Ghost 12 and a Backup Scheme

Archive
1

Apologies in advance for the length, but I want to be very clear in my confusions :).

 

In the past, I have had many problems with hard drive failures and Windows OS crashes, and numerous times have had to endure the odious, tedious tasks of re-installing the OS (Windows XP, SP3) and all application programs.  I do not wish to ever do those tasks again from scratch, and I bought Norton Ghost 12.0 (some time ago) to help towards giving me the piece of mind that I won't have to.  I'm just now getting around to using it. 

 

The hard drive setup I want to have is the following: Two drives – the source drive (which I'll refer to as Drive S, where S is not the drive letter) currently having the OS (XP, SP3) on it and from which the computer boots, and a destination drive (which I'll refer to as Drive D, where D is not the drive letter), both in the computer enclosure and both accessible (readable and writable).  Drive D will be a larger drive than Drive S and will be made to have an exact image of Drive S on it.  If any of the following two eventualities occur:  

 

  1. Drive S (drive from which computer boots and currently contains the OS (XP, SP3)) runs out of or runs low on disk space, or …

  2. there a hardware failure on Drive S, …

I want to (quickly) switch to make Drive D the drive in which the computer boots from and contains the OS.  

 

My plan is to use the copy-one-disk-to-another-hard-drive option of Norton Ghost 12.0 ("Copy drive" under "Tasks" in the User Interface, see Norton Ghost 12.0 User Guide, pp. 153, 4) to give Drive D an exact image of Drive S.  And I plan to periodically use the same option to copy Drive S to Drive D in order to keep Drive D's contents current with Drive S's.

 

In the event either case 1 or 2 above occurs, I want to be able to quickly make whatever changes are needed to have the system boot from Drive D, and then reboot with Drive D providing the OS. 

 

My BIOS is Phoenix v6.00PG.  It has a "HDD Group Boot Priority" that allows the user to set the order of the available hard drives in which attempts will be made by the system to boot.  (At least that's what I think it's for and which I think I have verified with experimentation in the past. I have several drives that show up as "active" in the Windows XP Disk Management utility, and the system boots with the drive that is labeled as "system" according to changes in the "HDD Group Boot Priority.")    

 

Please tell me if setting the options to the copy-one-disk-to-another-hard-drive task as detailed below will give me the functionality I described above.  (I have questions, especially about the "Drive letter option, which I'll discuss there):

 

Copy Disk Options and Choices:

- Check source for file system errors: Checked

- Check destination for file system errors: Checked

- Resize drive to fill unallocated space: (It is grayed out by the program.  I can't choose on way or the other.)

- Set drive active (for booting OS): Checked

- Disable Smart Sector copying: Not checked

- Ignore bad sectors during copy: Not checked

- Copy MBR: Checked.

- Drive letter: (Grayed out.  Can't specify a drive letter.)

 

Questions:

 

1. As for the "Set drive active" option, I'm assuming that since I already have more than one drive that the system sees as "active" (Disk Management XP tool says so), that there is no problem with setting this option to make Drive D active.  (It actually is already one of the drives the system sees as active, and no problems have been seen.)

 

2. Since Drive D is to be made the system drive with the OS, I assume it has to have the MBR copied from the current system drive (Drive S).  Is this correct?

 

3. As for the Drive letter option, I should explain that Drive D is already formatted and currently being used by the system.  (As stated above, the system already sees Drive D as an "active" drive.)  I have not given Drive D a Windows drive letter.  The reason for that is I figured that if since Drive D is to be a replacement for Drive S (currently the C: drive) in either of the previously mentioned events occur, it must have the same drive letter as Drive S, i.e., C:\.  This is since Drive D is to contain an exact image of Drive S whose paths would all be in terms of C:\.  And so, in the event of a hardware failure on Drive S, and Drive D replacing Drive S, it wouldn't do to have a drive whose letter is not C:\ referring to C since it might not exist.  It might work if the drive letter could be changed to C:\ during re-boot, but I fear that might be tricky and might not work.

 

So to make Drive D accessible while currently serving as Drive S's backup and allow accesses and periodic copies from Drive S to Drive D, I made Drive D accessible not by providing it with a drive letter, but mounting it in an empty NTFS folder.  My hopes are that, in the event of a hardware failure on Drive S, the procedure to get to system to quickly work again will be: 1) remove Drive S (the current C:\ drive), 2) set the HDD Group Boot Priority to have as it's first drive to boot from as Drive D (no current drive letter), 3) reboot, assuming Windows will take the drive in which is booting from as the (new) C:\ drive.  (This would seem to be what the copy-one-disk-to-another-hard-drive task is doing when it is being used only to replace the current drive with a larger one).  So questions concerning the drive letter are:

 

a) Is it correct that the replacement drive (Drive D) must have the same drive letter as the drive it is replacing (i.e, Drive S with letter C:\) in order to serve as Drive S's replacement if/when Drive S fails?

 

b) Is the three step process given in the last paragraph to make Drive D the new system boot drive correct? 

 

 

Thanks much in advance for your help. 

 

2

Apologies in advance for the length, but I want to be very clear in my confusions :).

 

In the past, I have had many problems with hard drive failures and Windows OS crashes, and numerous times have had to endure the odious, tedious tasks of re-installing the OS (Windows XP, SP3) and all application programs.  I do not wish to ever do those tasks again from scratch, and I bought Norton Ghost 12.0 (some time ago) to help towards giving me the piece of mind that I won't have to.  I'm just now getting around to using it. 

 

The hard drive setup I want to have is the following: Two drives – the source drive (which I'll refer to as Drive S, where S is not the drive letter) currently having the OS (XP, SP3) on it and from which the computer boots, and a destination drive (which I'll refer to as Drive D, where D is not the drive letter), both in the computer enclosure and both accessible (readable and writable).  Drive D will be a larger drive than Drive S and will be made to have an exact image of Drive S on it.  If any of the following two eventualities occur:  

 

  1. Drive S (drive from which computer boots and currently contains the OS (XP, SP3)) runs out of or runs low on disk space, or …

  2. there a hardware failure on Drive S, …

I want to (quickly) switch to make Drive D the drive in which the computer boots from and contains the OS.  

 

My plan is to use the copy-one-disk-to-another-hard-drive option of Norton Ghost 12.0 ("Copy drive" under "Tasks" in the User Interface, see Norton Ghost 12.0 User Guide, pp. 153, 4) to give Drive D an exact image of Drive S.  And I plan to periodically use the same option to copy Drive S to Drive D in order to keep Drive D's contents current with Drive S's.

 

In the event either case 1 or 2 above occurs, I want to be able to quickly make whatever changes are needed to have the system boot from Drive D, and then reboot with Drive D providing the OS. 

 

My BIOS is Phoenix v6.00PG.  It has a "HDD Group Boot Priority" that allows the user to set the order of the available hard drives in which attempts will be made by the system to boot.  (At least that's what I think it's for and which I think I have verified with experimentation in the past. I have several drives that show up as "active" in the Windows XP Disk Management utility, and the system boots with the drive that is labeled as "system" according to changes in the "HDD Group Boot Priority.")    

 

Please tell me if setting the options to the copy-one-disk-to-another-hard-drive task as detailed below will give me the functionality I described above.  (I have questions, especially about the "Drive letter option, which I'll discuss there):

 

Copy Disk Options and Choices:

- Check source for file system errors: Checked

- Check destination for file system errors: Checked

- Resize drive to fill unallocated space: (It is grayed out by the program.  I can't choose on way or the other.)

- Set drive active (for booting OS): Checked

- Disable Smart Sector copying: Not checked

- Ignore bad sectors during copy: Not checked

- Copy MBR: Checked.

- Drive letter: (Grayed out.  Can't specify a drive letter.)

 

Questions:

 

1. As for the "Set drive active" option, I'm assuming that since I already have more than one drive that the system sees as "active" (Disk Management XP tool says so), that there is no problem with setting this option to make Drive D active.  (It actually is already one of the drives the system sees as active, and no problems have been seen.)

 

2. Since Drive D is to be made the system drive with the OS, I assume it has to have the MBR copied from the current system drive (Drive S).  Is this correct?

 

3. As for the Drive letter option, I should explain that Drive D is already formatted and currently being used by the system.  (As stated above, the system already sees Drive D as an "active" drive.)  I have not given Drive D a Windows drive letter.  The reason for that is I figured that if since Drive D is to be a replacement for Drive S (currently the C: drive) in either of the previously mentioned events occur, it must have the same drive letter as Drive S, i.e., C:\.  This is since Drive D is to contain an exact image of Drive S whose paths would all be in terms of C:\.  And so, in the event of a hardware failure on Drive S, and Drive D replacing Drive S, it wouldn't do to have a drive whose letter is not C:\ referring to C since it might not exist.  It might work if the drive letter could be changed to C:\ during re-boot, but I fear that might be tricky and might not work.

 

So to make Drive D accessible while currently serving as Drive S's backup and allow accesses and periodic copies from Drive S to Drive D, I made Drive D accessible not by providing it with a drive letter, but mounting it in an empty NTFS folder.  My hopes are that, in the event of a hardware failure on Drive S, the procedure to get to system to quickly work again will be: 1) remove Drive S (the current C:\ drive), 2) set the HDD Group Boot Priority to have as it's first drive to boot from as Drive D (no current drive letter), 3) reboot, assuming Windows will take the drive in which is booting from as the (new) C:\ drive.  (This would seem to be what the copy-one-disk-to-another-hard-drive task is doing when it is being used only to replace the current drive with a larger one).  So questions concerning the drive letter are:

 

a) Is it correct that the replacement drive (Drive D) must have the same drive letter as the drive it is replacing (i.e, Drive S with letter C:\) in order to serve as Drive S's replacement if/when Drive S fails?

 

b) Is the three step process given in the last paragraph to make Drive D the new system boot drive correct? 

 

 

Thanks much in advance for your help. 

 

3

Thanks for the reply. 

 

I am not worried about XP getting itself out of sorts, and having to restore it to a previously working state.  I am worried about the boot drive drive with the OS on it having a hardware failure and becoming unusable.  Do "image/restore" techniques address the scenario where there is no working OS, or avoiding having to re-install the OS, re-installing all updates to the OS, and re-installing all application programs.  That's what I want to avoid. 

4

 

pulgar wrote:

 

   Do "image/restore" techniques address the scenario where there is no working OS, or avoiding having to re-install the OS, re-installing all updates to the OS, and re-installing all application programs. 

 

 

Certainly do. As I mentioned, you can have your backup images "anywhere". If the HD fails, replace the failed HD with a new empty HD. No partitions are need. Boot from the Ghost CD and follow the restore wizard. Remove the CD and boot from the new HD. It really is that simple. 5 to 10 minute job for my OS.

 

The big advantage of creating images is you don't have to manually do it. The schedule does it. You can create two or more backup images (recovery points) daily (if you want to) and delete the oldest ones that won't fit on your storage device. So if the HD fails you only lose a few hours of data. Doing two Copy Drives daily is just impractical and you would only have one generation of backup. Sometimes you might want to extract files from an old backup because that data has been inadvertently deleted and isn't present in the most recent backup.

 

The sniper's motto is, "One shot, one kill". Our motto could be, "One OS install, never again".

5

Thanks again for the reply. 

 

After looking through the Ghost 12 User guide (I tried to attach the User guide but the posting software wouldn't take such a big file), I'm presuming the "image/restore" technique you're alluding to is covered under the "Defining a drive-based backup" section, discussed started on p. 45 (if you have it) (the word "image" is used only three times in 204 pages) and recovery of the backup to a new hard drive is discussed starting on p. 136 under the chapter section "Recovering a computer."  Does that sound like what you're referring to? 

 

I'm wary of some possible problems/irritations with this technique:

- have to install a new drive if the current drive fails (just an irritation), then

- must use Ghost CD to recover the recovery point to a new drive (never confident this software works when needed under an emergency as no shortage of message board topics will attest).  Would have to test to satisfy myself it would work.  But what else is new.  Any strategy will need to be tested.  (It's just the anxiety of not knowing whether the recover software would work as advertised that gets me the most.)

 

 

In addition to trying that technique, I'd like to also attempt to execute my strategy I detailed in the initial message to start this thread (since if the boot system fails, I wouldn't have to install a new hard drive, but rather just change the boot sequence and be on my way).  Are those questions at the end difficult to answer? 

 

Thanks again for your time and help.  And I like the motto very, very much.

 

 

6

If you use Copy Drive to copy your OS onto the second HD and then try to boot the second HD by changing the boot order, you will corrupt the drive letter assignment on the second HD. WinXP will appear to boot but it is booting with the assistance of the first HD. When you remove the first HD the second HD will not boot at all.

 

What you should do after a Copy Drive is remove the old HD from the computer and allow the new HD to boot on its own. Only then will it take the C: drive letter.

 

I've restored thousands of images and never had a single failure. It is a reliable procedure. When I mention "image" that is equivalent to Ghost's "Recovery Point". I prefer the term "image".

 

If you had a HD failure I'm not sure your second HD would boot unless you removed the failed HD. So you would have to open the case anyway. So you need to become confident at changing HDs. It can be learned in a few minutes.

 

on p. 136 under the chapter section "Recovering a computer."

 

That's the section.

 

 

Edit...... I've found my old instructions.

 

boot from the Ghost 12 CD
choose your Time Zone
click Recover My Computer
Next
in the "View by" (drop down arrow) choose Filename  
click Browse
double click Computer
navigate to the folder containing your Recovery points
select the relevant Recovery point (Baseline or incremental)
click Open
Next
Select the relevant target partition
Next
put ticks in Verify, Check for file system errors, Set drive active
Only tick Restore original disk signature and Restore MBR if restoring to a new HD (not if it is the same HD)
Next
put tick in Reboot when finished
Finish

 

 

What size HDs do you have? How are they partitioned?

7

Thanks again for the reply. 

 

After looking throught Ghost 12 User guide (included as an attachement if interested), I'm presuming the "image/restore" technique you're alluding to is covered under the "Defining a drive-based backup" section, discussed started on p. 45.  (the word "image" is used on three times in 204 pages) and recovery of the backup to a new hard drive is discussed starting on p. 136 under the chapter section "Recovering a computer."  Would that be correct? 

 

I'm wary of some possible problems/irritations with this technique:

- have to install a new drive if the current drive fails (just an irritation), then

- must use Ghost CD to recover the recovery point to a new drive (never confident this software works when needed as no shortage of message board topics will attest).  Would have to test to satisfy myself it would work.  But what else is new.  Any strategy will need to be tested.  (It's just the anxiety of not knowing whether the recover software would work as advertised that gets me the most.)

 

 

In addition to trying that technique, I'd like to also attempt to execute my strategy I detailed in the initial message to start this thread (since if the boot system fails, I wouldn't have to install a new hard drive, but rather just change the boot sequence and be on my way).  Are those questions at the end difficult to answer? 

 

Thanks again for your time and help.

 

 

8

See above.

9

Thanks again for your replies. 

 

Here's what I did, and some discussion in the hopes maybe someone else might find it helpful.  Your previous comments are in quotes, and my replies are directly below. 

 

"If you use Copy Drive to copy your OS onto the second HD and then try to boot the second HD by changing the boot order, you will corrupt the drive letter assignment on the second HD."

 

Yes, I figured that.  (I forgot to re-state from the original post that I have Drive D with no letter name in windows.)  Here's what I've done and what happened.  (I've had success, by the way, but maybe what I've done can help someone else.)

 

Instead of referring to my drives as Drive S and Drive D as I did in the posts above, I'll just give the drive letters, and perhaps it'll be easier to follow. 

 

For purposes of the current discussion, I have (2) internal drives:

- Drive 1 is 200 GB and has two primary partitions: C:\ (50 GB), and P:\ (150 GB).  C: is for the OS and P is for small-ish type data (music, etc are on other external drives).

- Drive 2 is 500 GB and has two primary partitions:  D:\ (100 GB), and Q:\ (400 GB).  D: will be for C:'s backup and Q: is for P:'s backup. 

 

I wanted to have both drives in the machine where C and D both contained a functional OS, and either could boot.  So in case of either needing to go to a bigger drive or a failure of Drive 1 (i.e, C and P), I could just disconnect C, and reboot and have full functionality with very little down time.  (D really has no drive letter, but is available by mounting it to an empty folder in Q.  I don't realty think this would matter, because if Drive 1 is no longer in the machine and the machine boots using Drive 2, Windows automatically assigns the boot drive the C drive letter.  (I think, but am not completely sure on the rules of XP's boot process.))  When I put another drive in the machine to replace C-P, it would be probably 1TB, and I can just re-do the same strategy.  Hence, I'll always have assurances in case of either disk failure or requiring more space.  One hard drive for that purpose (and ease of mind) is well worth the cost in my calculations. 

 

The original plan as stated in the original post above was to:

 

- copy C: to D: using the Copy drive option.

- if Drive 1 (C-P) fails, do the following: 1) remove Drive 1 (C-P) leaving only Drive 2 (D-Q) in the machine, and 2) reboot (checking the boot order making sure Drive D is first in line for the machine to boot from (other than CD-DVD, etc), 3) hope it works, and 4) add a newer bigger drive shortly thereafter but at relative leisure in comparison to having to replace something that very moment. 

 

So I tried that.  Unfortunately, the copy drive option didn't work when D-Q had no drive letter.  So I gave it the drive letter D for the copy operation, and then removed the drive letter after Ghost12 had copied C to D.  I then turned off the machine, and took C-P out, leaving only D-Q.  Then rebooted.  It seemed to work.  I use a log on, so the log on dialog box came up, and I gave it the user name and password.  That worked, but then the next thing it did was give a "Disconnecting from Network" dialog box, sat through that for some moments, and then it proceeded to log me off.  Then it provided a new log on dialog box.  Subsequent log on's just went through the same thing making a cycle of log on, disconnecting from network, log off, log on, disconnecting from network, and so on. 

 

I just assumed the copy option had failed or something beyond Ghost12's copy expertise was the problem.  So, Step 3 resulted in disappointment.  Have no clue why and it seems weird than an exact copy of the functioning disk would not work. 

 

But I had another option. because prior to doing the copy drive option, I tried the image/restore/recovery point for an entire disk option you referred to in the earlier post.  The image/recovery point for C (but not P because I just backup data with robocopy) was stored to an external USB drive. 

 

So I simply put the Ghost12 CD (has the recovery software on it) in the machine and rebooted.  Told the recovery option to use the right recovery point and recovered it to the drive I've been referring to as D (though it had no letter name).  (I did not restore the original disk signature, but did restore the MBR.)  Of course, this destroyed the clone the copy option made, but it didn't matter – it wasn't working, anyway.  When the restore operation was done, I rebooted, and it worked.  (For some programs to work, I did have to rename Q to P because I store some configuration files on P.)

 

So now Drive 2's first partition (D: in the discussion) had a OS on it and I could boot the machine using it.

 

Next, I re-connected Drive 1 (C-P), rebooted, made sure the boot order would use Drive 1 (C-P) before Drive 2 (D-Q), and rebooted again.  It worked.  (Probably a boot manager would make life easier, but…)  So, now I have the functionality I wished for in the beginning, and can easily make Drive 2 the drive to boot from in case of Drive 1's failure or needing more space.    Can also probably keep D up to date with C just by doing nightly robocopy's of C to D, also.  But I'll also keep up with the Ghost12 recovery points on the C partition to the external drive. 

 

Anyway, thanks again for your time, replies, and help.  And maybe someone else will be interested in my backup strategy.  I'm satisfied with it so far.  Sure does calm the nerves knowing no more OS re-installs (at least till I decide to upgrade, but I'll probably be on Mac's by then). 

 

Cheers,

 

pulgar

 

PS: Further responses to your comments…

 

"WinXP will appear to boot but it is booting with the assistance of the first HD. When you remove the first HD the second HD will not boot at all." 

 

But it does boot correctly with two active drives, each with the exact same OS on it, as I noted above.  Maybe it's just my particular setup that's making for a unrepeatable happy accident, but it's probably just the ability to choose boot order of the drives. 

 

 

"What you should do after a Copy Drive is remove the old HD from the computer and allow the new HD to boot on its own. Only then will it take the C: drive letter."

 

Unfortunately, that doesn't work, as I explained above.  It seems perplexing that an exact disk copy doesn't work, but a compressed copy that is then de-compressed and stored to a new drive does.  Strange. 

 

 

 

"I've restored thousands of images and never had a single failure. It is a reliable procedure. When I mention "image" that is equivalent to Ghost's "Recovery Point". I prefer the term "image"."

 

The Ghost12 GUI likes the "image" term, but their documentation doesn't use it and when it did, I think it was for virtual disk images.  They should be consistent for non-technical folks, or even technical folks like myself who don't frequent those particular technical precincts.  

 

"If you had a HD failure I'm not sure your second HD would boot unless you removed the failed HD."

 

I think I addressed that above. 

 

"So you would have to open the case anyway. So you need to become confident at changing HDs. It can be learned in a few minutes."

 

Oh, I'm not scared of it, and I've done it plenty of times for various reasons, believe me.  But I hate doing it for some reason. 

 

Again, thanks,

 

pulgar

10

Oops.

11

Nevermind.  :0