Best HDD/Desktop Migration/Imaging Software?

[andyshriver]

Greetings, all-
I would like opinions on what the best product on the market for "cloning" a desktop image might be. I work for a small business, and we are still using a Netware server for files and data. There is, therefore, no means of creating a template from which every workstation can be imaged (i.e. none of the Win2k/Win2k3 remote/unattended installation features). I understand that some people use Norton Ghost to achieve similar results, but I know there are products out there specifically designed for this task. Who makes the best?

Many thanks in advance.
Cheers,
Andy

 

[gbaughma]

Symantec Ghost.



Just my 2¢
"Life gets mighty precious when there's less of it to waste." -Bonnie Raitt "Nick of Time"
--Greg

http://parallel.tzo.com

 

[ArizonaGeek]

Symantec Ghost.

I'll second that.

Cheers
Rob

 

[gbaughma]

As part of our disaster recovery, we've got a server sitting here with "base" images of every model of computer at our company.

If, for example, someone's laptop craps itself....

I have Ghost on a BartPE boot CDRom with all my network config and so forth.

Boot off of the CD, run ghost, pull the image off of my ghost server.

20 minutes later (tops), I'm handing them their laptop back.



Just my 2¢
"Life gets mighty precious when there's less of it to waste." -Bonnie Raitt "Nick of Time"
--Greg

http://parallel.tzo.com

 

[ArizonaGeek]

That's exactly what we have here Greg. Works pretty good but it does have its limitations. For a small business (less than 10 or so machines) Ghost is perfect. But having 30+ gigs of images for all the laptops and desktops we have (at least 15 different models or updates to some of the same models) it gets a bit much.

I've actually been looking at Microsofts newest version of Business Desktop Deployment and I gotta say I am pretty impressed. No need for more than one image and you can edit on the fly. Just create the original install file, configured for your needs along with all your programs, dump all your drivers for every different machine into one share folder and it will install and find the drivers from the share. Boot to PXE, grab the BDD IP address and that's it.

I've kinda had my plate full the last couple of weeks but I think next week when it slows a bit I am going to try my hand at it and see how it goes.

Cheers
Rob

 

[linney]

Another site that offers excellent Imaging software.

http://www.terabyteunlimited.com/prodgrid.html

http://www.terabyteunlimited.com/index.html

 

[smah]

Check out Acronis True Image Workstation.

 

[andyshriver]

Hey Folks -

Awesome! Thank you all for your input. It seems that Ghost is the odds-on favorite, though MS-BDD is worthy of investigation. We have, essentially, two images - one for those PCs on the "Headquarters" LAN, and one for the remote machines (laptops or the desktops in our 3 remote locations). Having just purchased a bunch of new machines, I really don't want to spend hours at a time either migrating data from one user's machine to the replacement or simply setting up new machines with pretty much the same configurations as existing workstations. Unless I miss my guess, Ghost is probably my best and most cost-effective choice. Again, I thank you all.

Cheers,
Andy

 

[smah]

If you just want to migrate existing local user data to a new machine, imaging software is probably not the way to go. Windows File & Settings Transfer Wizard works quite well for this as does Belkin's easy transfer software & usb cable.

 

[ncolsgk]

I disagree smah. WFST does not transfer program files.