System Restore

[Anne-Kathryn]

My computer has crashed. I have Windows XP Home Edition. I
also have a VPR Matrix computer. The CD that my computer
came with for restore is not a window's xp disk. It is
their version of restore. It's "Easy Restore 5.0" by Power
Quest. It has 2 options:
1.) Restore all software originally pre-installed on your
computer's hard disk
2.) exit cancel restore.
Now, I don't want to lose what I have on my computer (it's
happened to me once a while ago, and I don't want to have
to do it again. It's a real pain in the ass. So... I don't
know what to do. I'm not familiar with "Easy Restore 5.0",
so I don't want to click on anything and accidentally
restore everything without my information i've installed
on it. If anyone is familiar with this program- please
explain to me how it works!
I have the serial number of my Window's XP Home edition,
but I have no disk for it. I've heard that if I was able
to get a copy of this, that it has the option of running
the "system restore" program, that would take me back to a
good restore point. First of all, is this true? Second,
how can I get a copy of the CD? Would Microsoft send me a
disk to do it? Would it cost me anything? I've asked
around to the people I know, and no one has Window's XP
home, they either have Window's XP Professional or a
previous version of Window's. I've been told by people
that I can't try Window's XP Pro for format reasons, so
I'm basically stuck right now. I just need a disk.... I
don't even need the serial number for the disk or
anything! ... just being able to pop in the disk and hit
restore.

 

[David Vair]

The disk will put the computer back to as it came out of the box, all your programs and data that
have been installed since that day will be lost. When you say the computer crashed, what exactly
happened to it? Are you able to boot at all? If it can start to boot you can try going into safe
mode to do a system restore. If it does not boot at all it may be a hardware failure that will need
to be corrected.

 

[Anne-Kathryn]

I can boot it... ok this is what happens... i start my
computer, and it gets to the screen to load Window's XP
(you see the little bar scrolling across as it loads) and
then it restarts after about a second of that. It does
give me the option of starting in safe mode, the last
known configuration, or start normally, and i've tried
everything, but it still just restarts after it gets to
that screen. I really don't know what's wrong. but i have
a boot-disk (floppy) that i made, and that loads DOS
where i can see all my files there. I've copied the
neccessary files that i needed for my college semester
and now am able to work on everything from my campus
computer lab. I've even tried going to them about the
problem and they're no help (a bunch of work study and
dumb computer science majors). I know more than some of
those people... so i have a hard time trusting them. But
reguardless... that's what happens to my computer. Is
there a way to initiate system restore from DOS?

-Original Message-----

The disk will put the computer back to as it came out of

the box, all your programs and data that

have been installed since that day will be lost. When

you say the computer crashed, what exactly

happened to it? Are you able to boot at all? If it can

start to boot you can try going into safe

mode to do a system restore. If it does not boot at all

it may be a hardware failure that will need

 

[David Vair]

No system restore works from Windows. If you have retrieved the files that you need then I would go
ahead with the restore CD, just remember that it will wipe out the whole drive.

 

[Guest]

I had the same thing happen to my computer and my mother's too. I have a friend who works on computers for a living, and he said he has seen this happen to a few computers too. The only solution we could find was running the restore disk. It fixed the problem.