Hello Gerald, Yes, the image can be created using either Drive Image XML or Image for Windows. I mentioned being able to break the image down for purposes of burning to a DVD with Drive Image XML, but you don't have to do it that way. When I used Drive Image XML, I created an image and backed up to an external hard drive. The program gives the option of breaking the image into smaller parts for later burning, but if you only want to back up to an external drive then just create the image without breaking it down. Also, I mentioned the program before mentioning Image for Windows because you asked for a free program. Again, I have successfully and quite easily used Drive Image XML to create an image of a hard drive, and like Image for Windows it can be done without leaving the Windows environment. You can also easily use the extraction tool in Drive Image XML to browse to the backup on the external drive and restore one or more files without restoring the entire image. Like other programs, the restoring has to be done from a lower level than Windows. If you are interested in the free Drive Image XML then I suggest you visit their site and read a lot of the information about the program. Image for Windows is also an excellent program and only costs about $40, but you asked about a good free backup and restore program and i think you might want to look at DriveImage XML. The web site if you want to check into the program is www.runtime.org
Take care. Brian Lee brianl...@charter.net For answers to frequently asked questions about this list visit: http://www.jaws-users.com/help/
