How to Open a GHS File

A GHS file is a digital ghost, or more accurately, a part of a ghost. Norton Ghost software backs up applications, settings, folders and files and restores them even after system failures. Ghost stores the information from your hard drive or other disks as a digital image -- the ghost -- then uses that as the source for recovering lost data. Ghost saves the main body of the disk image as a GHO file, then saves excess data in one or more GHS files, named 001.GHS or 002.GHS in some versions of Ghost.

Instructions

1. • 1
     Reinstall the same version of Norton Ghost you created the GHS files with, if it isn't already on your computer. If you can't find or aren't sure of the original version, use whichever version you have available. Check that the version you're installing can handle GHS files -- Ghost 9.0 cannot.
   • 2
     Open Norton Ghost. If the GHS file hasn't been corrupted, Ghost should open the file without any problems. Click on "Open" in Ghost, find the GHS file you want and click to open it.
   • 3
     Download Ghost Explorer if you don't want to pay for Norton Ghost. Ghost Explorer is a free program available online from Symantec. Once installed, you can use it to open GHS files, see the contents and extract files or directories from the GHS image.
   • 4
     Run a registry scan if nothing seems to open your GHS file. Your Windows registry stores the configuration of your file folders and anything that confuses the registry -- a link to a file that no longer exists, for instance -- can interfere with your system. Microsoft has its own registry monitors and there are websites that will perform registry scans for free.