Drive Image (software)


Drive Image is a software disk cloning package for Intel-based computers. The software was developed and distributed by the former PowerQuest Corporation. Drive Image version 7 became the basis for Norton Ghost 9.0, which was released to retail markets in August 2004. Ghost was a competing product, developed by Binary Research, before Symantec bought the company in 1998. This also explains the different file extensions used for Ghost image files: formerly it was.gho, now in versions 9.0 and above it is.v2i.

Product history

Drive Image version 7 was the last version published under the PowerQuest corporate banner. It was also the first version to include a native Windows interface for cloning an active system partition; prior versions required a reboot into a DOS-like environment in order to clone the active partition. In order to clone active partitions without requiring a reboot, Drive Image 7 employed a volume snapshot device driver which was licensed from StorageCraft Technology Corporation.
Drive Image 2002 is the last release that allows the creation of a rescue set on floppy disk, which can be used to create and restore an image.