webman Posted October 1, 2007 Posted October 1, 2007 No doubt the CC3 fanboys will be along shortly complaining that there's no option for RM On the contrary... We use RM software on our network - machine images can be created/restored (via boot disk or remotely) in under 10 mintues.
ajbritton Posted October 1, 2007 Posted October 1, 2007 Can I just be a total nitpicker and point out that RIS is NOT imaging. When a PC is built using RIS, it's an automated network install. I have to confess that I have never successfully created a RIPREP build, but AFAIK it's basically the same as a RIS build with some extra files and registry entries copied on after the automated install finishes. IMAGEX as I understand is a 'file' based image as opposed to Ghost images which are 'disk' or 'partition' images. One of the reasons that Ghost is fast is that it treats the partition is that it does not need to update file allocation tables (or the NTFS equivalent thereof) when copying each file. That should mean less work for the heads on the disk and therefore higher speed.
GrumbleDook Posted October 1, 2007 Posted October 1, 2007 'Imaging' is often the term used for OS (and installed software) deployment, whether it be via a disk image or automated installation of files ... semantics ... but yes, perhaps we should be more careful about what we call what.
bossman Posted October 1, 2007 Posted October 1, 2007 @baxter: do you have the full remote acronis suite or just the workstation deploy model? I have also looked at symantec livestate but it is not as good as Acronis. Do you also use the Acronis full metal server restore suite?
netadmin Posted October 1, 2007 Posted October 1, 2007 I use Drive Image XML. I was able to create a custom Bart PE setup for a USB drive. This setup allows cloning over the network. It works very well. Only takes about 25-30 minutes to copy a 12GB image. Plus, it's free
AnnDroyd Posted October 2, 2007 Posted October 2, 2007 Very much dependent on Ghost here too. We use it not only for creating and deployng images, but for remotely starting up and shutting down PCs at the end of the day, deploying AI packages and configuring computer name and domain memberships. Couldn't do the job without it.
mrtechsystems Posted October 2, 2007 Posted October 2, 2007 Yeah I have been using ghost for while but thinking of moving over to Acronis just researching it at the moment....... Mr Tech
ConTheITGuy Posted October 5, 2007 Posted October 5, 2007 No doubt the CC3 fanboys will be along shortly complaining that there's no option for RM On the contrary... We use RM software on our network - machine images can be created/restored (via boot disk or remotely) in under 10 mintues. I believe he meant no option in the poll. Andy
Psymon Posted October 5, 2007 Posted October 5, 2007 RIS / Windows Deployment Serviced /w Group Policy software MSI rollout. Rebuild is a simple network boot, put computer into group, restart.
dhicks Posted October 5, 2007 Posted October 5, 2007 Partimage run from SystemRescueCD installed on a small partition on each machine. -- David Hicks
SimpleSi Posted October 5, 2007 Posted October 5, 2007 @dhicks That looks interesting - could you give some more details please? regards Simon
dhicks Posted October 5, 2007 Posted October 5, 2007 Boot from SystemRescueCD (liveCD type Linux install designed to aid with system maintainance/recovery tasks). Resize Windows NTFS partition to fit in a small (<1GB) EXT2 partition after it. Install SystemRescueCD on that EXT2 partition. Add a startup script to SystemRescueCD on harddrive so that on boot it mounts a server share and re-images the NTFS partition using Partimage (imaging software that comes with SystemRescueCD). Could also use DD, of course (would suggest zeroing unused diskspace beforehand and compressing with gzip). Computer becomes a dual-boot Windows/Linus machine with GRUB used as the bootloader. You can hide this fact by setting the GRUB timeout value to 0 and defaulting to Windows boot. Then, when you want to boot into Linux to reimage the machine, re-write the grub.conf file on the EXT2 partition (you'll need to have an EXT2 driver installed in Windows - I use a older version of EXT2FSD that works via the command line so no GUI appears on screen) and restart. I've set up a Windows image for our new Dell machines that has a local "reimage" user - on boot, a script mounts the EXT2 partition, rewrites grub.conf and then reboots. The machine boots into SystemRescueCD, runs the reimaging script when it boots, then re-writes grub.conf again so that Windows boots after another restart. The image is set to auto-login as another local user that runs a renaming / software install script when Windows firsts loads. It's not exactly fast, we need to leave machines for an hour or two to reimage and install software. This could be as much to do with our network being made from 5-port desktop switches chained together and the file server being the cook's ex-home desktop machine, though. Reading back through the above, I realise that that seems to whizz past a bit quick and lacks a few details. I'll see about typing things up properly and posting to a FAQ / Wiki / blog someplace. -- David Hicks
SimpleSi Posted October 6, 2007 Posted October 6, 2007 This could be as much to do with our network being made from 5-port desktop switches chained together and the file server being the cook's ex-home desktop machine, though. love it - obviously working in a primary then Thanks for info - a bit too complicated for me but very interesting though regards Simon
Awfers Posted June 12, 2009 Posted June 12, 2009 I'm fooling around with StorageCraft right now, seems pretty good (had some problems with my old Vaio / XP and Acronis). Anyone have any experience with it?
kearton Posted June 13, 2009 Posted June 13, 2009 (edited) If they are unmanaged, buy some decent HP ones Don't let AngryTechnician hear you say that link (NSFW) Personally, I like HP switches too. Although we've got 2 old ones which periodically loose VLAN tag settings. I think it might have something to do with power cuts/surges? We use an ancient version of PowerQuest here, but are now looking for an alternative due to it becoming increasingly hard to find DOS drivers for NICs in new PCs. I saw an very informative webcast of Acronis yesterday. I might have to look into RIS and/or Ghost... Edited June 13, 2009 by kearton
EduTech Posted June 13, 2009 Posted June 13, 2009 Thought i had already posted on this topic, clearly not. anyhow, we use NetRunna and have been for a few years now! just looking at upgrading to their new version now as they have more features available James.
amfony Posted June 14, 2009 Posted June 14, 2009 i use ghost gss - but ive heard some good things about image for windows
mac_shinobi Posted June 14, 2009 Posted June 14, 2009 Don't want to hijack the thread but whats clone zilla / fog like versus RIS or WDS ?
sparkeh Posted June 14, 2009 Posted June 14, 2009 Used to use RIS, then WDS but now I use FOG Don't want to hijack the thread but whats clone zilla / fog like versus RIS or WDS ? I actually prefer using FOG. Seems quicker and does a lot more. I seem to have spent a lot of time with WDS mucking around with NIC drivers to get the deployment image launched (but of course that course have been my fault) whereas FOG has a lot of NIC drivers built into the kernel and I haven't had an issue yet. Also FOG will image our older machines which are not supported by WDS due to size of RAM. You can use FOG to image (also virus scan in a pre boot environment with ClamAV, memtest, securely wipe disk, test disks, recover files, manage printers, WOL and schedule showdown, inventory...and probably some other stuff I can't think of right now. Oh and of course you can launch all those functions remotely from the management console - and, if you are feeling nerdy, iPod touches, iPhones and PDAs!
mikeglover Posted June 14, 2009 Posted June 14, 2009 We are moving away from Ghost now and starting to use FOG. (FOG :: A Computer Cloning Solution - Home) FOG has got to be the best free imaging software around!
Soulfish Posted June 14, 2009 Posted June 14, 2009 We're currently using FOG, and finding it great. We are going to try out WDS this summer to compare the two however.
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