W98 Protection Progs

[reviver]

I know many of you are sufficiently clever to not need insurance, but I'm a worrier and am fed up of system crashes.

I'd appreciate some guidance if anyone has experience of installing and running various competing products.

How are the various safety programs like PCMedik, WinFix and Norton Utilities 2002 rated as protection programs please? :)

[pmasley]

The best protection is a good backup.

Basically the FAT ( DOS thru ME) system is nothing but a CRASH.

If you are not experienced with NTFS (NT3.0 thru XP), do not even try.

Now, I am not trying to be a smarta$$, but:

I have tried each of the progs that you listed. It seems that all they do is hog up resources that I can use elsewhere. Norton Ghost is pretty reliable though I would not put the Norton (any progs) group anywhere but file13 (trash can).

Before I attempt to explain this, I will show you my system and partition setup using a 20 gig harddrive.

c: 1.5 g O/S
d: 1.0 g Swap
e: 2.0 g Patches/Updates
f: 1.5 g General System Programs
g: 2.0 g Programs
h: 2.0 g Programs
i: 10.0 g MP3 or Files (If you lose these your **** is sunk drive)
j: CD Burner
k: CD Rom
l: DVD

Using Ghost, this is how I have set my system up. You have to take into mind how you have your drive(s) partitioned, for the number of CD's that you will need. Regardless of the OS, I alsway set the swap (page) file on a partition by itself. I put the OS on one by itself (normally C), but triple the partion size. The OS partition sounds like wasted space but it is not. Believe me, you will need it in the future. I then put my running progs in a different partition.

Now for the setup. You will need Three CD's for the O/S.

Install your O/S on C: Drive with all needed patches (Thanks to GOD Gates) including your internet accesses. Before your shut down, move the swap (page) file to drive D:

Ghost a copy of this drive (C:). This is your basic setup and mark it as C: SETUP

Now tweak the hell out of the O/S to where you want it.

Ghost another copy of this drive (C:) and mark it C: TWEAK

Skip Drive D:

Copy all of your patches to E:

Install your basic system programs on F: "Virus Protection, Accelerator progs, firewalls, ect.

Install your progs to G: and H:, Microsoft Office, Corel office ect.

Copy your safe files to I:

After you have completed a setup like or similar to this and have it running the way you like, including all progs that you CANNOT DO WITHOUT:

Ghost the following drives:

Ghost C: and mark it SYSTEM C:
Ghost E: and Mark it PATCHES E:
Ghost F: and Mark it SYSTEM PROGS F:
Ghost G: & H: and mark them Applications G: or H:
Ghost I: and mark it Safe Files.

It took me over 12 hours to set my system up and make the CD's.

I can now wipe the entire drive and reset the system in 45 minutes with the Ghost CD's. Every thing is back to the way I like it.

This is basically an error free way to do it. Say for instant you install a new application to G: drive and it screws up the system.

All you have to do is reinstall the Ghost C: System and Ghost G: Applications and you are back to where you started and the screwed up application is no where to be found. If you install something that you want to keep, all you have to do is ghost the c: drive and the drive where you installed the new app.

As I am sure you are aware of, some patches ca completely toss an O/S. It is great to pop the C: System CD in the drive and restore it less the screwed up patch.

I know this is a little long, but there is quite a difference between 45 minutes and 12 hours.

Later

Paul.

[pmasley]

I cannot figure out how the smiley faces got into the message, but it does not change the message.

[BipolarBill]

LOL! The smily code is : ) (closer, actually). you need to put some pace in there like so - (C: ).

[reviver]

Thanks Paul for that comprehensive guide.

I'm part way there already with my laptop - that's W2000, with a C OS & Essentials (IE6, Office),E for other progs,F for Drive Image Backups, and G for my data/personal files. After some cogitation about your more elaborate alternative I may go that way - one thing I haven't done is image to CDs; probably should (tho' I backup all my personal files that way).

However, my original enquiry was regarding a W98 setup that I'm doing on a amalgamation of three older systems into one reasonable one (the two biggest hdds; fastest CD-ROM; an old, but working CDRW; Cyrex 333 CPU; etc) for my wife. And so I wanted to make this as safe as poss for her.

But on reflection, it's probably best I also setup W2000 for her - provided I can get all the correct drivers for her system.

Once again, many thanks for that guidance.