GHOST is expensive. Tell me why I couldn't create an open source

[fly]

I mean all that Ghost does is basically zip files up, right? As far as I can tell, the program would need to grab:

* Bootsector

* Disk format

* Files

What else would be needed?

edit: And has this already been done?

[-I-]

it stores mutch more than just the fles..

it makes a per BIT exact copy of a volume (disk) only after that, it uses a compression. this is why it can make back-up's of both fat and ntfs and other file-systems as well...

there are some backup aplications for this use already that can do this,

but i do not know if any of them use a 7z -like compression....

[fly]

it stores mutch more than just the fles..

it makes a per BIT exact copy of a volume (disk) only after that, it uses a compression. this is why it can make back-up's of both fat and ntfs and other file-systems as well...

there are some backup aplications for this use already that can do this,

but i do not know if any of them use a 7z -like compression....

Are you sure about the bit per bit part? I thought it only did that on file systems that it didn't recognize, as bit per bit is MUCH slower. Making the backup could easily be read with an admin account, or with the free version of NTFS4DOS...

Edited July 26, 2006 by fly

[LLXX]

Coding a simple disk-imager is quite easy, less than 200 lines of Asm. (To duplicate e.g. primary HDD to secondary HDD).

Basically a sector-by-sector copier. Ghost does moar, like compression and has more options.

[CoffeeFiend]

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Edited November 7, 2006 by crahak

[fly]

Thanks for the reality check. <3

[jaclaz]

Also, there are alternatives to GHOST, either Freeware or Open Source:

http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?showtopic=16534

http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?showtopic=14991

Please refrain from posting anything like Oscar comments in the above threads , if you like GHOST and your time is precious, buy it, if you haven't got the money use another Freeware app.

Selfimage seems one of the Windows based "winners":

http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?showtopic=15809

However, if you like some of the suggested applications and really want to help the community, writing something that uses for example DD to copy data from HD in chunks and compress them in 7z archives and then uncompress them, could be useful.

jaclaz

Edited July 28, 2006 by jaclaz

[fly]

excellent post! thank you very much for your help.

[CoffeeFiend]

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Edited November 7, 2006 by crahak

[fly]

It gets expensive quick in a ~1500 user environment...

[CoffeeFiend]

.

Edited November 7, 2006 by crahak

[jimmsta]

For a quick solution, wouldn't something like this work?

dd if=/dev/hda of=/dev/null > p7zip image.7z

DD will do a bit for bit copy of the original drive, and p7zip will compress it to a 7zip file... I KNOW something like this would work. You'd still need some way to resize the resulting partition, as the image would take up the same size as the original disk... but all the same, this is a simple solution to your question. (Albeit not so graceful, and definitley against what LLXX is talking about).

[CoffeeFiend]

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Edited November 7, 2006 by crahak