Ghost Solution Suite

This is how we used to do it, back before GSS and the Ghost Console. You can use the utility to create a boot disk (floppy or CD/DVD) which you can use to boot into a DOS environment, automatically loading network drivers and running the client. You can then have the individual clients connect to the Ghostcast session you set up on your server and send the image out to multiple workstations at a time via multicast.

You can put the image on the DVD and use that, though if you do you'll need one for each machine you want to image simultaneously. If you use a boot disk and connect to the server, the disk can be removed one the client is running and used to boot another PC.

We never automated it since we generally rolled things out in small stages and still did a lot of post-image configuration by hand (like I said, this was pre-Console), but I'm sure you can give command-line arguments to the Ghost client to get it to connect to the right server and session automatically.

Hi,
From what you are describing you can do the following to automate the process. Run 3com PXE server that comes with GSS. From Ghost boot wizard create network package that you can install to PXE server. This network package will contain ghost.exe that you can run with any parameters that you wish. In your case you'll configure it to connect to Ghostcast multicast session that you will run back on the Ghost console machine.
On Ghost console machine start up Ghostcast server and configure it with same options that you provided to the clients (eg. session name, disk number etc) and click 'accept clients'.
Boot client machines to PXE server, ghost.exe will automatically start with specified parameters. Once all clients have connected to Ghostcast server click 'send'.
That should do the trick for you.

I have a Ghost Cast Server that i constantly use to puch images to my clients. However i am leaving for Australia and need to push the same Image to more Clients once I get there. I would like to do this from DVD, however Ghost Cast does not have a burn to DVD option, i am using Symantec Ghost Corporate Ed 8.0. If i burn the .GHO files to a DVD and try to push them to the client Via a Ghost Cast Startup Disk, it tells me that the Disk was not Created by Symantec Ghost. How do i fix this problem, oh and i leave in less that a week, so this is kinda important. I will be very grateful for any suggestions.


LCpl Edwards

Hi,

I'll start with options that you have and then ask some questions regarding your post that are not clear to me.

Firstly - your best option would be to either use floppy or PXE booting. Floppy would be more preferable in your mobile case.
1. Create simple ghost floppy boot disk with network support.
2. Burn gho image together with ghostcast exe onto a DVD. From memory ghostcast exe is completely standalone app and you can run it pretty much from anywhere.
3. Startup ghostcast exe, point it to your gho image on DVD and start the restore session.
4. Boot client machine from floppy, connect to your ghostcast session and restore your image.

Similar story goes for PXE booting but it may not suit your moving environment as much. Hopefully this is what you need.

Now back to your original question that I want to ask few more questions to better understand your problem.
1. You are saying that you gho to DVD and "someone" tells you that disk was not created with symantec ghost, who's that? Ghost exe or ghostcast exe or someone else?
2. Also what do you mean by "ghost cast startup disk"? Is it just floppy disk created by ghost boot wizard or something else?

Thanks!

Hello,

First I want to say thank you for the quick response. Secondly I figured it out yesterday, after I had posted my question. However i still wish to discuss with you the easiest method of doing this.
   To answer your questions. I build the Floppy Boot Disks then convert them into a Bootable CD. it is a much easier method i believe than using two floppy disks. PXE boot was recently enabled on our Ghost Cast Network that we built and that works great. As for burning the Image to a DVD I had been taking the .GHO Files created by the Ghost Cast Server and then using Nero Burning ROM to put them on DVDs, which doesnt work. When you boot the Ghost Cast Software on the Client then select the LOCAL, then FROM IMAGE, then selecting the disk drive, when it boots it either says "This is not the First Disk in the set", or "This Disk was not created by Symantec Ghost." That was the origonal problem.
   I resolved this issue by Booting from the Ghost Cast CD, then Selecting LOCAL, TO IMAGE, then selecting the Drive. Ghost.exe itself then burnt the iamge to the disk via the Laptop, which was then accepted by the Ghost Cast Software.
   Did that answer all your questions?
   Do you have any suggestions?
Thank you again
LCpl Edwards

Hi,

I am still a little confused when you say "when you boot the Ghost Cast Software on the client then select LOCAL ...", I think you mean you boot either CD or floppy, which in turn started ghost.exe and from there you select LOCAL etc.? Hopefully this is the case. If this is true then you might be correct - ghost might not like the fact that there is something else on CD/DVD - it might consider that it should only contain an image and if it does not, it complains.

You other option (rather than making two floppies, then burning them to CD and booting from that CD) might be to simply create bootable USB drive but then you are talking about Ghost 8.0, which is more than 2.5 years old. You probably want to upgrade to latest GSS 2.0.1 release (Ghost 11), which will provide you with richer choices. If you stay with 8.0 then either:

• booting from CD and then after ghost.exe starts up to use DVD containing just gho image burnt with ghost.exe
• booting from CD and then connect to GhostCast server running standalone on the same network and broadcasting this image from DVD to restore
  

Hey,

That is the Ghost.exe Software from the floppys.
How do i go about updating to GSS 2.0.1?

Thanks

Hi,

You can download it from Symantec online store here. I am not sure whether they still sell 2.0 (ghost 11) Gold release or 2.0.1 (LiveUpdated recently) version. In either case you can run LiveUpdate to get your version updated to 2.0.1 afterwards.

Hey,

Thanks for your help. i will look into getting Ghost 11.

Sincerely,
LCpl Edwards

Best of luck! :smileyhappy: