Norton Ghost 14.0 [Old Version]

Saves a lot of time when things go wrong

I bought this in order to clone my old disk drive when I replaced it with a larger one. Unfortunately Ghost assigned a different drive letter to the new disk, making it impossible to simply swap the disk drives as all the software was looking for drive C, rather than drive G as Ghost had named the new drive. Norton Ghosts Indian Tech Support was available by internet chat only unless I wanted to pay $1 per minute for telephone support... The Indian support rep had NO idea what to do, and did not seem to understand the term clone, and after consulting his/her computerized telephone script screens finally told me to contact Microsoft for further support. I returned Ghost as defective to the vendor and got a full refund on this useless, unsupported software. While researching Ghost problems on the net, I discovered that you can download a free copy of Acronis from Seagate, the manufacturer of my new drive. It could not have been easier to install and run the software. It cloned my old drive onto the the new drive, and I was able to instantly swap the drives with no interruptions in functionality. Note that Seagates free version of Acronis will search for at least one Seagate drive on your system in order to run. If it does not find a Seagate, youll be prompted to buy the license, but in my case, it had no trouble detecting the new drive connected to a USB port. Im very grateful to Seagate for including such a great tool at no additional charge with their drives!

I bought this software thinking it would have more capabilities and functions. Had I not gotten a good deal on it, it would not have been worth purchasing.

I must admit, Norton is getting better. I agree with most of the other comments below - this version of Ghost is better than previous versions, with much more efficient backup & friendlier user interface. But while it might do a quick, decent backup, it is not reliable in restoring your system. I simply cannot recommend any Norton/Symantec products. And for the life of me, I cannot understand how they have held onto a reputation of being the PC security/backup/recovery company. There are many, many better products out there that are free. Just to name a few security/recovery programs (that every PC user should use): ZoneAlarm or Comodo, AVG, a2, spybot search & destroy, AdAware, and every PC user should download and install the HOSTS files from MVPS-org. For backup, use a combination of these programs, and look on life hacker, boing boing, zdnet, and other forums for a backup/recovery system that works best for you. Do NOT rely on the Vista backup system, either. Or, buy a 1-touch external hard drive. Or perhaps my best advice would be, move to a Mac, or get Linux (I am especially enjoying the new Ubuntu version on my Asus Eee). But I strongly suggest avoiding the temptation to get ANY McAffee or Norton products. None of them work well.

works

I though v14 was better than v9, but I was wrong. In v9 I was able to copy from my laptop internal disk to another disk inserted in the same slot as the DVD rom normally stays... I am saying FULL copy, with boot capabilities, not just a backup file to be restored. Well, v14 CANNOT DO IT... I called Symantec support and I was told that it does not do disk copy into USB drives. The second disk inserted in the notebooks bay is seen as an USB drive. It use to work, exactly this way with v9. For my purpose, I do not recommend the product.

Ive used both Ghost 12 and 14 for years. For making a backup to an internal partition and restoring it to the original or new drive partition, Ive been quite pleased. Just be aware that to restore your system partition onto a new drive you first have to create and format the partition using the Windows install disk. It is okay if the target partition is bigger than the original, that is usually the point of a new drive. Non-system partitions can be formatted using the Windows Disk Management utility in the Control Panel, Administrative Tools, Computer Management section. I have not tried to use Ghost 14 with a networked drive nor have I tried the Copy my hard Drive function that other reviewers complained about. The user interface is not as intuitive as older versions. The Home screen does not include the One Time Backup method that I prefer. I found it under the Tasks icon instead. All the funtionality of previous versions is there if you look for it, but it really pushes the scheduled backups that I prefer to do manually. Once I had it installed, upgraded and working I disabled Live Update. Symantecs Live Update corrupted my copy of Ghost 10 right around the time my license expired. If it works, leave it alone and it will continue to work for years.

I own a Dell Dimension Computer with XP and a lot of installed software and I wanted to move my whole bootable C drive to a new larger drive. The software that came with my new Western Digital drive did not work. (Didnt expect it to really.) So I thought Id just go top of the line and buy this. Big Mistake. I tried Norton Ghost 14 three different times and it simply would not make a bootable copy of my original. (Each attempt takes several hours on a big drive.) The software is buggy and will not do what it is supposed to do. If you want to clone your drive, download Acronis True Image. Acronis worked perfectly the first time. Not only that but the download gives you a 15 day free trial. (If you cant clone your drive in 15 days, youve got a big problem.) Norton Ghost 14 is a big expensive piece of S@*& !!!! Acronis True Image, two thumbs up !!!!

I use nothing but Norton products. I received this product extreemly fast and was exactly as described. I would suggest to everyone to buy from this seller!

Vista Home Basic and Home Premium users were unfortunately ripped off when the product didnt come with a standard backup feature built into the operating system. Thus, solutions like the legendary Norton Ghost. - First good news is it installed within minutes on Vista x32 and x64 - Second good news is backing up to my external Maxtor One Touch was flawless. It backed up nearly 200GB in a little over an hour. - Third piece of good news is when making the Symantec Recovery Disc, you can tell it exactly where to find your driver files and load those onto the disc. But. . . - First bad news is the UI stinks to high heaven. Trying to go the simplified look with high feature rich innovation like of Apple didnt work here. Symantec failed miserably. I had to search online or in the Help more than once to figure out how to use many of the features. - Second bad news, is its failure to restore, which is an essential feature in a backup & restore solution. So many bad reviews on Amazon, but so few of the reviews anyone actually trying to do a OS restore. So you backup your pictures and docs to a USB drive, big deal. A manual copy & paste does that. But restoring a crashed OS is a key feature that should be tested. Suffice it to say, the restore process failed for me like it did for the few others who posted reviews where this was attempted - Third bad news is the online support for actual error messages stinks. If you get lucky and find an obscure message board with a fix, then count your blessings because the online knowledgebase from Symantec needs help for the Ghost v14 product. Im a support manager by trade and every business report will tell you the #1 deflector of calls in to Support is to get online resources. . .Guess Symantec isnt partaking in standard business practices OVERALL: If you need something that will backup your data automatically, this works. But for the price you might try searching Sourceforge first to find a free solution. The worst part, every review that tried to do an OS restore, including myself, was unsuccessful. A key reason NOT to get this product.