Ghost Solution Suite 2.5
Symantec Ghost Solution Suite 2.5 is the imaging software for both Windows and Linux that enables network administators to efficiently image, deploy and manage OS installations and disks for secure migration, hardware and software inventory or system retirement.
Symantec Ghost Solution Suite can create images of operating systems, user files and settings, and installed updates using the sector-based method of imaging.
- Key Features
- Key Benefits
- Product Description
- System Requirements
- Is this product right for me?
- Compare Similar Software
- FAQ
Key Features
- Make images of a live system using the hot imaging feature
- Reduced administrative overhead through the centralized management console
- Run all management, imaging and migration tasks from a single administator console
- Uses the DeployAnywhere technology by Symantec that allows administators creation of images that are hardware-independent
- Ghost Solution Suite 2.5 fully supports Microsoft Windows Vista including Vista 64-Bit
- Includes Vista inventory filters that speeds-up imaging on Vista machines
- Store software and hardware inventory in Ghost Solution Suite database for quicker and more efficient management of your images across the network
- Symantec Ghost Solution Suite 2.5 is available for both Microsoft Windows and Linux
- Configure and schedule tasks remotely
- Deploy virtually thousands of Linux and Windows systems across the network
- Support for imaging of logical drives
- Migrate PC user settings, files and profiles hassle-free
- Securely migrate your data and retire your old systems
- Reduced network bandwidth utilisation
- Extremely easy to learn, deploy, and use
- Faster imaging thanks to MS Windows Preinstallation Environment (Windows PE)
- Encrypt images and grant / revoke access rights to them to specific users or groups of users
- Supports ext2, ext3 (Linux) and FAT, FAT32 and NTFS (Windows) partition types
- Create images of drives up to 2 TB in size
Key Benefits
- Save time and money while planning and executing system management, deployment, and migration
- Reduce administrative overhead and costs involved
- Automate routine administrator tasks
- Perform management and helpdesk tasks remotely right from your desktop
- Design a consistent and transparent file / user settings environment across the network
- Suitable for organizations of all sizes: from small and mid-sized to large companies and institutions
- Supports Vista migration
- Significantly reduced number of images and amount of generated network traffic
- Unbeatable performance and speed compared to other software available on the market and OS-standard tools
Product Description
Symantec Ghost Solution Suite 2.5 is the most widely used migration and mirroring solution for corporate customers, mid-size and small companies.
Symantec Ghost Solution Suite 2.5 delivers comprehensive tools for OS and user settings/profiles migration, hardware-independent migration (Symantec's DeployAnywhere technology), hardware and software assets audit and inventory, centralized management console for remote administration and it also enables network administrators and managers to efficiently plan and securely complete system retirement.
Symantec Ghost Solution Suite 2.5 allows administrators to remotely plan and execute system migration without the need of physical presence at the network desktops. GSS 2.5 can speed up routine tasks, lower administrative overhead and significantly cut costs and time during system migration.
You can buy Ghost Solution Suite or renew Ghost license via Symantec online store.
System Requirements
Ghost Solution Suite may be installed in a variety of fashions and components. The selection of components you choose for installation will determine your system requirements.
Please refer to the following Ghost Solution Suite configurations so see which one applies to you:
Symantec Ghost Server and Console installed on same box
- Minimum video display mode is 256 colours at 800x600 screen resolution
- Supported operating systems:
- Windows Vista Business
- Vista Enterprise
- Vista Ultimate
- MS Windows Server 2008
- Windows Server 2003 Standard and Enterprise Edition SP1
- Windows Server 2003 R2 Standard and Enterprise Edition
- MS Windows 2000 Server Service Pack 3
- MS Windows 2000 Professional
- Windows XP Professional SP2
Symantec Ghost Imaging Tools
- RAID is supported in hardware mode only
- Supports Linux ext2, ext3 and MS Windows NTFS, FAT32, and FAT partitions
- Supported operating systems:
- MS Windows Vista Business, Vista Enterprise, Vista Ultimate Edition
- Windows Server 2003 R2 Standard and Enterprise Edition
- Windows Server 2003 Standard and Enterprise Edition SP1
- Windows XP Professional Service Pack 2
- Windows 2000 Server Service Pack 3
- MS Windows 2000 Professional
Symantec Ghost Console Client
- Installed and operational Windows Networking,
- Working device drivers for network interfaces
- Single boot system is required as there's no dual boot support available at this moment
- The following 64-bit and 32-bit Windows OS are supported:
- Microsoft Windows XP
- Windows 2000 Professional (support for 64-bit Itanium is not included)
- Microsoft Vista Business, Vista Enterprise, and Vista Ultimate Edition
- Windows applications running in 32-bit mode
Is this product right for me?
What is the target audience?
Ghost Solution Suite 2.5 is intended for use by IT professionals, IT administators, managers, and CIOs.
In terms of organisation size primary targeted are SME businesses with 50 to 999 desktop seats and secondary target are enterprises and institutions with up to 4999 seats.
How do you define a potential customer for Ghost Solution Suite 2.5?
Businesses and organisations who require a quick, cost-efficient and easy-to-deploy migration solution for Windows and Linux environments are potential customers for Symantec's GSS 2.5.
If your organisation needs an easily configurable software tool that works without the need of complex configuration and/or if you don't have resources to manually migrate systems or build your upgraded infrastructure from scratch, then Symantec Ghost Solution Suite may help you.
Ghost Solution Suite can take the burden of manual migration of systems and user profiles off you, significantly improving security of data while reducing migration time and lowering TCO.
Compare Similar Software
Compare feature enhancement of Ghost Solution Suite 2.5 to earlier versions
The latest release of GSS 2.5 is a feature-rich, and improved version of the Ghost Solution by Symantec. Please refer to the table below for detailed comparison of the new features in this release to previous versions of Ghost Solution Suite.
| Feature | Ghost 6.5 | Ghost 7.5 | Ghost 8.0 | GSS 1.1 | GSS 2.0 | GSS 2.5 |
| High performance and speed while creating mirrors |  |
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| On-the fly compression of images created | |
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| Images and archives are browseable | |
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| Do partitioning of disks using custom scripts | |
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| Migrate users and settings using built-in Ghost tools | |
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| Support for Unicast deployments included | |
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| Support imaging on a peer-to-peer basis | |
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| Perform incremental creation and update of images | |
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| Use virtual partitions | |
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| Central administration and management console for remote deployments | |
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| Install client management software remotely | |
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| Included support for boot CD media | |
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| Software and hardware inventory and audit | |
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| Full support for 32-bit operating systems | |
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| Preserve important system files during installation | |
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| Multicast Network Support generates less network traffic | |
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| Run scheduled jobs at a specific time | |
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| Write your own advanced scripts that control Ghost | |
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| Boot machines from USB and Firewall | |
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| Migrate users and settings directly from the Central Management Console | |
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| File- and sector-based operations for more accruacy | |
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| Machine groups | |
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| Native support for 64-bit versions of Windows OS | |
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| Full support for Microsoft Vista and MS Vista migration | |
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| Improved support for various RAID devices and configurations | |
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| Browse, manage and edit NTFS images | |
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| Wipe disk files securely conforming to the latest data disposal standards | |
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| Includes DeployAnywhere technology by Symantec that supports deployment on different hardware | |
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| Hot Imaging of live workstations | |
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| Linux and Windows-based support of Logical Volumes | |
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| Built-in support for third party images including PowerQuest PQI, VMware VMDK, and Symantec BackupExec System Recovery V2i | |
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| Integrates Windows PE Preboot Operating System | |
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FAQ
Question:
What products are included in Ghost Solution Suite 2.5?
Answer:
Symantec Ghost Solution Suite includes the following tools:
- Symantec Client Migration (enables you to create images of PC user settings and profiles)
- Symantec Ghost Corporate Edition (enables you to create images and deploy them)
- Symantec PQ Tools (facility that enables you to customize DeployCenter)
- Symantec GDisk (cleansweep sensitive data from your disk irrecoverably)
- Symantec DeployCenter
Question:
Why Ghost now includes all the above listed products?
Answer:
Symantec Ghost Solution Suite 2.5 includes DeployCenter, Client Migration and Symantec Ghost that have been bundled into one product to deliver greater value to Ghost customers.
Question:
What is the difference between Norton Ghost and Symantec Ghost Solution Suite?
Answer:
Norton Ghost is designed for home PC users to assist them with backup and restore tasks commonly performed on a standard desktop.
Symantec Ghost Solution Suite is intended for enterprise and corporate use enabling system and network administrators to easily plan and execute system migration and retirement.
Question:
What is the difference between Symantec Ghost and Symantec Backup Exec?
Answer:
While Symantec Ghost may be used to perform basic backup and recovery tasks, it is not intended to act as a fully-fledged backup solution for corporate customer.
If you require a tool for your sophisticated, all-round backup needs, you'd be probably better off with Symantec Backup Exec solution. With Symantec Backup Exec you can run scheduled, incremental backups of selected files and folders, restore systems from a saved recovery point and much more. » Click here for more information about Symantec Backup Exec.