Hard disks can fail anytime. It has happened to the best of us at one time or the other. There is a reason for all those
hard drive recovery adverts you come across. Backing up data on the
backup software of your choice is only the first step towards data security and disaster data recovery. An integral part of the backup process has to be disk imaging. The
disk image software you deploy will help you retrieve information thats lost due to a faulty hard drive.
At the most basic level, simplistically speaking the disk image software will take a picture of your hard drive. What this means is that the software will record the state of each bit of your hard drive regardless of whether it holds file data, boot sector data or FAT data. This raw data will be available in case the drive crashes. While the files recovered by the data recovery software will be random and need a lot of spade work to reorganize, the data recovered when you use disk imaging is almost as is. There will not be any need to rework or rename the files.
If you have ever accidentally deleted files and have struggled to recover the same, you will appreciate the ability to go back in time to when the file was available, that the data imaging software gives you. Data imaging lets you recover data in an easier format than the recovery software. If you want data from just before a virus attack, look for the image from that time and retrieve your data from there.
When live copying or the ability to copy or image the drive while it is being used is available, disk imaging is even more necessary in your arsenal.
Especially if you have to manage a network of computers, disk imaging is a have to have resource. Imagine being able to deploy the OS, and all the programs you need to install on each of your 100 new computers by just copying the image of the first computer in all the subsequent ones! No wonder these disc imaging software are so popular.
Most network or system administrators have their own little kit of software that they pull out when they are faced with the myriad crises of their profession. And a disk imaging software is one of the most vital components in that kit for backup and disaster recovery.
