Papov
What is your *native* language--your *English* is very good--I have no non-native language skills at all
!
1. Ghost 2003 is DOS based--DOS has a roughly 2 GB file size limit--so no Ghost 2003 image can be larger than that--if the data requires more room than 2 GB, then the image has to be spanned into additional spanned files.
Why did Ghost span the image file differently on the DVD than the HDD--really don't know--when I have used my DVD optical writer, it uses the full 2 GB before it creates the next spanned file.
But, Ghost seems to *choose* other spanned file sizes that don't make much sense either. The first Ghost image I ever made on CD's was with Ghost 2002--and it broke the files into something like 200 MB file sizes, spanning 6-7 CD's and there must have been 20 or 30 spanned Ghost files all totalled in the whole set.
Quote:Isn’t there some way whilst using Ghost 2003 that the image remains in one part & not split unless it’s asked to span/split initially?
You can start Ghost with a command line *switch* that forces it to make all spanned files the same size (except for the last one that has to be the size of whatever remains)--so on a DOS boot disk, the command would be *ghost -split=2048* if you want all files to be the maximum size allowed by DOS--but if you have more than 2 GB of data, there will have to be a spanned file set to contain all the data.
Apparently, the *-split=* switch only works if you are saving the image to a HDD--if you are having Ghost 2003 save the image directly to optical media, Ghost will ignore that switch:
can Nightowl or someone please burn a test disk
There's a discussion here about what size to save files to a HDD for later burning to DVD using the *-split=* switch--looks like 1494 MB may be the maximum file size to fill a 4.7 GB DVD optical media--but that may be a calculated *theoretical* maximum--the burning program may need a little room to be set aside for *record keeping*--so *fackue* decided in the reply # 5 to use *ghost -split=1477*:
My restore CD project
If he used the maximum file size of 2 GB, then only two files could be burned to the DVD for a total of approx 4 GB, and the 0.7 GB could not be used if the next Ghost image file was also 2 GB. Of course, this becomes a moot issue if the data size is smaller than what fills the DVD.
Quote:Can the split images restore an OS as good as a single image?
Should I delete these split images & save single images for restoration?
What are the pros & cons of split & single images?
*Split images* will restore just fine--should be no problem.
You will have split images no matter what unless you have less than 2 GB of data.
No pro's or con's--they both work fine.
2.
Quote:Make a Data DVD> Nero window pops open> add the image file/files .GHO & than simply burn, is this the correct way?
Looks like that should work fine.
But, be forewarned--Ghost 2003, if you boot using the *Standard Boot Disk*, will likely see your optical drive, but will state that there are not *Ghost Images* on your DVD that you burned using a third party program such as Nero. Ghost 2003 will only *recognize* a Ghost image if you burned directly using Ghost.
You have to use the *CD/DVD Startup Disk with Ghost* in order for Ghost to agree to *recognize* the Ghost image that was burned from a HDD to the optical media.
Or you can use any other DOS boot disk that include the DOS driver in *config.sys* that mounts an optical drive (such as *oakcdrom.sys*), and assigns a drive letter using the DOS driver in *autoexec.bat* (such as *mscdex.exe*).
3.
Quote:3. Thirdly coming to the issue of DOS mode capturing, am sorry to say that despite your repeated telling of pressing Alt+ Print Screen buttons am failing to capture a shot in DOS.
The *Alt + Print Screen* combination only works if you are booted to the Windows OS, and have opened a command window (what I refer to often as a *DOS window*)--after doing the *Alt + Print Screen*, you can then open the *Paint* program, and paste the *bit map* screen capture to Paint--use Paint to add some effects such as circles or ellipses, etc and then save it as a *.gif* file for posting on the web, etc.
If you want to do screen captures having booted to DOS from a floppy boot disk (this is what I refer to as *Pure DOS*), I mentioned in
reply #12 above
how I'm doing that with an old DOS prorgram called *
Screen Thief
*. (There appears to be a newer program by that name, but it only works under Windows, not DOS.)
The only way I can get it to work with the DOS Ghost 2003 program was to have a FAT partition available on one of my HDD's, create the *Screen Thieft* sub-directory (default name is *ST*) on the FAT partition, place the *Screen Thieft* files in that sub-directory, and also place a copy of *ghost.exe* in that sub-directory.
Use any boot disk that boots to DOS and get to the A:\ prompt, change to the drive letter of my FAT partition, in my case I type *G:* and press enter, then change to my sub-directory by typing *cd st* and press enter (cd = change directory in DOS).
Now at the prompt G:\st>, I type *st* and press enter--this loads the *Screen Thief* program, I then hit my *left pointing arrow* key twice to get back to the prompt G:\st> (Screen Thief is now loaded in memory), I now type *ghost* and press enter--this loads the Ghost interface.
Now I can press *Alt + Ctrl + T* and my system makes a *screechy beep* and a *gif*, *.tif* or *.jpg* file is saved of that screen to the *st* sub-directory.
Once back to Windows, you can open that screenshot file and do what you wish with Paint, or Photoshop, or whatever, and then post it to the web, etc.