@WeaponX : once you have the CD's, it's very easy to duplicate them. The ghost image CD's are regular data CD, you can backup them simply using Nero, "CD Copy".
The difficult thing is to have the files splitted (advanced usage of the Ghost program). Once you have the ghost backup image spillted into several 680 megs files, it's easy to put them on a data Cd, and this data CD will be very easy to duplicate.

@qwijibow : When I backup a pentium III and install the backup on a Celeron, it does not boot. This seems to mean that the disk access info depend from the motherboard buses.
I also tried to backup a Celeron machine and install the backup on a Pentium IV, at reboot I have blue screen. That's why I say that the safest way is restoring on the same system (same motherboard, same CPU, same bus, same disk). Nevertheless, I simply conitue trying reloading a backup and looking if it works, and if it fails I know it's normal.
Regards
Yordan

See all these Ghost images are completely hardware specific - so in 99% cases ghost image for one system wouldn't work on another unless it has the exact same configuration. Problem is not with ghost, but Windows - which configures itself to a particular system by installing only those specific drivers needed for that system. That's why it's so difficult to run a ghost image on a different configuration.

On the other hand, when I used to work on my univ. IT dept., I had the advantage of having all similar systems in each lab... So creating one set of images for each lab would do the trick real easy..

Such is also my case. In my lab I have eight systems, exactly the same hardwre. So I do a single install, do a ghost backup, and then I put it on any one of these eight.
Outside of these eight ones, sometimes I spend five minutes trying on another system, different hardware, different processors, sometimes it happens to boot correctly, sometimes not.

That's what I thought originally also. But they said it can't be duplicated like that. They use Nero 7.0 for most of their burning needs, but have tried others like I said with no success.

OK, if they do copy successfully, is the image on the CD still bootable though? They will most likely split the image into 2 CDs or more.

I need to get my hands on Ghost to see how they are doing this. So the hardest part is the splitting process...does Ghost split and burn on the fly or is there a way to make it split the files up first so we can then burn them individually and hopefully are still bootable?

See, Ghost on-the-fly burning has terrific problems. Most of the time you end up with bad images and more than 20-30 wasted cds. This is because, everytime it fails, you've start from CD 1 all over again. It has no way of figuring out which CD is bad and creating only that part of the image.

Best is to span it into volumes onto some separate partition - but the spanning is a trick which i couldn't uncover yet.. maybe someone else can help you there... Once spanned and broken into 700MB images, not a hassle to burn them using Nero.

In case you want to make sure your first disk is bootable, you should use WinImage to create a separate boot image and NOT RELY on Ghost to do it. Along with this bootimage you place Ghost.exe and Mouse.Com ..and your job's done.

I STRONGLY recommend usage of WinImage and it makes your boot image extremely flexible and tailor-made to the exact order you want.

Suggested Reading: Guide to Creating Bootable CD/DVD's without A:\ Floppy Drive

I use Nero 6, and I guess Nero 7 has the same functionnalities.
I ask ghost to create the backup on several files. Usually I simply put each file on one CD.
Usually I boot on a bootable floppy disk, and then I insert the first backupk CD.
I also use the opportunity given par Nero6 to create a "bootable CD", it's one of the choices offered by nero 6. Then Nero asks me to insert the bootable floppy disk in the A: reader.

I don't recommend to ask ghost to do the on-the-fly CD creation. It's safer and faster to ask Nero to create the backup files on disk. The CD's are for security, "just in case". Usually I restore the ghost backup by means of simply reading the backup images from the disk, it goes faster than from cd-rom.

OK, I think I'm getting this all down now.

So Ghost can do this two ways. Either burn on the fly (more risky due to errors) or ask it to split into several files and save it for burning later.

Assuming I use the latter method and span the files first, I won't be able to make it bootable then right? I need that ghost.exe file in the root folder for CD1...and that only works if I burn those spanned CDs on the fly?

Thanks for the WinImage link m^e. I will take a look at that program. Will this be a replacement for Ghost (so instead, use WinImage and not Ghost)?

I know hardware is important here, but will hard drive size/brand make a huge difference for the image if we restore it? Will it work if I ghosted it from a 40GB HDD and try to restore it on a identical system except with a 80GB HDD? How about partitions? Will having a different partition setup affect the image restore process?

Still curious on this question though. Is there any way to create a Windows image (be it 98/2000/XP) so it works on any machine?

Thanks everyone for your continued support on this issue.

Nope, it can be bootable. Simply ask Nero to create a bootable CD, instad of asking for making a regular datafile CD.
Depending your ghost version, you can simply add ghost on the bootable CD you asked Nero to create, or you will have to use the original Ghost boot CD (or a clean copy of the Ghot boot CD).

The size of the hard drive makes no difference. You only need the first partition to be big enough in order to contain all the files which were on the original system.
That's why my C: disk is a 4 gigabytes partition. Then I simply have to create a 4 giga partition (or use the existing partition if there is one, it's size is not important if it's at least 4 gig) and restore on this partition.

I think only the original Win98 or win2K our WinXP CD is able of installing Windows on any disk on any kind or processor on any kind of motherboard.

Regards
Yordan

Thanks yordan, et al, for posting your replies. Mind is at ease now

Just wish there was a way to do image installs on any machine...the ideal pc world

No, not really. WinImage doesn't replace ghost.

See there are two methods, right ?? The extremely error prone on-the-fly, and the much safer write to disc and then burn.

Ok so we take the second approach. Now in either of these approaches, you can tell Ghost to make the first cd bootable. Then you won't need to boot using any other utility, but instead can boot straight off the ghost cd and write out the partition. BUT, for this, you need to show ghost a location where it can find the Boot Image. It's going to ask you to insert a bootable floppy into Drive A and get the image from there.

Now with this boot floppy (which in 99% cases is a 1.44MB one) - you can either put a ready-made boot image (from Win98) or create a tailor made image by adding/deleting some files from it. My biggest problem was my system doesn't have a floppy drive - leave alone floppies.

Another problem was I wanted to put a whole bunch of tools (like the DOS-based Partition Magic, a couple of other drivers & utilities) on the boot floppy. But 1.44MB is very limiting - and I'd have to compromise one tool for the other.

This is where WinImage really came to help. It supports creation of Image Files in a very WIDE variety of formats - including linux variants. You can either write out the image in form of a file - which you can use with Nero to create bootable CD's - or write it directly to a Floppy.

What I did was, I created a 2.88MB boot image - and stuffed PartitionMagic, Ghost.exe and several other tools comfortably into it.

Then I told Ghost to make me spanned disk images WITHOUT A BOOT IMAGE (coz I have it ready separately)...

Then I used Nero - told it to use that boot image on the first CD along with the first spanned volume of Ghost Image.

Second Disc onwards, it was just the Ghost image, coz you need to boot ONLY from the first disc.

Advantage here is, if you boot using this custom-made image, and you're working on a BLANK hard drive, you've all the tools needed to create/edit/delete/format partitions and then simply restore the Ghost image..which CANNOT be done using a normal 1.44MB boot disk (certainly not with the FDISK included on it... YUCCCK.. I HATE IT).

NOTE: BTW, you don't place this Boot Image directly onto the root folder of the first CD. That WONT make it bootable.

Instead you've to tell Nero to Create a Bootable CD


and then point it to the location of this image file you've created:


There - hopefully that will give you a complete picture..

Regards,
m^e