Drive Image 3.0

Starting the program from our Windows 98 desktop didn't work; the program's need to run in a DOS environment conflicted with the notebook's power-management system and caused the machine to shut down. To test Drive Image, we set it up to take a snapshot of a notebook computer's data partition and store the resulting image file on another partition. (In the test, the partitions were on the same physical disk, but it would have been just as easy--and in fact a good idea--to store the image file on a separate unit.)

It took about three minutes to store 400 MB of data in an image file without compression, though the software does offer compression if you're more concerned about the space your image files will occupy than about the time it takes to create them. Continuing with the test procedure, we deleted some files from the imaged partition to simulate a problem, then ran the Drive Image restore utility. It asked where to put the files stored in the image and added them back on the "damaged" partition. The process was speedy (again, about three minutes) and easy to perform.

The test computer wasn't equipped with any high-capacity removable-media drives, but Drive Image ships with drivers for Iomega Zip and Jaz drives as well as for Syquest drives. The program won't write to recordable CD-ROMs directly, but you can use a CD-ROM writer program to burn an image file onto a CD-ROM and later restore from that CD-ROM, provided you have the proper DOS drivers.

Drive Image runs as a DOS program because DOS, as a non-multitasking operating system, does not allow multiple files to be open simultaneously. As a result of this engineering decision, users of Windows NT must take care to install Drive Image to a FAT-formatted partition and boot to DOS before they use the program. Windows NT users also can install the software on floppies. By the same token, Drive Image works on nonbooting NetWare, Linux, and Unix disks. --David Wall

Amazon.com Product Description
Drive Image Pro 3.0 is a hard-disk imaging solution for IS professionals, fee-for-service providers, and configuration centers. Drive Image Pro allows you to create a compressed hard disk image file, then use that image file to quickly and easily deploy Windows workstations or upgrade existing workstations. Using PowerCast (SmartSector technology combined with TCP/IP multicasting), IS professionals can quickly deploy Windows across an enterprise, distribute applications, and manage changing desktop environments. Drive Image Pro's patent-pending SmartSector imaging speeds up the entire process and ensures that you'll preserve your Windows optimizations. Drive Image Pro also includes the award-winning technology of PartitionMagic Professional for added flexibility.

Now what Partition Image offers, and other programs don't, is the support of all available platforms. FAT, FAT32, NTFS from Windows NT 4, NTFS5 from Windows 2000, as well as Linux partitions. You can even restore single directories and files, instead of the complete archives. The backup and restore operations are very easy through a Windows program and they are fast. How long took your last Windows installation? An hour? Two? Three? When I run the program, it takes two to four minutes afor a restore of 1GB of data. And 5-10 minutes for a backup of 1GB of data. That is fast.

No other program can offer what this one does.

Got get it now!


Not pro - but standard !   June 15, 2000
Programs by powerquest is usually of a certain standard. This could not be called a pro-version, but standard. The program works, but do not have any real effects not seen before. You can get freeware that support same features. Partition Magic is still the best Powerquest product to date.