Cloning from USB HDD

I need some advice. I'm looking to take an external 500 Gig and make it bootable with some sort of imaging/ghosting program. Then I could store images on it and restore PC's in the field when needed without having to bring the PC back to the office or image from the office over the CAN. Anyone out there know of a program that may accomplish this?

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CompuTron99

You could try Acronis True Image.

Complete hard disk recovery solution, backup, drive copy, clone and image computer software

When I used to travel from office to office, I had an external USB drive with the different images depending on the PC model.

RobertKaucher

My experience with Acronis was always very good, but I don't believe that the consumer edition allows you to store images, does it? I thought it would only fully image the disk, not store the image as a file...

CompuTron99

I've been using version 10 and 11 and so long as Acronis picks up the USB drive as bootup, I select Restore Backup.

I think you can download a trial version.

skrpune

CompuTron99 wrote: »

I've been using version 10 and 11 and so long as Acronis picks up the USB drive as bootup, I select Restore Backup.

I think you can download a trial version.

I believe I tried to download the trial recently, and it doesn't allow you to actually DO much...it's one of those trials where you can see what it does but it doesn't let you actually do it.

RobertKaucher

CompuTron99 wrote: »

I've been using version 10 and 11 and so long as Acronis picks up the USB drive as bootup, I select Restore Backup.

I think you can download a trial version.

But if I have 5 PCs that I want to store images from am I able to do that? I used Acronis 9 and 10 and I'm pretty sure it only imaged disk to disk, it didn't store the disk image as a file... Is that correct? I have to admit my experience with it was quite limited.

If it does not allow you to store the images as files you'd need a USB HDD for every PC. Unless you create a master image that will work with all the hardware you use, that is.

But I have to agree with the suggestion It's and easy to use and intuitive piece of software.

rwwest7

I did take a look at Acronis. It says you can convert an image file to a VHD file and boot it with MS VM. Can you restore directly from a VHD? It would be sweet to be able to make changes to my images without have to clone them to a machine first.

I've already downloaded the trial home version, they wouldn't let me download the server edition with registering and waiting for them to get back to me.

RobertKaucher

That is a really cool feature. You could also use them with the WAIK then as well. Is the VHD feature available for the home edition or just the server?