Cover Story: Tools for Trouble-Free Computing

Disk Imaging

Best Buy: PowerQuest Drive Image 5

Today, many computers ship with an image file of the system included on their hard drives. Should you encounter a problem that you can't fix, this disk image file allows you to return the system to its original state.

But wouldn't it be better to return it to a point when it last worked properly--with all of your personal tweaks intact? Drive imaging software can do that for you. Unlike with file backup software, you probably won't need to use it frequently. Instead, use it after setting up your new PC, and again after making a major change, such as installing an application. The main difference between drive imaging and file backups is that drive imaging is meant to return you to a complete working installation, whereas file backups protect the day-by-day changes to your data.

A drive imaging program creates an exact copy of your hard drive setup and stores it in one large compressed file, which you can save on a dedicated partition on your hard drive or on a series of CD-R or CD-RW discs.

Writing an image to a partition is faster and easier but requires a lot of free drive space (as well as partitioning software). And if your drive dies, you're out of luck.

Like partitioning programs, the three drive imaging programs we reviewed--PowerQuest's Drive Image 5, Symantec's Norton Ghost 2002, and V Communications' DriveWorks--need to boot into DOS to do their thing. PowerQuest says Drive Image 2002, which wasn't ready in time for this review, will support backup and partitioning from within Windows.

The current version of Drive Image wins our Best Buy because it's easy to use and reliable. As with the company's PartitionMagic, Drive Image has modules that work inside and outside of Windows. You can load the Windows program QuickImage, tell it that you want to back up the C: drive to a file, set options such as the compression level, and then click the Create Image icon. QuickImage will then close Windows, reboot to DOS, perform the imaging, and boot back into Windows.

We found nothing easy about Norton Ghost 2002, but in its defense, it is designed with highly technical corporate IT users in mind. You load Ghost by booting from a floppy--a floppy that you create from a wizard inside Windows. Be careful what options you pick in that wizard, however. If you don't read the on-screen fine print, you could easily create a floppy that can write to a CD-RW but not read from it. In other words, you'll be able to create a hard drive image, but should disaster strike, you won't be able to restore it. Once you've booted into the DOS-based Ghost, you have to contend with confusing terminology ("Proceed with partition dump?") and an annoying copy-protection scheme. One thing in Ghost's favor: It's the only imaging program of the three that will work across a network, giving you an option other than backing up to a partition or a CD-RW disc.

DriveWorks combines drive imaging with a version of Partition Commander. It's a good thing it can create partitions, because DriveWorks does not support recordable CD media at all--V Communications says that'll arrive in a future release. Another DriveWorks limitation: The program can only back up to a FAT16 partition, which has a maximum size of 2GB.