CompletePC Backup works great!

[wgd]

Wanted to try backing up my Vista Beta 2 partition using the included
CompletePC Backup option. It creates an image backup of the full
partition (similar to Ghost). Started it up in Vista and did the image
backup to an external USB hard drive. Took about 8-10 minutes to backup
up the partition which is currently using about 15GB.

Pulled the 40GB hard drive which I initially installed on in my Vista
Beta 2 test system. Put it a new unformatted Seagate 160GB SATA2 3GBs
NCQ hard drive. Booted from the Vista Beta 2 DVD, went into the recovery
options and did a CompletePC restore to the new drive.

Worked great. Vista Beta 2 is smoother than ever on the new, faster hard
drive. Although I did have to go through Windows activation again after
Vista started on the new drive.

It's too bad this feature is not going to be available in Home Premium
which is what I was targeting as the version I would purchase.

 

[wgd]

Wanted to try backing up my Vista Beta 2 partition using the included
CompletePC Backup option. It creates an image backup of the full
partition (similar to Ghost). Started it up in Vista and did the image
backup to an external USB hard drive. Took about 8-10 minutes to backup
up the partition which is currently using about 15GB.

Pulled the 40GB hard drive which I initially installed on in my Vista
Beta 2 test system. Put it a new unformatted Seagate 160GB SATA2 3GBs
NCQ hard drive. Booted from the Vista Beta 2 DVD, went into the recovery
options and did a CompletePC restore to the new drive.

Worked great. Vista Beta 2 is smoother than ever on the new, faster hard
drive. Although I did have to go through Windows activation again after
Vista started on the new drive.

I think I spoke too soon on this. After restoring from this backup I
started to encounter some strange problems. Performed another restore from
a Ghost partition image backup and everything started working fine again.

Partition image backups taken from within Vista while it is active may not
be such a good idea. Ghost image backups of the partition are taken once
Vista has completely shutdown.

 

[Mark D. VandenBerg]

I have been successful with restoring an installation of Vista from a
CompletePC Backup, but have not tried "ghosting" a new drive this way. Were
you successful after taking the image when Vista was not running and
applying the image to a new drive?

 

[wgd]

I have been successful with restoring an installation of Vista from a
CompletePC Backup, but have not tried "ghosting" a new drive this way. Were
you successful after taking the image when Vista was not running and
applying the image to a new drive?

Yes, when I restored the Ghost image file (Symantec Ghost 2003) of the
Vista Beta 2 partition to new drive everything worked fine.

 

[Mark D. VandenBeg]

Good to know! Thanks.

Yes, when I restored the Ghost image file (Symantec Ghost 2003) of the
Vista Beta 2 partition to new drive everything worked fine.