Mobile Imaging

MAC_Addy

Title says it all, really. I was wondering if anyone has used any software to do mobile imaging or imaging on the go. We have a Ghost server setup at our main office with all the branch offices tied in with an ASA. It would be nice to image laptops/desktops on the go, but with our branch offices usually being on a 1.5Mbps T1 it just won't work.

Has anyone had any luck with using a USB flash drive and doing mobile imaging?

Any input would be greatly appreciated.

Roguetadhg

MAC, are you saying you want to image computers remotely?

Or Forensic computer image building of mobile computers?

Tackle

I've been using Drive Image XML. Works pretty good. I have a laptop image already taken that I can put on a USB, bring to the site, boot up the PC from a resource CD (Take your pick, UBCD works well), then restore the image to the laptop.

If you want to take an image, bring an external drive, or have them hook one up.

veritas_libertas

I take my Ghost images with me and use a bootable copy of Ghost. USB HDD + CD works fine for me. You can also boot Ghost with a USB drive.

MAC_Addy

veritas_libertas wrote: »

I take my Ghost images with me and use a bootable copy of Ghost. USB HDD + CD works fine for me. You can also boot Ghost with a USB drive.

I did not know you could boot Ghost with a USB drive...

Rouge, I just want to be able to re-image a computer while on the road. Ran into a lot of desktops/laptops that have had a lot of problems. Running ghost through our VPN connection would kill everyone. Literally.

Moe 0101

I have a 16gb flash drive, boot off the flash drive using Acronis and can restore my image. I can store about 3 different images on the flash drive. Acronis also lets you connect to an FTP site so the file server which can be your laptop could be handy. When I read the thread, I thought you were trying to clone smartphones, which would be cool.

veritas_libertas

MAC_Addy wrote: »

I did not know you could boot Ghost with a USB drive...

Yup. It works very well. You use the Ghost software to create a CD/DVD.

eansdad

I have a laptop setup as a WDS. Have access to all images and can fix them on the fly if needed.

sthomas

eansdad wrote: »

I have a laptop setup as a WDS. Have access to all images and can fix them on the fly if needed.

I was going to suggest something like this as well. You can setup laptop with a Server OS and use WDS or whatever imaging software you choose to use. Also, I have put Windows PE on a flash drive and used imagex to install .wim images on computers in remote locations.

RomBUS

Hmm this is an interesting idea...if someone has a good solution that could do this I would appreciate it

At my workplace we have a lot of sales reps and this would cut the time for them to have to actually ship their mobile device back for us to image it again.

WafflesAndRootbeer

MAC_Addy wrote: »

I did not know you could boot Ghost with a USB drive...

Rouge, I just want to be able to re-image a computer while on the road. Ran into a lot of desktops/laptops that have had a lot of problems. Running ghost through our VPN connection would kill everyone. Literally.

The thing about Ghost is that using it is as much of an art as it is a science. There's a lot of features and settings that people don't touch that really need to be explored in order to best use the program effectively and properly. There are actually pretty hefty books/user guides about the program, believe it or not.