Thinkpads Forum

Hi,
I want to create an "ideal" client, then make an image of the hard drive and then put onto many different hard drives (sizewise), same laptop model though (t41, for ex.)

Here's the problem - I didn't find any decent imaging software that will do it right.

Acronist True image for example will make an image, but will not resize (stretch) it, to a bigger hard drive.

Ghost, only corporate version is somewhat acceptable, but first it takes a gazilion time to oot and click lots of promts before you do something, then you loose the Recovery partition.

I was looking into Phoenix ImageCast 6, but no trial available...

Any suggestions? Seriously, no major software packages (tried a lot) can do a job right.

BTW, restore and recover HAVE to be done over network.

Dimitri_P wrote:Acronist True image for example will make an image, but will not resize (stretch) it, to a bigger hard drive.

Have you looked at the corporate versions of True Image?

http://www.acronis.com/enterprise/produ ... trueimage/

Cheers,

Bill

Still same, will not stretch the image onto a bigger hard drive.

BTW, one thing I noticed, I doesn't see the Recovery partition; even when it is Enabled under BIOS (Winows sees it).

D.

My only hope right now is Phoenix ImgaeCast 6 and IBM TrueImage...

Come on, anybody...? anything...?

Dimitri,

I don't understand what it is you're attempting to accomplish.

Why do you think an image has to be "stretched" in any way?

If you have a 20GB HD image and clone it to a 100GB HD, then you'll wind up with 80GB of free space on the cloned HD, exactly what anyone wants to do when installing a larger cloned HD.

Regards,

James

I guess he wants the software to be able to restore the image into hard drive without creating the partition that has the same size as the image file was created. Sometimes I create a image file from a small partition (say like 12GB) and when I try to clone it to another hard drive I want to have the same copy on a 20GB partition without separating the hard drive into one 12GB partition and one 8GB partition. I can use Ghost to do that but the version I use doesn't provide the network recovering/restoring ability.

I guess the best way to do this is to choose the preferred partition size of the source at the beginning. Then regardless how big the target hard drive physical size is, after cloning, just create empty partition by using the remaining empty space left on the drive.

<teetee> is correct.

What I'm doing is I'm creating "ideal" system for every Thinkpad model I have

And then, when I sell it, I can easily install a bigger/smaller hard drive and just drop an image onto it

Does anybody kno wby any chance, why on T40's and T41's I cannot see the recovery partition even when I allow access to it under BIOS?

I'm trying to create full image incl. the recovery partition as well

If the goal is to prepare a machine for sale, is there some difference between an "ideal" system and a "restore to factory image"?

"ideal" system is when it is preconfigured and ready for sale

f Ido a restore to factory defaults, then I would need to spend time swapping the recovery CDs.. then leaving it running, while it performs recovery... and then I would need to get all those drivers to make it work

D.

I have used Rescue and Recovery to do this. There is a commandline tool (in the install directory of Rescue and Recovery) called rrcmd. What i have done is to use this with the -sysprep parameter, and saved my backup to a usb-hd. What the -sysprep parameter does is ready the system to reboot into WinPE after sysprep is run on the machine, and backup the entire harddrive. Then i have deployed this on other machines by simply by doing a recovery from the sysprepped backup. No need for any imaging tools, and its free (at least on the Lenovo machines).

How would I initiate the recovery from sysprep backup, if I have a bare metal machine?
D.

Dimitri_P wrote:if I have a bare metal machine?

If you have a bare metal machine, why are you insisting you need to do this over a network?

Cheers,

Bill

Because I can store it on the server that has all the space I would need.

And I can boot the Thinkpad with Bootable cd (if a particular program makes it), or boot to RIS server (Microsft RI, under Win2003, sucks BIG time...)

That's what I'm trying to do... Not that the software I tried cannot do network - IT cannot work with images/Hdds righ.

D.

Dimitri_P wrote:How would I initiate the recovery from sysprep backup, if I have a bare metal machine?
D.

To initiate this you need a Rescue and Recovery boot cd, which you can make using "Create Rescue media", which is an option after you have installed Rescue and Recovery. The RnR predesktop environment lets you recover from a network share. Since i use a usb-hd, RnR creates this as a bootable device, and all i have to do is choose the usb-drive as the startup device.

Will it restore the OS, along with the recovery partition, provided I have a freshly formatted drive, with nothing on it?

Or just the OS, without the Recovery partition?
D.

Dimitri_P wrote:Or just the OS, without the Recovery partition?
D.

It will not restore the recovery partition if you have removed it. It will only do a restore of the partition. If you want the service partition you need the recovery cd-set.

[censored]...

Dimitri_P wrote:Because I can store it on the server that has all the space I would need.

If that is the only reason you insist on having a network install capability, you are certainly intent on making life unnecessarily hard for yourself, given you could easily achieve your desired business outcome using 2.5" drive in an UltraBaySlim 2nd HDD adapter (or maybe even an external USB enclosure) and no need for network capability.

But what the hey, its your time and $$$!

Cheers,

Bill

It is not that I'm not OK with and HDD, it is that that software cannot work with images correct... Where to store them, or transfer them from if NOT an issue...

Dimitri_P wrote:it is that that software cannot work with images correct...

Sorry, that makes no sense.

Cheers,

Bill

I haven't tried what you are attempting, but I see two ways this might be accomplished.

(1) Clone the image using what you've got, then expand the partition after the fact with Partition Magic, or something similar.

(2) Use backup software instead of cloning software. This is more time consuming, but you will get your chosen configuration on the other ThinkPads. First you will have to use the Product Recovery Disc set if you want to have the Service Partition, next install the backup software (if you use something other than Rescue and Recovery), then restore the backup. If you use this method, I would not necessarily recommend Rescue and Recovery, as it is slow. Stompsoft Backup MyPC works quite well for backup software.

EDIT: I just remembered that I used to have a program called Drive Copy, from PowerQuest (IIRC). It worked basically like a cloning program, but it gave you the choice to have the old image expanded to fill the size of the new drive. I believe this program worked with the NTFS file system that Windows XP uses. I bought this program some years back, and I am not sure if anything like it is still available. If I am not mistaken, Symantec bought out PowerQuest. You could try and track down an old copy, and see if it would work for you.

GomJabbar wrote:I am not sure if anything like it is still available.

True Image 9 is quite capable of cloning to and from partitions of different size on the source and target drives.

Cheers,

Bill

After Symantec bought PowerQuest they closed all their products and push their crappy version of DOS Ghost... wroks like sh...

I will try the combiation of Both Acronis products today to make images and then expanding.

BTW. No single software see the recovery partition on T40's or T41's. T42 and up are OK.

D.

There are several methods to accomplish this using Acronis.
1)Use the Clone feature.

2) Restore the image to the larger drive.
- Boot the OS
- Open True Image
- Create a Secure Zone in the unallocated space
- use the Manage Secure Zone wizard to delete the Secure Zone. You will then be able to merge that space to your main partition.

3) When preparing to Restore an image
- At the screen where you choose to restore a partition or entire drive, choose one partition. Later you will be able to drag the partition slider to the size of your choosing.
- If you have more than one partition to restore choose "Yes I want to restore another partition or drive." You'll be able to resize that one as well if you want.
- Repeat for all necessary partitions.
- Finish by checking the MBR and Track 0 check box
- Commit your restore by pressing the Proceed button.

Laptop won't boot into Windows after that.

I mean, if I restore just the image, with bunch of unallocated space - I can boot into Windows, but if resize as you advised - it won't

Any further steps?

What about creating the image on the new drive, then booting a live linux CD (MEPIS would work) and running qtparted or GParted http://gparted.sourceforge.net/ to resize the partition?

EDIT: Looks like the GParted has a small live CD available just for this purpose.

http://gparted.sourceforge.net/livecd.php

I'm using Acronis True Image Bootable CD. I connect the "Ideal client drive" and make a clone from it onto destination, manually resize partitions, and everything works perfectly.

Not sure if the sam ething will work with an image file... server down.

So I guess problem fixed. Although, will work only on T42 and up, because anything prior to that has HPA... which is not an actual partition...

D.