Best practices for Ghosting IBM computers

Products

• Ghost Solution Suite

Issue/Introduction

What are the best practices for using Ghost on IBM computers?

Symptoms
You may get 'signature' errors or failure to boot to Windows after restoring an image.

Cause

IBM computers have proprietary master boot records and enhanced security that requires additional configuration of Ghost.

Resolution

Ghost requires the use of the command line switch -IB and that the Security / Pre-Desktop Area be disabled in the BIOS.

• Blue screening can occur when using SATA / AHCI hard drives. They are best accomodated by using the latest version of Ghost, 11.5 and Windows PE. Using an older version of Ghost may require changing the setting for SATA in the BIOS to ' Legacy ' or ' Compatibilty '.
• In some cases you must also use the command line switch -FDSP to preserve the disk signature when restoring an image.
• Additional switches may be required: -FNI -FFX -NOIDE -NOUSB
• In some cases you may have to remove a laptop computer from a docking station.
• Other security settings in the BIOS can require user intervention. Disable them in the BIOS to allow for automated Ghosting.

References
Document: 'IBM Laptop fails to boot after cloning an image'available at http://service1.symantec.com/support/on-technology.nsf/docid/2006111517032525

Document "'Signature Failure' or 'Bad Block' errors when restoring an image to IBM laptops'" available at http://service1.symantec.com/support/on-technology.nsf/docid/2005011108290525


Technical Information
For information about usign Ghost with Lenovo laptops, check the link http://www-307.ibm.com/PC/support/site.wss/document.do?sitestyle=lenovo&lndocid=MIGR-57590.

• IBM laptops that have a fingerprint reader can have other settings under ' Security ' that would require user intervention when using Ghost in a pre-os environment. Alternatively, you could use ' hot imaging ' from the Console which would allow you to take an image while the Windows operating system is running.