Imaging with Ghost
The University of Findlay's College of Education

Creating An Image

Imaging is a two step process. The imaging process begins with a model computer. This computer has all necessary software installed and configured. This computer is used to create a file called an image. This image file is a full copy of the original computer's hard drive including all software and settings at the time the image was created. This includes things like a full copy of all cached web pages, temp files and all the hardware configuration settings. If the original computer was shut down improperly right before being imaged, the image will "remember" this.


Once an image file has been created, any computer can then have it's hard drive replaced with the contents of the image. If the original computer used to create the image becomes corrupted, the image can be restored to return the machine to its state at the time the image was created.

There are several things to be considered before using the imaging process to restore a corrupted computer.

  1. All data on the corrupted computer will be lost. Imaging usually starts by doing the equivalent of a disk format.
  2. The image file has all the software and hardware settings of the original computer. These may not be the same for the corrupted computer.
  3. Restoring an image will not fix a problem that is the result of a faulty hardware component.
  4. Some settings from the image may have to be changed. For instance, the IP number and computer name in the image may be different for the restored computer. These will need to be changed after the image is restored.
  5. You will have to have a way to get the image onto the corrupted computer (CD, LAN, 2nd Partition).

Imaging can also be used to roll out new computers. If a district purchases 20 new computers that are all the same, one of these machines can be setup to be the model machine. An image of that machine can then be used to quickly setup all other 19 computers. Once all the machines have been deployed, the image can be used in the future to restore any one of the machines to its initial state.