Well let's see. That is 9 Gigs too much.
With 9 gigs, you could almost back up an entire 100 GB hard drive with Ghost.
The 360 and Ps3 only have 512 MB of system memory.
(I think)

which version of ghost are you using? i can only managed to squeeze 24GB of data into 13GB even with maximun compression.

Anyway, 10GB isnt that bad now-a-days considering most prebuilt computer comes with at least 10x of that.

Uhh... I feel the need to point out that you need between 30-60GB of space to back up a 100GB drive with Ghost, assuming the drive is nearly full. I make this assumption because you did not specify. The variance depends on what kind of files exist in the image file and how compressible they are.

Don't try to give me that shit about how I don't know what I'm talking about either... I work in the IT department of one of the world's top 10 software companies (no, not Microsoft), deploying and rebuilding Ghost images nearly every single day.

How is that size 9GB too much anyway? A 320GB hard drive from Seagate currently goes for approximately $89 CAD at NCIX. Most companies will likely get a bit of a discount too.

Your argument would have been valid 5 years ago, but not anymore.

Memory is alot different then hard drive space. memory = fast in small bits
hard drive = relativly slow but large space

But yes 10 gigs is alot that is not the actual system.

Just out of curiousity... What is the big deal about Vista using 10GB of space? That is hardly anything these days with 500GB drives going for $120 (yes, I looked up the price on Newegg to make sure I don't exaggerate to try to make a point).

Also, what does "with 9gigs, you could almost back up an entire 100GB hard drive with Ghost" have to do with anything? By your argument, then that would also mean that with Ghost, you could back up the image to 1GB. Once again... I don't see the point you're trying to make.

"The 360 and Ps3 only have 512 MB of system memory. "

What in the world does that have to do with Windows Vista? Game consoles have operating systems streamlined just for games... that's it. Windows Vista / XP / Apple OS X / Linux are full operating systems built for many things on multiple hardware (not talking about Windows XP Embedded / streamlined Linux for specific hardware, etc)

As for the image needing about 1GB of RAM, that is also not a big deal. With 2GB of RAM going for $86 (G Skill F2-6400CL5D-2GBNQ... I happen to have 4GB of this), it should be easy to run Vista in a VM.

Hi hi , just for games 512MB(XBOX360 AND PS3), for WORD and excel VISTA 2GB. Hi, hi...

I use specially crafted disk images for my VMs - the disk images are 4 Gb uncompressed, with 1.5 Gb used by OS and basic apps. Shutting down useless services for a VM (system restore, print spooler, server...) and reducing swap file to a minimum, this 4 Gb disk image can be compressed to 800 Mb (and still work very well in snapshot mode).
Now, I would say that this special Vista version must use the same conditioning: not all services started, no system restore - but not compressed disk image.
As such, 10 Gb doesn't seem too much for a bloated OS like Vista.

Yes, I did say that Vista is bloated.

On the other hand, trying out Linux requires... a DVD drive. All hail dynamic fused RAMdisks.

Alright already.
It has been awhile since I used it. I seem to have stopped using norton products after they crashed my raided system. Started Slip-Streaming XP.
I also wish to state that I never used full compression. I Though however, that I read something
about ghost's efficiency a couple years back - Maybe it was from 2003 a few ago. I can't remember. I was Ethernal.
I still hold my stance on the excess space though.
Yes, who cares about 10 Gigs? The Q is what uses that much space? Page system files?

by the way, anything better out there than Norton?

Yea, I have a comment... what???

Mitch just a little correction, For linux all you need is a CD drive not a DVD drive. Ubuntu's liveCD/installer is only 700mb and that's for a full featured OS with OpenOffice and just about everything you might need.

Now if you just need a basic OS (web and simple office stuff), Puppy linux will run off a 64 mb jump drive and 128mb of ram. No HD required.

The lamers might just offer a VMWare Player image as well, so that "normal" people could try it out, too.

What is VMWare's functionality efficiency?

you can create and use virtual pc's, like that one, for free.

or maybe that isn't normal.

Valis