Hello al and thanks so mutch for this forum on ghost i realy think it is great.

However i have some weird situation.
First i will explain (trying in my best english, casu thats not native) what the situation is :

I have 2 drives. 1 is Primary Partition (1) C:\ 10.000 GB
Then i have a second Primary Partition on drive 1 called E:\
Then i have a 2nd drive 40 GB with 1 primary partition set to active named D:\

I think i did something wrong here? Should i only have 1 Primary Partition on the master drive called C:\ And then better have a dos extend --> Logical Drive?

I will explain my problem with i (hopefully 'had'cause io now use the 2003 version)

Every thing went fine this way. I used Ghost 8.3 Corp al teh time to backup C:\ 10.000 GB and put that on E:\ 300 GB drive with a lot of data. So, C is my system only and i have Games Audio apps etc on E:\ In nice orginized folders.

So, moste of the time i put the image in E:\Image.gho so it was in the root always.
The first one i make is without video drivers cause i find that a handy idea.

Then a day later i add some folders to E:\ and give it teh name (Image) and i moved the Image.gho into that folder. So you would get

E:\Image\Image.gho  Seems more logical doesnt it?

So a day later i reboot the machine and did some work on it made some more directories and changed the name Image to a name so i could understand it better Server1.gho.

Then i reboot with ghost 8.3 loaded and wanted to make a new image, but now something realy wierd has happend..

When i brows to my folders (Ghost dos mode) i could NOT see the Image folder i created. I though ow no!! now my image is gone?

So i reboot the machine and did CHKDSK while i was in windows xp, so no problems hm. And i did see in explorer the E:\Image and also the GHO file. So all seems oke there.

Note: My system is all NTFS version 3.01 so windows xp.

I tryed to reboot again and again it could not find the dir.
Then i boot back in windows i moved the image to the (root) again. Boot to ghost in dos and gues what?

No! grrr i could not see this wierd isnt it? And when i deleted a file or better to say a folder of the same drive E:\ is does not show me this in ghost version 8.3 It did before but i lookt like i have to many NTFS folders? OR Dos cannot see it?

Note: PC not overclocked and BIOS on stock / normal. All Drives dected on AUTO mode. S.M.A.R.T Is Off

Well i though there must be something wrong here with my drives. But no metter how many times i did Chkdsk C: /F  D: /F (So, even my drive 2) and E:\ the big problem Partition chkdsk E: /F

No problem. Then i started to go into recovery console. And now comes the issue :

Checkdisk has found errors. After a long time i got this message after doing 1:WINDOS:>CHKDSK E: /P /R

Hmmm it did not repair? You see i cannot do /F cause /P can only be used in recovery console.

So i tryed to do it again just at once and i got no error now. So i thought it must be oke now? other drive 'seems;  ok. and partition C:\ seems oke aswell. But E:\ is a big problem in ghost.

I tested to restart the pc and went to ghost again i could not see the added folders. And now? even in drive D:\ (2nd Driver 1 Primary partition named D:\ set to active could not see some folders aswell so i though wel grrrr.

Then i tryed to boot into NTFS Dos Pro 5.1 and gues what? this used to work and now i see:

Cannot mount drive cause of Volume Information error in (NTFS Partition)

It did however mount my 2nd drive. So it now does not even mount C:\ and E:\ grr.. so it looks like problems happen slowely?

How come this happends. I though well maybe if i repair my MFT ghost backup would not work of the old image cause it would overwrite the partition onfo? or is this not true and just replaces only the folders into a new (working) partition (Say, i format and do it all over again)

Then after looking via google and reading a lot about Partitioning hmm i could not find the aswer so i though Ghost (maybe) did something wrong? however i do not realy believe it, it must be my mistake somewere.

This has happend also if i make Image1.gho and Image2.gho that is a new version of 1. It does not show it. But IF i type the name from head image.gho in ghost dos explorer program it DOES open! and start.

$MFT? is it uh $^%$^&#%^#$ hehe

The thing is i am so afrait now of ghost heheh yeah.

So now what do i do i can not format E:\ it is data worth of maybe millions. So what i did after reading this forum i got 2003 version installed it made a boot disk and my only way is to make a backup of E:\ and also D:\ to DVD

I know, people will say you beter buy an external drive. Well i know but there must be a way to backit up to DVD.

And gues  what? It worked!!!! Oke lol i have to change for 40 GB about 8 DVDS (well i got the time no problem) perfect in dos, just brilliant!

It was finito and i reboot the pc. start ghost 2003 in windows and runn Ghost explorere. Well hehe i know i need a lot of accessive swapping but i just like to know if this works.

After some time if askt for segment 18 CDR00043.GHS. Well that realy does not exist dear ghost
So i though NOOOO pleaseeee (To backup 40 GB first instead of goning for 200 GB.. i do this to see if 40 gb will work ok i am confident 200 GB will work oke aswell)

So it askt for CD number 6. I put in cd 6. but it keeps asking for segment 18? I thought but i have only on last DVD CDR00042. Not 43 sorry

So yeah i stopt i though well hell again trow away the dvds. But something in me told me ghost  been so great this year i just cannot imagen it is as bad as Backitup by Nero.

So last try. Lets verify all discs. I select to do a verification in ghost 2003 windows and it reboot my pc in ghost and started nicely with the first DVD of 8.

It keeps asking for DVD after say 30 minutes. It askt ans askt and everything went OK! I though well this is working?????
And the last DVD 8 min left!!! yeahhhhhhhhhhhh hahaha 5 min!! and reboot machine.

I look into the log of ghost and gues what? Verification Success.

Dear forum Ghost experts --> Does this realy mean that i my backup to DVD spanned etc realy worked?

I cannot use the Ghost explorere i have no idea but it asks for the incorrect CDR000 ect version Segment 18 or so.
However i could live with that. But i hope some one know what to do it would be great to just reset some folders later on when i redo all my drive partition again.

I want and realy have no choice. Do a complete format remove ALL my partitions. Study HOW i should do good partitioning for C:\ D:\ and E:\ and then hope to be able to replay the image backup from DVD back from ghost dos into the *new* partitions. I know, i have to have the same space free.

I just now hope that the image on the dvd now that i wil make tonight of my E:\ drive does NOT inclose the error. Cause then when i could reset and reformat and partition again and reapply back this image i get the problem.. or do i see this not correct? Does Ghost 2003 (wich i just used with success) only backup data and not the $Volume Information $MFT or any error that might be in the partition table.

Cause realy guys i can still not understand why NTFS dos does not mount and what the hell Volume Information error is. It tells it about the NTFS Partition.

0X80:2 <-- Drive 1 Partition 2 this is E:\

However i will not bother anyone with this.. cause i do not think the forum is ment for it, however if someone 'sees''  anything that i do completely wrong? i am greatly willing to learn. So it could be my drives are wrong partitioned and then you can only see this error slowely comming beginning in dos

Or there is an error in ghost 8.3 (wich i do not realy believe)

Cause i could not even mount under NTFS dos pro. So yeah.

I hope this is not a to long post, but i had to make it very clear to understand.

Thanks for reading and if someone knows what i do wrong so that in the future i could partition the correct way or do something els a better way i like to learn that.

Maybe it is just 1 bit i have to change in E:\ and all is oke in NTFS dos, but i am scared to do it thats wy i need to backup (wich is a good thing anyway cause i am never thinking about it hehe)

Thanks all.. looking forward to some help (hopefully)

Maarten

Quote:


Yes it is i gues. No idea why it happend. Maybe there was a limitation on the 8.3 version.
I loaded it from a boot cd that made a ram drive of say 50 mb. and loaded cdrom drives.

Yesterday i used 2003 version just booting from the diskette. And after 24 hours it did made the image on dvd.
I knew i could believe ghost. It is the best app ever made in this kind of work. I love the creators of this idea.

I did a int check on 40 GB its about 8 dvd's. It says passed. Now i am done doing almost 50 DVDs hehe well i could do integry check but i just have the feeling i trust ghost in a way even with so many data.

I did however see while it was writing the image this :

01 Yes~.mp3   in windows this should be 01 Yes.mp3. I do not know why i saw a ~ while it was in dos version creating it. They say they make a identical copy? so i should believe it just shows this ~ but when the image is reset in windows there should not be ~?

I hope. so what i do now i copy all data of D:\ 40 GB to E:\ i have space 80 GB left. I will then format D:\ in windows. Reboot and try to reset the image of 8 DVDs back to D:\

Then i will try to search for file names that are not correct (if there are any) e.g. ~  etc. I thoubt it thoug, cuase otherwise i should have got problems in the past when i reset whol C:\ system drive. I think it is 100% identical however i have to check with D: before i start with E:\ drive

The D:\ drive is just a data drive. I just say that the partition is primary and it is set to active (No idea why) It is the only primary partition on the drive. Just 1 partition 40 GB thats all.
I tought it is set to active always when there is just 1 partition made that ofcourse can only be primary.

What i want to do is then if this test passes. Format C:\ main drive. Make a new Partition the one that i have now. So the correct volume information is back.

And then try to reset the backup of the bad E:\ partition back to E:\ from dos version 2003.

If ghost 2003 makes 100% identical copies of the folders and files then i am very safe i think.

If it somehow restores the bad partition volume information of the previouse E:\ then i have a problem.

I do not know what ghost addes to his GHO and GHS files other then folders, structure, and files.

Uhm, i know you can safe partition table info, however this i did ofcourse not do. I just used all Default Image settings.

The part where i could not see the image created, whel now it is on a DVD so i can not tell you if it does the same with 2003 version. However i am starting to believe this is a error of the 8.3 version. It seems 2003 is newer than 8.3

And i wrote somewhere here that you said 2003 is one of teh best versions for dos mode. So i realy like to follow your advise.

Thanks so mutch for helping me out!