Thanks for that, but I can destroy anything when I put my mind to it when
I don't know what I.m doing. Point in fact: whenever I lifted the hood and
poked around in my old pickup I screweed something up so I stopped lifting
the hood - burnt out the motor having no oil! Best I wait,
POKO
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Perhaps you are right in saving it for someone else. But........
None of this stuff is "idiotproof".
Even though this program is DOS-based:
http://www.partition-saving.com/
It will cut out the disk imaging part of the deal.
I backed up my Win98 at three different stages and I think the disk image
can be backed up to CD. It can create an optional batch file to restore
later. One of the people that used to frequent here went to the trouble of
documentating all the steps do run this program. It's worth a read anyway.
Too much help?
First
Things he doesn't mention:
Deleting of any unwanted stuff (tempfiles, cookies)
c:\ scan/surface/auto,
clean the registry (damn thing)
Maybe use Index.dat Suite (a plug for Steven Burn)
Thorough trojan and virus scans (we don't save nasties)
defrag to get your stuff as small as possible
Backing up all *very* important files (as usual)
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Message-ID:
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[email protected]>
I just tried restoring the C:\ drive from a Partition Saving image.
It worked, and it was very fast, 3-5 minutes.
That is the same speed as Drive Image in restoring an image.
To make it easier for others to use Partition Saving without reading long
text files I can give some easy directions:
Get the program:
http://www.partition-saving.com
Make a bootable floppy disk, either from some dos system or windows.
savepart.exe is very small, just 215kB, but you may have to remove some
file to make place for it on a windows rescue disk.
Or you can put it alone on a floppy and load it after loading a bootable
floppy disk. I put the two other small files on the floppy too, drvpart.sys
and Allocxms.com, just in case savepart has some use for them.
Reboot into the floppy disk and start savepart.exe.
In all these screens, use tab, arrow keys, and enter to navigate. You may
need to use the US-american keyboard layout to write file names, if your
boot floppy does not set your country keyboard correctly.
First screen: Choose save an element. It means save a partition, a disk, or
another part of a disk.
Second screen: Choose disk number, usually zero for the first hard disk in
your system, where your C: drive is.
Third screen: Choose partition to save. In the third column it gives you
the real names, choose C:
Fourth screen: What do you want to save?
Choose "occupied sectors". No use in saving unused parts of the partition.
Fifth screen: Choose a filename to save to. Use D:\saved.par for example.
Use a partition you know has enough space for the file.
[yes, if you have the room, it can be saved to C: (DSzady)]
Sixth screen: Choose maximum size of the saved file. This is probably a
safety measure in case something would go wrong. Default is 2GB and you can
use that unless you think the file will be bigger than that.
Maybe it is better to choose a lower value based on your own estimates.
The size of the saved file will be approximately half of the used part of
your C: drive. In my case 800MB resulted in a 390MB file with compression
level 1.
Seventh screen: Choose level to deflate, choose level 1
Now the copying starts, and you see a screen showing the progress and a
time estimate of how long it will take, BUT this screen is very misleading
in its estimates, both the time and the progress bar show what would happen
if the partition was absolutely full, and if the whole maximum size of the
saved file was to be used.
So the process will stop a lot faster than one is lead to believe, and it
looks like only a part of the process has been completed.
Don't worry though, it has done what you told it to do when it says the
copying is ended.
Look at the center of the screen close to the top, where it say "running"
as long as the copying is going on, and it says "ended" when it has ended
the copying process.
Choose to not let it create a bat file if you like, and reboot into your
normal windows operatingsystem.
Check out the created file, it should have half around the size of the
content of your C: drive.
Restoring is even simpler, just start savepart from the boot floppy again
and choose to restore an element.
In the next screen choose the file you saved, either by writing its name
including path, or looking for it and use enter to choose it.
Push the OK button.
Next screen, choose what partition to restore it to.
This is, of course, the critical choice. Make a mistake here and you will
wipe out all the content of another partition, so be careful here.
But the display is easy to read and you should have no problem choosing the
C: drive.
Also this time the predicted times and the progress bar are giving the
impression that it will take a long time, but it took only a few minutes
for my 800MB C: drive to be restored.
All in all, this freeware program is very good and easy to use.
I have hesitated to try it out for a long time because the documentation
text files are not fully clear on how to use it.
Together with the Ranish partition manager this program is one of the most
useful and essential partition saving and restoring tools.
I republish here below my review of 3 partition saving programs, to get it
all in one text:
......
Partition saving to an image file is very useful for backup purposes.
Most useful for partitions with a content of up to 4GB.
Big storage disks can take very long to save or restore.
Restoring an image overwrites the chosen partition with the content of the
image file. These programs can save only the used parts of a partition and
can resize the image to fit on a smaller or larger partition, as long as
there is space enough for the content.
_Norton Ghost (ver6 or 2003)_
Payware
Speed: 70MB/minute, and the speed seems to be very constant, no matter if
you use a slow or fast computer, or choose no compression or fast
compression.
The speed seems to depend only on the speed of the hard disk.
Explorer: Very good explorer functions. You can view, delete, add and
change files in the image file. Good search and sort features.
_Drive Image (ver5)_
Payware
Speed: Faster than Ghost, maybe 140MB/minute, with no compression or low
compression.
Explorer: Less good than Ghost. You can view the content and restore any
file to its original location or any other location, but not add or change
anything in the image file. Difficult to find files in big directories as
there are no find or sort features.
_Savepart, Partition Saving V 2.80_
Freeware:
http://www.partition-saving.com
Copyright (c) 1999-2003 D. Guibouret
Speed: When I tried with compression level 1 it was very fast, similar to
DI and a lot faster than Ghost.
The resulting partition image file has exactly the right size, the same as
the ghost file for the same partition. So I think the saving was done
correctly. (I restored it later and it was good)
I think the reports I have heard about it being very slow is the result of
less well chosen parameters. You need to choose to save only used sectors,
and choose compression level 1, which gives 50% reduction in size, the same
as the optimal compression in DI and Ghost.
A slow computer makes the saving time longer.
Partition Saving has a good visual interface, you choose what to save,
where to save it, what compression level to use, on a series of visual
screens. The user interface is good and similar in all these programs.
I found Partition Saving easy to use, but you need a little basic knowledge
about partitions in your computer. That is needed for all these programs.
Explorer: No explorer functions at all.
I talked about this with the author via email and he is maybe thinking
about adding such functions
I saved a partition image of my C:\ drive, 800MB used.
It took 3 minutes in PS, similar time in DI, and 10 minutes in Ghost.
--
Roger J. (No Emails)
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Registered Linux User: 347957
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