Have you ever heard of drive imaging? This where a complete copy can be made of your C:\ (main) drive for storage in a different hard drive, a hard drive partition or some form of removable media, i.e. a CD. It's an absolute boon for when your computer gives trouble.

This isn't a requirement for it's use but the ideal time to use drive-imaging software is just after a disk format and re-installation of the basic Windows operating system. So, firstly, some words about formatting. Don’t panic! Just spend a few hours on the following before doing anything else:

a) Find your important or created files and store them away from the C:\ drive on a remote drive or CD.
b) Make sure that you know your ISP connection password and user name. Also any other passwords and user names.
c) Write down all key numbers needed to reinstall software.
d) Make a Windows start-up disk using the facility within Windows. Try it to see that it works OK and that you get a drive letter for the CD ROM.

Normally, that is all that’s necessary before taking the formatting plunge. However, for the purposes of drive-imaging, it is necessary to install the imaging program and follow the instructions for making a floppy disk for later use. Make sure it works by inserting the floppy and booting the computer up. It should start the imaging program up.

The disk can be formatted once thorough preparations have been made regarding the above.

When the format is complete restart the computer with the Windows start-up disk inserted in the floppy drive. Type: E:\ (or whatever the CD ROM drive letter is) and press Enter. Type: SETUP. Then reinstall the following:

1. The operating system (W.98, Windows XP etc)
2. Sound and Video card drivers
3. Scanner and printer software
4. The word processor.
5. The modem or network card driver (once installed, set up the Internet connection).
6. The latest updates for the Windows operating system using Microsoft Windows update service.
7. The latest version of your preferred browser (usually available from computer magazines). If Internet Explorer is installed, apply any available updates using Microsoft Windows update service.
8. Transfer all you previously backed up important or created files into their rightful folders on the C:\ drive.
9. In short, install any basic software that is needed to run the computer or any software not likely to be changed or updated in the near future.

With that done, set up:
a) Menu layouts
b) Program preferences
c) Passwords necessary for logging into forums.

All this can take a good number of hours to complete but those brave enough to go get to the stage of a bug free new installation can then restart the computer using the floppy previously made by the drive-imaging program. When the program has started, follow the options for copying the contents of your newly rebuilt installation onto a CD or other preferred drive. Job done. You'll then be able to use the copy to quickly restore the computer to the 'new installation' condition any time you want to.

As mentioned at the beginning, this is perhaps the best and most ideal time to take an image of the drive. However, imaging software doesn’t have to be used in conjunction with drive formatting. It can be installed and used at any time.

If your system is running correctly with no glitches and you are completely happy with it then why not take a copy of it? Then, if troubles occur in the future, you can always dump the working copy of your file system back onto the computer hard drive and be up and running smoothly again in 20 minutes or so.

These paragraphs all relate to using Norton Ghost but there are also other programs that function in a similar fashion.

An alternative:
There are ‘go back’ programs available (Windows ME has it’s own) that will take the computer back to a point of time before any troubles began but my preference is for drive-imaging. It seems to me that any program that allows a ‘go back’ point must shadow your moves to a degree and take up a chunk of disk space. Perhaps this doesn’t matter with faster computers with large drives but unfortunately I don’t fall into that category, so I find drive-imaging software really useful.

You must have been thinking of my very problem, TW! Last night I was considering the best way to back up my C: drive since I could never recreate the files and modifications to files and programs that are on the drive now.
I am barely computer literate because the art has moved beyond my understanding.
This is what I was thinking: put a blank CD into my D: drive then go from Windows to DOS and type the command: diskcopy c: d:
It sounds too simple and I'm afraid to try it and be laughed at by my more computer literate friends.
I have a 4 gig hard drive with 2 gigs used up. I figure that it would take 4 or 5 writable CD's to download my C: drive.
All I want is an exact copy of my C: drive files to load into a new drive if, and when, the old one fails.
What is it about computers that doesn't allow making a direct usable copy?

Diskcopy is a Windows utility for copying the contents of floppy disk to another floppy disk rather than for copying whole drives.

The good thing about imaging software like Norton Ghost or DriveImage is that it copies your whole system with boot info, preferences and everything. When you use the copy the computer ends up working and looking just the same as when the copy was made.

I've used Ghost very many times without a hitch but I still think its best to be perhaps over-cautious and back up important documents, files and information to a couple of places before overwriting the present disk information with the copy. Then, if the copy were to fail, the situation although somewhat disasterous, would at least be recoverable from. However, this has got to be an outside chance, so if you want to create a copy this way I'd say go for it.

I've got a few copies of my hard disk on CD's with various other browsers, programs and configurations on them. It takes me only a short time to go from one to the other should I want to. I now have confidence that it will work every time.

One thing I did find is that the copy needs to be read by drive it was created in. The only time the software has ever made me catch my breath was when I put the copy into my normal CD ROM drive rather than the CD-R drive and then tried to copy it to the hard disk. The copy would not work like that.

Another thing to remember before overwriting the hard drive with the copy is to back up any files created since the copy was made.

Thanks for the info and the prompt reply, telly. I'm going to check out Norton Ghost. I have my files and programs fine tuned for my preferences and would sure hate to lose them!