I tried the trial of SSR 2011 in Virtual PC and I liked it. If you know your way around Ghost 15, you will not have much of a learning curve. I think if you look hard enough, you can find it at a lower price than some places charge for Ghost.
I've never dealt with this company, but the price seems reasonable..
Thanks for the feedback and the link. I haven't dealt with Provantage before either, but they look like a solid company and the price was great so I placed the order.
I noticed that they had another SKU which included 12 months of support for $5 extra, so I went that route just in case.
Overall $50 is not a bad price for two years of improvements + Restore Anywhere. I wish it had integrated cloud backup, but we can't have everything.
I'll report back on both the vendor and the software.
Make sure you still post here once in a while instead of the Symantec forums 
Hey Red,
that sounds like a good deal for about £30.00 in the UK, probably cost a few bob to ship it over here though.
Deric
Shipping is high from US to UK. I sent a small package last week and it was $14. I'm not sure if there is a cheaper rate for just a CD or not. It would be easier just to download the software and email the license key.
The next release of Ghost will be built on the same engine as SSR. Thus, if you want to be a beta tester for SSR, you will effectively be beta testing Ghost.
Count me in.
Deric
Andy - you mean the same engine as SSR 2011, or the same engine as a forthcoming 2012 version of SSR?
Just wondering if I'm getting the latest with SSR 2011.
By the way, Provantage shipped the same day I placed my order and I should have it Monday. They seem a very professional firm.
Exactly. The upcoming release of SSR 2012 and Ghost will run on the same engine, and both will support Windows 8. I'm not sure what the next releases will be called. Currently, Ghost 15 and SSR 2011 are running on slightly different engines.
andreash_utah wrote:Exactly. The upcoming release of SSR 2012 and Ghost will run on the same engine, and both will support Windows 8. I'm not sure what the next releases will be called. Currently, Ghost 15 and SSR 2011 are running on slightly different engines.
Hi,
So what will differentiate the products? - other than the box 
If I have Essential Support with my SSR 2011, will I get the 2012 version under that agreement? The web site says I get "Upgrades and Updates" but it's not clear if that means patches (LiveUpdate) or annual new releases.
I don't have access to the licensing database, so I can't tell you for sure. When you get a minute, call the customer care team and they can tell you for sure. Here's their number: 800.721.3934
I received and installed my SSR 2011 package last night. I would recommend ProVantage without reservation.
The package is very nicely done, including hole-punched cardboard CD holders, etc.
The upgrade process could not have been simpler. I uninstalled Ghost (Norton seems to make uninstall routines that actually work - it was very thorough) and then installed SSR 2011. All my existing backups, schedules, and settings transfered. I ran a new base backup just to ensure my base was done with the new engine, but from what I can tell they are 100% compatible.
So far I've found three main differences with SSR:
1. Restore Anywhere
2. The icon is different.
3. The splash screen is different.
That's it. I'm sure there's more below the surface, but the UI is almost 100% identical. That's a good thing since I liked the way Ghost handled the UI and scheduling options, etc.
I'd still like to see more control over retention policies and I'd like to see a backup strategy with one base, multiple differentials and incrementals to the differentials. Those things aside, this thing is pretty much perfect for my needs at this point.
Looking forward to seeing what's in the 2012 release.
Thanks to all for the guidance and helpful purchase link.
Philip.
philipm785 wrote:I received and installed my SSR 2011 package last night. I would recommend ProVantage without reservation.
The package is very nicely done, including hole-punched cardboard CD holders, etc.
The upgrade process could not have been simpler. I uninstalled Ghost (Norton seems to make uninstall routines that actually work - it was very thorough) and then installed SSR 2011. All my existing backups, schedules, and settings transfered. I ran a new base backup just to ensure my base was done with the new engine, but from what I can tell they are 100% compatible.
So far I've found three main differences with SSR:
1. Restore Anywhere
2. The icon is different.
3. The splash screen is different.
That's it. I'm sure there's more below the surface, but the UI is almost 100% identical. That's a good thing since I liked the way Ghost handled the UI and scheduling options, etc.
I'd still like to see more control over retention policies and I'd like to see a backup strategy with one base, multiple differentials and incrementals to the differentials. Those things aside, this thing is pretty much perfect for my needs at this point.
Looking forward to seeing what's in the 2012 release.
Thanks to all for the guidance and helpful purchase link.
Philip.
Philip,
Thank you very much for your positive review/recommendation for SSR. 
You can also make your Custom SRD on a UFD (USB Flash Drive), correct? I guess it's time to change SRD to SRE (Symantec Recovery Environment).
Red - that's correct. I haven't tried it yet (not even sure if my computer will boot from a UFD) but will give it a shot. It's certainly a more convenient way to handle things.
I'm going to run this setup with a few weeks of incrementals and then do a test restore to a spare drive just to make sure. The same test with Ghost worked fine and I'm sure SSR will be OK too, but with the way these block level filter drivers work one can never be too careful when installing new versions with potentially new interactions and depedancies. I had another (non-Symantec) product from a major brand which would just "miss" block changes, so you'd end up with incremental backups that captured only a portion of the changes on the disk. The predictable result was a backup which contained more and more unreadable data as time went by, but that would pass verifcation and appear in every other way to be OK. It would even mount fine, but a CHKDSK on the mounted image would reveal issues. Scary. 
Red,
I tried the USB flash drive bootable recovery media last night and it worked perfectly. Creation process is straight forward and the RE worked fine. Boot time wasn't any faster than a CD from what I could tell, but certainly more convenient.
Philip.
Good to hear. Now you don't have to use DiskPart or other tools to make a bootable UFD.