a ghost image is an image that you make of a fresh install of windows, and all the apps that you would normally install. At my work i would install XP, office 2003, VNC, and a program called Citrix. I would then do all my updates for Windows and Office. then use Symantec Ghost to create an "image of my computer", so that if i have 10 of the same machines i can just use that "image" and i have 10 perfectly good machines done in 30 mins instead of 1.5 hours per machine