Cloning my office's machines
hi,
I am planning on making a clone all my offices 8 computers. The intention is to install a older HDD currently just on my shelf doing nothing, and also cloning software.
then Cloning the drive with the OS, and then simply keeping the cloned drive attached.
In the future, if there is a problem, I would just boot into the " cloned" drive, and then using it to one day replace the image on to the original drive.
I do not want to buy 8 copies of software, and even if I had to, should it be the paragon " migrate OS to an SSD " , or the paragon " Drive Copy Professional " or " back up and recovery" ?
any comments appreciated...
I am planning on making a clone all my offices 8 computers. The intention is to install a older HDD currently just on my shelf doing nothing, and also cloning software.
then Cloning the drive with the OS, and then simply keeping the cloned drive attached.
In the future, if there is a problem, I would just boot into the " cloned" drive, and then using it to one day replace the image on to the original drive.
I do not want to buy 8 copies of software, and even if I had to, should it be the paragon " migrate OS to an SSD " , or the paragon " Drive Copy Professional " or " back up and recovery" ?
any comments appreciated...
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Gary
i thought an image is the clone... What does clone mean
The machines are peer to peer ,not on a domain.
i thought an image is the clone... What does clone mean
The machines are peer to peer ,not on a domain.
We usually say "clone" to move an image to another machine or machines.
"Image" normally means a restorable backup as we pointed you to above.
I hope that helps.
"Image" normally means a restorable backup as we pointed you to above.
I hope that helps.
A clone is an exact copy of a disk on another disk. The clone is immediately usable. An image is when a disk or partition is copied to an image file. The file can't be immediately used, it must first be restored to a new disk before it is usable again. An image is usually also compressed, so the file uses less space than the data used on the original disk. So it is possible to store several disk images on one HD, but only one clone.
I use XXClone http://www.xxclone.com/ to make bootable backups. It only works with XP, Vista, and Windows 7 though. Comes in a free and paid versions.
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sorry >Lee
Both at 39 $ also have the migrate to SSD option, and are made for windows 8 and uefi systems
: http://www.paragon-software.com/home/dc-professional/features.html
it looks like the back up version has more options for repairing problems
Both at 39 $ also have the migrate to SSD option, and are made for windows 8 and uefi systems
: http://www.paragon-software.com/home/dc-professional/features.html
it looks like the back up version has more options for repairing problems
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so then if I understand what my teaching friends have commented,
1 a cone is a restorable image. I can use the free paragon back up and recovery to both create and restore this image which can be stored on a separate external drive.
the paragon software would also make a bootable disk, so that I may restore the image. However this is only available for free, if for personal use.
2 My original intention to have a duplicate disk ready to go in the machine is not a clone, but rather a mirror. and the mirror can be created with the disk manager included in windows. However this option will only work if the drive is at least the same size.
3 There is no software that I can that will allow me to install on multiple computers for my purposes. I need a license for each machine.
1 a cone is a restorable image. I can use the free paragon back up and recovery to both create and restore this image which can be stored on a separate external drive.
the paragon software would also make a bootable disk, so that I may restore the image. However this is only available for free, if for personal use.
2 My original intention to have a duplicate disk ready to go in the machine is not a clone, but rather a mirror. and the mirror can be created with the disk manager included in windows. However this option will only work if the drive is at least the same size.
3 There is no software that I can that will allow me to install on multiple computers for my purposes. I need a license for each machine.
3 I need a license for each machine <--- Yes, at least for Ghost, but licenses are not expensive.
You can use CloneZilla, it is OpenSource and free, and you don't need any licenses for it. It can make both clones and images. You just can't run it from within Windows, but will rather have to boot from a CloneZilla Boot CD or USB stick to run it:
http://clonezilla.org
http://clonezilla.org
"... a clone is a restorable image. " ==> No. A "clone" generally refers to exactly that ... a CLONE (duplicate) of the current disk. This disk could, in fact, simply be put in place of the original disk and will boot as is.
An IMAGE is what you're thinking of. Think of an image as a compressed "picture" of the hard drive using lossless compression ... so the original hard drive can be restored to its exact contents. Because it's compressed, it is NOT a "clone" (duplicate) of the hard drive; but it contains all of the information needed to restore the hard drive to the exact state it was in when the image was made. You can make images using Paragon, DriveImage, Image for DOS, Ghost, etc.
"... My original intention to have a duplicate disk ready to go in the machine is not a clone, but rather a mirror. and the mirror can be created with the disk manager included in windows. However this option will only work if the drive is at least the same size. " ==> This is a bit of semantics, but in general "clone" and "mirror" are two different things. A clone is something YOU create ... i.e. you use a 3rd party imaging utility to COPY the disk ... and the copy will simply be a clone of the original disk. Clearly that requires that the destination disk be at least as large as the disk you're cloning. A mirror generally refers to a disk that's automatically maintained as a duplicate of the original disk ... e.g. a RAID-1 system. It doesn't require any action on your part.
"... There is no software that I can that will allow me to install on multiple computers for my purposes. I need a license for each machine ..." ==> This depends on the product. You can sometimes buy "technician" licenses that allow you to use the utility on as many machines as you want (up to some specified limit); and other products simply have quantity discounts when you buy multiple licenses.
An IMAGE is what you're thinking of. Think of an image as a compressed "picture" of the hard drive using lossless compression ... so the original hard drive can be restored to its exact contents. Because it's compressed, it is NOT a "clone" (duplicate) of the hard drive; but it contains all of the information needed to restore the hard drive to the exact state it was in when the image was made. You can make images using Paragon, DriveImage, Image for DOS, Ghost, etc.
"... My original intention to have a duplicate disk ready to go in the machine is not a clone, but rather a mirror. and the mirror can be created with the disk manager included in windows. However this option will only work if the drive is at least the same size. " ==> This is a bit of semantics, but in general "clone" and "mirror" are two different things. A clone is something YOU create ... i.e. you use a 3rd party imaging utility to COPY the disk ... and the copy will simply be a clone of the original disk. Clearly that requires that the destination disk be at least as large as the disk you're cloning. A mirror generally refers to a disk that's automatically maintained as a duplicate of the original disk ... e.g. a RAID-1 system. It doesn't require any action on your part.
"... There is no software that I can that will allow me to install on multiple computers for my purposes. I need a license for each machine ..." ==> This depends on the product. You can sometimes buy "technician" licenses that allow you to use the utility on as many machines as you want (up to some specified limit); and other products simply have quantity discounts when you buy multiple licenses.
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Just a note, if you break a "mirror" by removing one of the disks from the mirror (which is what I said in my first comment), it won't stay automatically maintained, and that 2nd disk will then be just like a clone.
when i want a clone - i use Casper : http://www.fssdev.com/products/casper/
I think Norton software had an option to remove the ssid's during cloning so other vendors may have this as well.