[TriLUG] Non-Profit Refurbishing

[John Gilbert]

Hey Folks,
 
I'm new to the LUG, but I had a request/question for those with more
experience. I run a not-for-profit program called Teaming for Technology
(part of the Triangle United Way) that refurbishes donated computers to
be given to schools and other non-profit organizations in Durham,
Orange, and Wake counties here in NC. Right now our process for
refurbishing goes as follows:
1.We remove the hard drives from the donated machines.
2.We plug the HDDs into our "Killing Machine" where we run the open
source "Darik's Boot and Nuke" disk wiping program.
3.We plug the HDDs into our "Cloning Machine" where we run Norton Ghost
to clone our master image onto our new HDD.
4.We put the ghosted drive into a machine and load the drivers from the
image.
Now, as you can imagine, Norton Ghost isn't the cheapest license to buy
in the world, especially for a non-profit and for the number of
computers we go through annually. Basically we need to find an open
source solution to replace our current cloning process. Our master image
has Windows 2000 Professional (I know, I know, I wish we could put Linux
on them, too, but we can't do that thanks to our agreement with
Microsoft), all the drivers that we have needed to date (along with a
program that wipes off the unneeded drives when run), the open source
anti-virus program aVast!, the open source MS Office alternative
OpenOffice, and a few other odds and ends. We would like to be able to
have a piece of software that is bootable, able to clone at least hard
drive to hard drive and hopefully over a network as well, and as
reliable as Norton Ghost. We don't have much to offer in return other
than gratitude and recognition. We would be willing to name the program
after the maker(s) and even include his/her/their name(s) on our
background image that goes on 1000+ computers every year. If you have
any questions about the program feel free to email me at
jgilbert at unitedwaytriangle.org, call me at 919.463.5047, or check out
our website at http://www.unitedwaytriangle.org/2004/t4t/t4t.htm.
 
Thanks So Much!
 
  John Gilbert
  Technology Outreach Specialist
  Triangle United Way
  P.O. Box 110387 
  Research Triangle Park, NC 27709 
  919.463.5047    Direct 
  919.460.8687    General 
  919.460.9019    Fax 
  JGilbert at unitedwaytriangle.org 
  www.unitedwaytriangle.org