Registry Back Up

  • Thread starter Thread starter Primal Oooze
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Primal Oooze

What does it take to back up the registry? I opened regedit and copied
everything in each of the five keys and ended up with five files that add up
to about 45 meg total. Is that it or is there more?
 
Primal said:
What does it take to back up the registry? I opened regedit and copied
everything in each of the five keys and ended up with five files that add up
to about 45 meg total. Is that it or is there more?
Click to expand...

Hi Primal Oooze,

That probably is about right. I just exported my entire registry just
to compare with yours and it came out to about 42 meg.
 
I didn't find exporting from regedit more difficult than using the Backup
Utility, however the Backup Utility backs up some additional files:

"The system state includes the registry, the COM+ Class Registration
Database, and your boot files."

Thanks for the info,
Dale
 
If you plan to backup the entire registry, the "export" option should NOT be
used. You can use NTBackup or the excellent third-party tool named ERUNT.
ERUNT backs up the user registry (NTUSER.DAT) as well.

[ERUNT] Registry Backup and Restore for Windows
http://www.larshederer.homepage.t-online.de/erunt/

[ERUNT Download URLs]
http://www.aumha.org/downloads/erunt.zip
http://www.aumha.org/downloads/erunt-setup.exe

[Installing & Using ERUNT]
http://www.winxptutor.com/regback.htm
http://www.silentrunners.org/sr_eruntuse.html
http://www.larshederer.homepage.t-online.de/erunt/erunt.txt

--
Ramesh, Microsoft MVP
Windows XP Shell/User

Windows XP Troubleshooting
http://www.winhelponline.com
 
Ramesh said:
If you plan to backup the entire registry, the "export" option should
NOT be used. You can use NTBackup or the excellent third-party tool
named ERUNT. ERUNT backs up the user registry (NTUSER.DAT) as well.

[ERUNT] Registry Backup and Restore for Windows
http://www.larshederer.homepage.t-online.de/erunt/
Click to expand...

Just want to back up what Ramesh said. Exporting the whole registry as a
backup solution is a waste of time, it will *not* work. Here's what the
Readme.txt file that comes with ERUNT has to say:
Note: The "Export registry" function in Regedit is USELESS (!) for
making a complete backup of the registry. Neither does it export the
whole registry (for example, no information from the "SECURITY" hive
is saved), nor can the exported file be used later to replace the
current registry with the old one. Instead, if you re-import the file,
it is merged with the current registry without deleting anything that
has been added since the export, leaving you with an absolute mess of
old and new entries.
Click to expand...

Do give ERUNT a try. You can configure it to run automatically and to
keep the number of backups you wish. If you keep the backups in a folder
under C:\Windows they are accessible from the Recovery Console if you
ever get a registry error that prevents Windows from booting.

It's free, it works and it's saved me several times :-)
 
Thanks Nightowl.
it's saved me several times :-)
Click to expand...

Yes. Same here.

--
Ramesh, Microsoft MVP
Windows XP Shell/User

Windows XP Troubleshooting
http://www.winhelponline.com


Nightowl said:
Ramesh said:
If you plan to backup the entire registry, the "export" option should
NOT be used. You can use NTBackup or the excellent third-party tool
named ERUNT. ERUNT backs up the user registry (NTUSER.DAT) as well.

[ERUNT] Registry Backup and Restore for Windows
http://www.larshederer.homepage.t-online.de/erunt/
Click to expand...

Just want to back up what Ramesh said. Exporting the whole registry as a
backup solution is a waste of time, it will *not* work. Here's what the
Readme.txt file that comes with ERUNT has to say:
Note: The "Export registry" function in Regedit is USELESS (!) for
making a complete backup of the registry. Neither does it export the
whole registry (for example, no information from the "SECURITY" hive
is saved), nor can the exported file be used later to replace the
current registry with the old one. Instead, if you re-import the file,
it is merged with the current registry without deleting anything that
has been added since the export, leaving you with an absolute mess of
old and new entries.
Click to expand...

Do give ERUNT a try. You can configure it to run automatically and to
keep the number of backups you wish. If you keep the backups in a folder
under C:\Windows they are accessible from the Recovery Console if you
ever get a registry error that prevents Windows from booting.

It's free, it works and it's saved me several times :-)
Click to expand...
 
Exporting all of the registry files with regedit gives me a little over 45
megs of back up files.

Using ERUNT amounts to just over 13 megs of back up files.

Backing up 'system state' data with the back up utility that comes with xp
consists of 330 kb.

Why such a disparity?

Ramesh said:
Thanks Nightowl.
it's saved me several times :-)
Click to expand...

Yes. Same here.

--
Ramesh, Microsoft MVP
Windows XP Shell/User

Windows XP Troubleshooting
http://www.winhelponline.com


Nightowl said:
Ramesh said:
If you plan to backup the entire registry, the "export" option should
NOT be used. You can use NTBackup or the excellent third-party tool
named ERUNT. ERUNT backs up the user registry (NTUSER.DAT) as well.

[ERUNT] Registry Backup and Restore for Windows
http://www.larshederer.homepage.t-online.de/erunt/
Click to expand...

Just want to back up what Ramesh said. Exporting the whole registry as a
backup solution is a waste of time, it will *not* work. Here's what the
Readme.txt file that comes with ERUNT has to say:
Note: The "Export registry" function in Regedit is USELESS (!) for
making a complete backup of the registry. Neither does it export the
whole registry (for example, no information from the "SECURITY" hive
is saved), nor can the exported file be used later to replace the
current registry with the old one. Instead, if you re-import the file,
it is merged with the current registry without deleting anything that
has been added since the export, leaving you with an absolute mess of
old and new entries.
Click to expand...

Do give ERUNT a try. You can configure it to run automatically and to
keep the number of backups you wish. If you keep the backups in a folder
under C:\Windows they are accessible from the Recovery Console if you
ever get a registry error that prevents Windows from booting.

It's free, it works and it's saved me several times :-)
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
Nightowl said:
If you plan to backup the entire registry, the "export" option should
NOT be used. You can use NTBackup or the excellent third-party tool
named ERUNT. ERUNT backs up the user registry (NTUSER.DAT) as well.

[ERUNT] Registry Backup and Restore for Windows
http://www.larshederer.homepage.t-online.de/erunt/
Click to expand...


Just want to back up what Ramesh said. Exporting the whole registry as a
backup solution is a waste of time, it will *not* work. Here's what the
Readme.txt file that comes with ERUNT has to say:

Note: The "Export registry" function in Regedit is USELESS (!) for
making a complete backup of the registry. Neither does it export the
whole registry (for example, no information from the "SECURITY" hive
is saved), nor can the exported file be used later to replace the
current registry with the old one. Instead, if you re-import the file,
it is merged with the current registry without deleting anything that
has been added since the export, leaving you with an absolute mess of
old and new entries.
Click to expand...


Do give ERUNT a try. You can configure it to run automatically and to
keep the number of backups you wish. If you keep the backups in a folder
under C:\Windows they are accessible from the Recovery Console if you
ever get a registry error that prevents Windows from booting.

It's free, it works and it's saved me several times :-)
Click to expand...

I didn't know that exporting the registry should not be used as a
backup. I see advice in Microsoft KB articles about backing up the
registry before making edits, etc. So I guess I got the idea from that
.. Thanks for helping me learn! :)
 
tiktoor said:
I didn't know that exporting the registry should not be used as a
backup. I see advice in Microsoft KB articles about backing up the
registry before making edits, etc. So I guess I got the idea from that
. Thanks for helping me learn! :)
Click to expand...


Hi tiktoor

Hope I haven't misled you! The advice in those KB articles is fine.

What they are talking about is exporting (i.e. making a backup) of just
the key or registry branch you're going to be working on, before making
any changes. That's a good precaution and if you do want to change
things back, you can import that file and all will be well.

Where the export method doesn't work is for backing up the *entire*
registry as part of your regular housekeeping, for the reasons mentioned
earlier.

For that you should use NTBackup or (my preference) ERUNT.
 
For 1: It's not the registry size, but the format that takes that much size:
Regarding System state, is it 330KB or MB?

--
Ramesh, Microsoft MVP
Windows XP Shell/User

Windows XP Troubleshooting
http://www.winhelponline.com


Primal Ooze said:
Exporting all of the registry files with regedit gives me a little over 45
megs of back up files.

Using ERUNT amounts to just over 13 megs of back up files.

Backing up 'system state' data with the back up utility that comes with xp
consists of 330 kb.

Why such a disparity?

Ramesh said:
Thanks Nightowl.
it's saved me several times :-)
Click to expand...

Yes. Same here.

--
Ramesh, Microsoft MVP
Windows XP Shell/User

Windows XP Troubleshooting
http://www.winhelponline.com


Nightowl said:
If you plan to backup the entire registry, the "export" option should
NOT be used. You can use NTBackup or the excellent third-party tool
named ERUNT. ERUNT backs up the user registry (NTUSER.DAT) as well.

[ERUNT] Registry Backup and Restore for Windows
http://www.larshederer.homepage.t-online.de/erunt/


Just want to back up what Ramesh said. Exporting the whole registry as
a
backup solution is a waste of time, it will *not* work. Here's what the
Readme.txt file that comes with ERUNT has to say:

Note: The "Export registry" function in Regedit is USELESS (!) for
making a complete backup of the registry. Neither does it export the
whole registry (for example, no information from the "SECURITY" hive
is saved), nor can the exported file be used later to replace the
current registry with the old one. Instead, if you re-import the file,
it is merged with the current registry without deleting anything that
has been added since the export, leaving you with an absolute mess of
old and new entries.

Do give ERUNT a try. You can configure it to run automatically and to
keep the number of backups you wish. If you keep the backups in a
folder
under C:\Windows they are accessible from the Recovery Console if you
ever get a registry error that prevents Windows from booting.

It's free, it works and it's saved me several times :-)
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
Ramesh said:
For 1: It's not the registry size, but the format that takes that much size:

Regarding System state, is it 330KB or MB?

--
Click to expand...

Your right - sorry about that - 330 MB

So
Exporting all of the registry files with regedit gives me a little over 45 MB of back up files.

Using ERUNT amounts to just over 13 MB of back up files.

Backing up 'system state' data with the back up utility that comes with XP (ntbackup.exe) consists of 330 MB

It would seem that (even taking into account the format? ) ntbackup.exe does the far more thorough job?
 
Primal Ooze said:
Exporting all of the registry files with regedit gives me a little over 45 MB of back up files.

Using ERUNT amounts to just over 13 MB of back up files.

Backing up 'system state' data with the back up utility that comes with XP (ntbackup.exe) consists of 330 MB

It would seem that (even taking into account the format? ) ntbackup.exe does the far more thorough job?
Click to expand...


Hi Primal Ooze

13MB seems rather small for an ERUNT backup. Are you perhaps only
checking System Registry, and not Current User Registry and/or Other
Open User Registries?

I check all of them, and my backup is 21.9MB in the main folder and
another 7MB in the User folders.
 
The "system state" does not depict the size of the registry alone.

Excerpted from an MS Resource Kit article:

System State data includes the following:
a.. Boot files, including the system files
b.. Files protected by Windows File Protection (WFP)
c.. The registry
d.. Performance counter configuration information
e.. The Component Services class registration database
© 2005 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved
http://www.microsoft.com/resources/...Windows/XP/all/reskit/en-us/prdg_dsm_eeos.asp

Whereas ERUNT is a registry-only backup utility.

--
Ramesh, Microsoft MVP
Windows XP Shell/User

Windows XP Troubleshooting
http://www.winhelponline.com
 
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