non destructive restore

[Guest]

I was told I need to do a non destructive restore. How do I do this? I have
a restore disk, but when and where does it ask me to specify non destructive
or destructive restore. I'm getting an blue screen error and need to
restore, but don't want to lose any of my programs.

 

[Malke]

I was told I need to do a non destructive restore. How do I do this? I have
a restore disk, but when and where does it ask me to specify non destructive
or destructive restore. I'm getting an blue screen error and need to
restore, but don't want to lose any of my programs.

Read the manual that came with your computer or go to the computer
mftr.'s website and read about their restore process. The process
differs from mftr. to mftr. so the best way to be sure is to check with
yours.

Always have your data backed up first - even though you may start a
non-destructive recovery, there is no guarantee that something won't go
wrong. Be prepared for the worst.


Malke

 

[Jupiter Jones [MVP]]

Each computer manufacturer sets up their restore media their own way.
Check your manual and/or contact the computer manufacturer for details

 

[Rick Rogers]

Hi,

Sadly, most manufacturer recovery disks are not capable of a non-destructive
installation. They basically wipe and reload the system to factory state,
and your data and programs are gone. A retail disk would allow you to
reinstall to a new folder and moves the old installation to a windows.old
folder, but this does not preserve your programs, only the data files.
Unlike XP and other versions of Windows, there is no "over the top"
reinstallation capability as Vista does not use a simple file overwrite
method of installation like they did (it lays down an image instead).

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org
My thoughts http://rick-mvp.blogspot.com

 

[Guest]

Can I put another partition on the hard drive to move important programs to,
then restore first partition only?

 

[Rick Rogers]

Hi,

You can create a second partition and move data, not programs, to it.
Programs cannot be easily moved, to do so could require migrating many files
and changing possibly hundreds, even thousands, of registry entries. In
addition, any of the available utilities that can help with this have to be
installed and run from withing a working installation.

In addition, once you restore the installation (whether you format or not),
you will need to reinstall the programs anyways. All the program pointers
and registry entries from the original installation will be gone, as they
were part of the original installation.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org
My thoughts http://rick-mvp.blogspot.com

 

[AJR]

thor492001 - Destructive and non-destructive restoration equate to a clean
install or upgrade. The terms destructive and non-destructive are generally
used by OEMS when referring to restoration partitions on their computers.

When using the restore partition you are given the choice (most instances)
of a non-destructive restore meaning data is preserved or destructive
restore meaning computer is returned to its original state.

Also some OEMS restoration process allow reinstalling the OS only - meaning
applications and data preserved.

Regarding "most instances" in paragraph above - if you copied the restore
partition to removeaable media the choice of restoration may not be
available.