Will,

I agree. PQDI has saved me days maybe weeks. When I was a consultant and had to face different Network OS, database backends, ERP versions, etc. I would simply create an image onto another partition of my HD. After that, I could tweak my system to make it work at the customer site without worrying about the config. Before leaving the customer I would simply restore the original image. In some cases I created a customer specific image if I knew that I would return to the same customer later. Creating and restoring an image took only about 15-20 minutes each for a 2GB partition.

In order for this to work properly, it's very important as you've mentioned to seperate programs and data so that restoring an image doesn't affect the data.

I made it a habit to create an image before installing new software.


>Hi Al,
>
>I agree totally, I use PQDI to image each of my bootable OS's
>But the main difference is that I use is a removable (bootable) hdd
>
>It will do the complete backup in about 20+ mins (4gb partition)
>I have different images for different situations
>Win 98 Clean install + drivers
>Win 98 Clean install + drivers + s/w
>Win 2000 Clean install + drivers
>Win 2000 Clean install + drivers + s/w
>Linux
>etc.
>
>If my main Hdd ever kicks the bucket I reckon I can be up and working within a couple of hours (that includes going to buy a new one!)
>
>Another useful product from Powerquest is bootmagic - You can have multiple OS's on multiple HDD's/Partitions and swap between them at reboot - you can also select which partitions are visible for each OS
>
>eg. I have 2 Win 98 partitions - one for me one for my Girlfriend she does graphic design/Web stuff (I don't want all that stuff bloating my OS) so it effectively gives us 2 pc's in 1
>All the common files go into a 3rd partition (Outlook address books/Messages/My documents etc) which are visible from both OS's
>Either partition can be PQDI'd if there are any problems - without loosing Outlook/personal stuff.
>
>I find it works brilliantly.. well worth the money!
>
>Will
>
>
>>Just thought I'd share my positive experience using Power Quest's Drive Image 4.0 in a backup situation.
>>
>>My production machine is W2K SP2 on a 20GB NTFS partition on an IDE hard drive. Total space used was 4,105MB including a 768MB swap file.
>>
>>DI boots from DOS (actually, Caldera DR-DOS) and creates exact images of partitions on accessible hard drives. It includes a packet writing utility so it supports CD-R drives.
>>
>>It is smart enough to only back up sectors that are used. It does not back up the swap file (which is not necessary under NT/W2K). It also offers compression. It supports spanning media if the image is larger than one CD-R.
>>
>>In my case it created an image of the 3,382MB of non-swap files onto 4 CD-Rs (the last one about 1/2 filled), in about 70 minutes.
>>
>>I then backed up my entire system to a network drive using NTBackup (for safety during this test). This was only slightly faster, at about 50 minutes.
>>
>>I then used Power Quest's PartitionMagic 6.0 to blow away the partition on the HD (gulp !)
>>
>>I then booted from the DI 4.0 boot diskettes and restored from the image CDs. I answered a couple of prompts, and 35 minutes later had my system back EXACTLY as it was before.
>>
>>If DI had failed, I would have had to reinstall W2K from the original CD, set up networking so I could see my backup file on the network drive, then restore from that. Never having done that, I don't know if it's as exact a restoration as the image (possible Registry issues, etc.?)
>>
>>Restoring from a tape would be the same process, except the tape device may have to be configured in NTBackup before use. Another issue with tape backup is system theft; if someone stole your entire system including your tape drive, it could take a day to get another one to restore from your off-site tape(s). In contrast, any new computer you buy will have a CD-ROM drive so you can restore an image immediately. The hardware will likely be different, so you would need to boot in safe mode and set up drivers, but it's still the fastest way to get back to work.
>>
>>One limitation is that your HDs must be accessible with real-mode drivers (e.g. standard IDE, SCSI, etc.) If not, DI can't see the drive to image it. One controller it won't work with is the Promise ATA/RAID controller for which there is no real-mode driver.
>>
>>I got it for CAN$62 (about US$40). Cost of 4 Sony CD-Rs is about CAN$4.
>>
>>Recommended. www.powerquest.com