NICK_P,

DVD option missing

This is all I could find. I guess it doesn't apply to you. Your frustration is understandable but most folks here prefer writing a backup image to the HD first and then burning to DVD.

Thanks for postings - they provided the kick start need to get a solution.

NightOwls comment re the optical drives being visible; they both were visible. However since the latest serious attempt to cure the problem the DVD drive kept on changing its drive letter from “W” to the earliest available drive (K) at a reboot. This problem went away when the Ghost problem was cured.

Having tried everything, I decided the only answer was to delete everything related to Norton / Symantec. Already had proved using the normal uninstall had no effect on problem so manually deleted entries in Program folders then deleted C:/Documents and Settings/USER/Application Data/Symantec — where USER was each of the defined users including “All Users” and “Default User” (had to drop into Safe mode to get rid of some files).

Then made sure registry was clean using a combination of Ultra Win Cleaner and then RegCleaner (an old utility which still finds registry entries others miss). Also made sure all temporary files were deleted from the system.

After rebooting and reloading Norton Systems Works 2005 Premier, Ghost was showing with both the optical drives and even showing the correct drive letters! Only problem left to solve is that Norton AV refuses to load (both 2005 and 2006 version) so have changed to another product to protect the machine at the moment.

Re Brian’s comment about burning to a HD first, it is an option I use but with a number of data drives to backup, I prefer the direct creation of DVDs as it is very easy to forget to create all the disks having created the Ghost image to a HD. Direct writing creates the automatic “nag” to insert another disk and only records that a backup has been created if it completes the burn.

Many thanks to everyone - hope the solution that I have found helps others.

Nick P