System Restore not working

[Walter E.]

System Restore in Win XP SP2 has become completely unresponsive. It will
not even open up the restore panel with the calendar that shows any restore
points.

Would a "Repair Installation" fix this or should I re-install windows?
-
Walter
www.rationality.net

 

[SC Tom]

System Restore in Win XP SP2 has become completely unresponsive. It will
not even open up the restore panel with the calendar that shows any
restore points.

Would a "Repair Installation" fix this or should I re-install windows?
-
Walter
www.rationality.net

You really should start your own thread instead of latching onto an existing
one. That way, replies will be to help you, and not be confused with the
original poster.

A good place to start for SR problems is here:

System Restore troubleshooting http://bertk.mvps.org/html/srfail.html

There are a lot of good solutions and links there.

 

[Daave]

System Restore in Win XP SP2 has become completely unresponsive. It
will not even open up the restore panel with the calendar that shows
any restore points.

Would a "Repair Installation" fix this or should I re-install windows?

SP2 is no longer supported. Without the latest security patches, you
might have malware.

What is the malware status of your PC?

Why do you feel the need to run SR in the first place?

 

[PA Bear [MS MVP]]

Why isn't WinXP SP3 installed? [1]

What anti-virus application or security suite is installed and is your
subscription current? What anti-spyware applications (other than Defender)?
What third-party firewall (if any)?

Has a(another) Norton or McAfee application ever been installed on the
computer (e.g., a free-trial version that came preinstalled when you bought
it)?

=======================
[1] Support for WinXP SP2 ended on 13 July 2010. Computers running WinXP SP2
"will no longer receive software updates from Windows Update" until SP3 has
been installed. Extended Support for WinXP SP3 will continue through 08
April 2014.

• What does it mean if my version of Windows is no longer supported?
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/help/what-does-end-of-support-mean

 

[Paul]

System Restore in Win XP SP2 has become completely unresponsive. It
will not even open up the restore panel with the calendar that shows any
restore points.

Would a "Repair Installation" fix this or should I re-install windows?
-
Walter
www.rationality.net

In Administrative Tools : Services, I see a service listed for
"System Restore Service". It is set to a Startup Type of Automatic,
and on my machine, is currently running. What does yours look like ?

For other hints, have a look at C:\WINDOWS\inf\sr.inf , which can be
opened with a text editor. It'll show you what things are installed
as part of System Restore. For example "rstrui.exe" is the thing
that brings up the Calendar window. You can find rstrui.exe here.

C:\WINDOWS\system32\dllcache\rstrui.exe

Hmmm. Great. Mine is busted too! Running rstrui.exe is generating
an error report to Microsoft, and a blank window which closes. Maybe
the "Patch Tuesday" fix did this ? I only did that one yesterday.
I think I'm going to try a reboot now, and see if it is still busted.
There wasn't a reboot after Patch Tuesday update, so maybe that
is the problem. I'm running SP3 too.

Paul

 

[Paul]

In Administrative Tools : Services, I see a service listed for
"System Restore Service". It is set to a Startup Type of Automatic,
and on my machine, is currently running. What does yours look like ?

For other hints, have a look at C:\WINDOWS\inf\sr.inf , which can be
opened with a text editor. It'll show you what things are installed
as part of System Restore. For example "rstrui.exe" is the thing
that brings up the Calendar window. You can find rstrui.exe here.

C:\WINDOWS\system32\dllcache\rstrui.exe

Hmmm. Great. Mine is busted too! Running rstrui.exe is generating
an error report to Microsoft, and a blank window which closes. Maybe
the "Patch Tuesday" fix did this ? I only did that one yesterday.
I think I'm going to try a reboot now, and see if it is still busted.
There wasn't a reboot after Patch Tuesday update, so maybe that
is the problem. I'm running SP3 too.

Paul

The reboot didn't fix it. I set a new restore point, then tried
the calendar thing again, and it is working. Weird.

Paul

 

[PA Bear [MS MVP]]

Who are you and what did you do with Walter E?

The reboot didn't fix it. I set a new restore point, then tried
the calendar thing again, and it is working. Weird.

Paul

 

[Jose]

System Restore in Win XP SP2 has become completely unresponsive.  It will
not even open up the restore panel with the calendar that shows any restore
points.

Would a "Repair Installation" fix this or should I re-install windows?
-
Walterwww.rationality.net

System Restore is a frequent target for malicious software attacks.
If SR was working before and is now afflicted, run some scans and then
resolve any remaining
issues.

Download, install, update and do a full scan with these free malware
detection programs:

Malwarebytes (MBAM): http://malwarebytes.org/
SUPERAntiSpyware: (SAS): http://www.superantispyware.com/

They can be uninstalled later if desired.

When the scans run clean it may also be necessary to reregister some
DLLs to get your SR calendar working. Reregistering the DLLs is okay
even if they do not need reregistering. You can also reregister the
DLLs before the scans which may fix the issue, but the scans are still
recommended.

Click Start, Run and in the box enter the following commands one at a
time. Click the OK button to execute each command:

regsvr32 jscript
regsvr32 vbscript
regsvr32 /i mshtml

The last command for mshtml will load the DLL but may also contain a
harmless warning message depending on your environment.