I've just found a solution to my problem.

I have switched to Acronis True Image and it's bootable environment works perfectly with my SATA optical drive.

Thanks, NightOwl.

I did this a a last resort, believe me. I have been a Ghost user for many, many years and never had a problem until I installed the SATA DVD burner.

In the Symantec forums, support staff recommend setting the SATA controller in BIOS in legacy IDE emulation and that probably solves the problem but I can not do that. I wouldn't do it even if I could because that would mean that I would not be able to take advantage of several SATA features - AHCI, Native Command Queing, etc.

The odd thing is that, in a way, Symantec acknowledges the problem but does not offer a viable solution. I've googled for SATA, bootable, Ghost the last couple of weeks and there are a lot of posts out there and the only solutions appear to be ugly hacks.

The box where I currently have the SATA DVD burner has also an IDE DVD burner but my plan is to keep only the SATA drive and eventually replace all the IDE optical drives at home with SATA ones.

So, to recap:
- I've succesfully updated my universal boot cd with the gcdrom.sys driver in config.sys and can see and read from the SATA drive in DOS.
- If I boot from the IDE DVD burner, Ghost works fine and can see the SATA drive.
- If I boot from the SATA drive, Ghost hangs in the GUI.

Hope this helps.

Best regards
Martinus

NightOwl wrote on Mar 4^th, 2008 at 1:36am:


Config.sys
Code:

[menu]
menuitem=CD, Start computer with CD-ROM support.
menuitem=NOCD, Start computer without CD-ROM support.
menudefault=CD,30
menucolor=7,1

[CD]
device=himem.sys /testmem:off
device=oakcdrom.sys /D:mscd000
device=GCDROM.SYS /D:MSCD001 /C0

[NOCD]
device=himem.sys /testmem:off


[COMMON]
files=10
buffers=10
dos=high,umb
stacks=9,256
devicehigh=ramdrive.sys /E 4096
lastdrive=z
device=display.sys con=(ega,,1)
 

Autoexec.bat
Code:

@ECHO OFF
set EXPAND=YES
SET DIRCMD=/O:N
set LglDrv=27 * 26 Z 25 Y 24 X 23 W 22 V 21 U 20 T 19 S 18 R 17 Q 16 P 15
set LglDrv=%LglDrv% O 14 N 13 M 12 L 11 K 10 J 9 I 8 H 7 G 6 F 5 E 4 D 3 C
cls
call setramd.bat %LglDrv%
set temp=c:\
set tmp=c:\
path=%RAMD%:\;a:\;%CDROM%:\
copy mouse.com %RAMD%:\ > NUL
copy mouse.ini %RAMD%:\ > NUL
copy doskey.com %RAMD%:\ > NUL
copy command.com %RAMD%:\ > NUL
set comspec=%RAMD%:\command.com
copy extract.exe %RAMD%:\ > NUL

:ERROR
IF EXIST ebd.cab GOTO EXT
echo Please insert Windows 98 Startup Disk 2
echo.
pause
GOTO ERROR

:EXT
%RAMD%:\extract /y /e /l %RAMD%: ebd.cab > NUL
LH %ramd%:\Mouse.com
LH doskey.com
echo The diagnostic tools were successfully loaded to drive %RAMD%.
echo.

IF "%config%"=="NOCD" GOTO QUIT
MSCDEX.EXE /D:MSCD000 /D:MSCD001


echo.
GOTO QUIT


:QUIT
set CDROM=
set LglDrv=

 

In the boot CD I have several directories with utilities - Ghost, Volkov Commander, etc. As I said before, I have used this boot CD for years and never had a problem.


NightOwl wrote on Mar 4^th, 2008 at 1:36am:


There is no Ghost-SATA HDD incompatibility whatsoever. I have no problems ghosting and restoring backups on any of the 4 boxes I have at home. All the boxes have SATA drives in AHCI mode and Ghost sees the drives and reads from/writes to them without a problem


Quote:


Well,  that's exactly the problem. Ghost is compatible with the SATA controller, actually it's compatible with all the Intel SATA controllers I've tested.

This is what is weird.
Booting from the IDE DVD: No problem. Ghost sees both optical drives.
Booting from the SATA DVD: Ghost hangs in the GUI.

I've tried every workaround I could think of. Changing the PATH environment, the COMSPEC environment, starting Ghost from the HDD instead of from the CD, using several switches: -NOIDE etc. All to no avail.

Quote:

I have already wasted enough time on this issue but, sure. I can test a couple of boot discs for you.

NightOwl wrote on Mar 4^th, 2008 at 10:42am:

No problem.

Quote:

Well, that's a standard Windows 98 Boot floppy which I converted to a CD a long time ago. I increased the Ramdisk size from the standard 2 MB to 4 MB and lately added gcdrom.sys. Never had a problem with it.

Quote:

No problem. Take your time. You don't need to include the Ghost executable. I can add it myself to the ISO or I can start it from the HDD

Quote:

It has to be something specific to the boot sequence. Something that triggers (or doesn't trigger) when booting from tha SATA DVD, as booting from the IDE DVD everything works perfect.

Quote:

It could be but I currently only have the Samsung SATA DVD. Can't test with another SATA drive at the moment. But if you google "Ghost gcdrom.sys SATA bootable" you will find a lot of posts out there with the same problem. Most of them are from Dell or HP users. Their newer models ship with a SATA optical drive and the only solution this people have found - as far as I can tell - has been to set the SATA optical drive in legacy IDE mode in BIOS.