just as you would expect in a normal system.

[Darth Bubba]

Well I have a setup I use for my home PC.

I created an image of Windows with all the apps I wanted using Ghost. I then save the Ghost Image to my little file server. Once that's done I create a BartPE DVD with the Image included and create an "Autorun" batch file to load Ghost and reimage the PC. All this is done without intervention other then pressing a key at "Press any key to boot from CD"

Could you share the details of this process, especially the AUTORUN file?

I don't know of any free software that would create an image of a harddrive like ghost does. Does mkisofs.exe have that capability?

AFAIK, mkisofs.exe only assembles a bunch of files into an .ISO image. I believe you can include instructions to cause it to create a bootable .ISO image as well.

In any case, what you outlined above would be great for my purposes!

Thanks!

[Darth Bubba]

I started the same search for an "easier way" in exactly the same circumstances. I rebuilt the entire system from case up in two hours, and then the dang OS/Sftwe reload, settings, tweaks and updates took two days!

That's about what got me started, except without the hardware construction part. What really irritated me was the reactivation of WinXP, MS Office, and all that other stuff just because of a power glitch at just the wrong moment...

After trying a number of different ways to make the process easier, a bunch of backup software, ghost, imaging tools, I found one that is perfect for me.

I tried the Acronis software - it was a free trial - but it didn't work all that well when I got to the restore part.

Not free, 40 bucks. Casper XP . I had a spare HDD, same size and manufacturer as my root drive, although it's not necessary that they should be the same. Copied all the contents of the root drive to this HDD, removed it from the system. It's really a couple of clicks. Your copy is then a bootable HDD with all your programs installed. Works with external drives, too, and will copy to HDD's of different sizes if you have any laying around. Will do backups, too.

If they have a free trial version I may give it a look.

Thanks for the reply!

[dell211]

I was experiencing the same problems, re-installations, activations, got old. I tried a couple of programs including Ghost but bought Paragon Drive Backup 8.0. I can now make a complete backup either onto DVDs or hard drives. I have several versions of XP now, bare basics and loaded. I have also backed up two other networked computers at home. I save the backups on an external drive, so now if needed, I can pop in the recovery CD and restore the system when needed.

I know lots of people love Ghost, but I like Paragon. Paragon also allows you to burn ISO backups to DVDs.