I am in search of some good reliable hard drive backup and restore software that will do several things:

-Do a complete back up of my hard drive
-Compresses that back up so the size is smaller then it should be (if possible)
-Don't need a CD to do the restore process, just use the software to restore the back up that way
-Or maybe a way to connect my new hard drive without the need to put it in an enclosure and then USB it that way.

As I will be upgrading my hard drive, should be here within the week or so, and I want to make it a smooth process without the need to go through the hell of reinstalling and updating everything. I did find one program that, but not to sure about it called DriveImage XML, that uses XML files to make a back up, and if anyone has heard of this software or used it, maybe you could help me when I am ready to do my transfer. I am no rush as I got about 3 weeks left in the semester and I won't be doing that process until school is over, and so I just need ideas for good soft that people have used and that have given them no problems whatsoever.

Do you think Norton Ghost will suit your needs? (I haven't actually used any backup programs or anything of the sort, so I'm not sure.)

I know this won't exactly answer your question, but this is what I am doing right now:

I have a laptop and use an external hard drive with a USB 2.0 enclosure. (I would jump to eSATA but for some reason, haven't yet. If you're iffy about an external because of the slow bottleneck problem that USB 2.0 will present, I suggest an eSATA PC card. eSATA seems to be more than twice as fast as the maximum speeds of USB 2.0 from what I've read.) I set My Documents to go to the external and install all my programs onto the hard drive, but I don't update anything since most updates are superfluous and even harmful as far as bloating up programs and adding new features that don't even matter to most people.

*glares at Windows Update*

Whenever I have to wipe the hard drive, it's a simple matter of wiping, reinstalling Windows XP and whatever programs I have, turning updates off for everything, and I'm good to go.

For all of my personal data, I have a separate backup drive to backup what's on the external that's always connected to the laptop. I do this once per month. When it's not being used, I leave it off.

This way, I don't have to back up my personal stuff every time I have a drive wipe (which takes forever), but I do have to go through the hassle of installing everything again.

I'm pretty sure Norton Ghost is the one with the most features out there for these kinds of task. Looking at your list I can say ghost does compress your backup image files into smaller sizes. You can store the image in a DVD or another drive. You don't need a CD to do the restore process. Its been years since I've used ghost though so they may have much more updated features now. The backup and restore process is very quick too.

By the way it was originally developed by some kiwis then brought by norton.

I was hoping to try look for a free alternative as this might be a one time thing, and spending $70 on software to do one thing isn't very appeasing to me. Since I have a external hard drive that I back up all my files on, although, it barely enough room to move this hard drive back up onto it. Either way, knowing how Norton works I would have to pay a subscription fee in order to use Ghost as well. So keep on posting some idea's as I am still thinking about the game plan to get this all done in one day.

Seagate puts out some OEM software called DiscWizard and I've heard good things about it. It seems it will do exactly what you're looking for and it will work with drives other than Seagate. From my own past experience working closely with Seagate, their products are reliable and topnotch.

It's free and can be downloaded from Seagate's tech support website here

Full documentation is found here