What software can I use to compress and back-up an image of my drive to DVD-R?

before you go starting to backup your files, do you know anyone eles with a g5 with osx .X because you could use the remote boot feature

Nope, no one else with a G5. However, i do also own an iMac G4 running OS X but it's not at home with me ATM. In any case, I just want some way to keep a back-up of files on hand just in case ... nothing I'm going to use ATM.

well the best thought i had was remote boot as ive seen this help in alot of the time >.>

backup to be honest i have no clue usualy on my pc i just move everythi8ng to an extra drive

Well here's the thing. My mac has two drives (each with one partition). I used to use one of the drives and back-up to the other. However, I just decided to raid the two drives together 'n' stripe them (raid0) so now I just have one giant partition.