System Restore, GoBack, Winternals Recovery Manager... etc

[Suxen]

Hey all,

I have a fantasticly amazingly habit - either through pure bad luck, or general lack of talent (I digress, but I would say my computer skills are very capable these days so I'm opting for 'bad luck') - of accidently ruining my OS installations.

Quick bunch of details: I use nLite to create an OS installation disc (of XP) and integrate the latest patches, etc, then go thorugh the installation. All apps/personal files are on E, everything else is on C, so reinstalling is quick. But to get to the point, it's still a pain having to go through reinstalling so much. Third time this year already, having a bad year.

I've looked at Winternals Recovery manager - it's good, but too complicated for my needs. I couldn't ever get it to work on my base workstation, because from what I can tell it's not designed for single workstation installation, more network/multiple system based where one computer is for storing backups, and the rest can be scheduled to take backups and store the data via the network.

System Restore is okay, but here's an example of where I find it failing

Day 1 - Created recovery point, installed applications

Day 6 - Uninstalled an application

Day 7 - Screwed up system, decided to revert to day 1

Well, it partially worked, but it left me with a few missing files and inability to unstall the application I did on Day 6 because those files were removed on day 7 and not all of them were brought back on the day 1 image. Also, some other files can be left lying around.

Lastly, tried Norton GoBack. Interesting program, but I see a lack of options which is somewhat painful. I want to exclude certain directories from being backed up, but I can't. Irritating.

Are there any other products, more advanced than GoBack but not the level of Winternals, that do a similar job to System Restore only more efficiently? If not... what would you suggest?

I know I could create system images every day and such, but as all my personal files are on E as well, that creates another whole problem. Why create an image of 100GB of data when all I need a backup of is the windows folder, a few files in program files that have changed, and a few files in application data. I don't want to have to lose latest emails in outlook, for example, because I've have to restore my OS to a state 7 days ago.

That's what I like about system restore, if I can credit it for anything. I don't lose my updated files, but I can restore the system (okay, I actually have lost a few files when using system restore, which is why I'd further like the ability to exclude a directory from changes being recorded).

I'd love to hear suggestions. I'd really like to up my level of productivity rather than waisting all my time just fixing my computer.

EDIT: Just wanted to add, I use SyncBackSE for keeping backups of personal data. It's great, it'd the kind of backup software I've searched for for years. I absolutely love it. But it doesn't solve my issues of wanting an easy way to rollback my system into a working state.

Edited January 20, 2006 by Suxen

[DigeratiPrime]

Acronis True Image.

Use it to make backup images of your C partition.

Store these images on your E: partition.

when you mess up C: pop the cd in and restore the C: partition from the image file.

This takes minutes to do. And Acronis is a excellent value imo.

[modernponderer]

Use Norton Ghost. It can create images of entire partitions!

[Suxen]

Tried it, the only issues I have with that are it's not incremental (though when I think about it, I believe you can make it so - however, the following point is still an issue, keep reading ).

While all my apps + data files are on the E drive (pretty handy, I guess you could say), if I uninstall an application then revert to a previous image that was taken while the application was still installed, you have an interesting situation. Windows will be looking for things that don't exist, registry entries that are no longer valid, etc. Solution is to reinstall the application, then uninstall it again so it removes the redundent crap from the registry. The second thing is if I have a lot of apps recently installed, think it's a mistake, and want to go back to an earlier state when they weren't installed, I have to work out what I can safely remove from the program files directory, and the documents and settings/user/application data that may have been added and isn't valid anymore. Not a huge deal, I agree, but either way it's slightly bypassing the timesaving benefits and isn't 100% complete solution. It would save some time at least, though.

If I get around this by installing all programs on C, I'll end up with a pretty big image file just so I can easily restore my OS. I see the benefits, and a reply is appreciated. It's good software, and I use it for any imaging I have to do these days compared to Ghost or DriveImage. But imaging daily is soon going to eat up my space, and I don't have unlimited funds for my hobby

Some kind of software to track system changes, file changes, etc, can safe lots of space in comparison.

Edit: And used to use Ghost. But the thing with images is I want to get way from having to copy a 3GB OS (maybe 1.5GB compressed) everyday. If I store 7 days, I've already hit 10.5. While it saves time, sometimes 14 days later I really just want to clear out a bunch of junk I've been working with recently for example. I can see the benefits at the same time, maybe I should just go for imaging of the OS.

Maybe some day 2BrightSparks will make really awesome system-restore/tracking software too, and my life will be complete

Second Edit: Also, I do use VMs to try and minimalize system damage with bad applications, etc, but accidents still manage to happen..

Edited January 20, 2006 by Suxen

[DigeratiPrime]

Heres how i do it:

I have two partitions: C & D

I install Windows from my XPCD on C:

I immediately make a backup image of this on D:

I then install all my program on D:

I make another backup image with everything configured the way i like it.

If something goes wrong i can revert C: to back where i had everything configured nice. I can also revert back to the day i installed windows.

The problem as you mention is the programs with dependancies on C. For example nLite w/.NET. I try to avoid these to begin with, but i also try to find portable/standalone alternatives. If i need a program with dependancies I install it after everything thing else and after my backups.

Preferably all your apps/games are standalone and can just sit on D. Many programs are really standalone wrapped inside an installer. This can be proved using Sandboxie, you install the program in the sandbox and then copy it back outside. Most of the time it works.

Also just the other day the 'Universal Extractor' was released. I have used this already to unpack just the needed binaries from some installers.

You may also be interested in this program: Total Uninstall

[EarthJim]

You said something about the need of incremental backups, someone has sugested Acronis True Image. The new v9 allows to perform incremental backups along with full and differential backups, also individual files and folders can be backuped (you mentioned something about it) so i think it's just what you need - give it a try.

Good Luck!