Can Windows 2000 restore the registry?

  • Thread starter Thread starter BillW50
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BillW50

Windows 98 has SCANREG /RESTORE

Windows XP has the System Restore

But is there something for Windows 2000 which has the same ability?
 
BillW50 said:
Windows 98 has SCANREG /RESTORE

Windows XP has the System Restore

But is there something for Windows 2000 which has the same ability?
Click to expand...

AFAIK There is nothing native to Win2000 to restore the
registry. You can use tools such as regback.exe to save the
registry at regular intervals (e.g. weekly), then some other
tools to restore it when necessary.

Have a look in c:\winnt\repair. How old are the registry
files there?
 
Pegasus (MVP) said:
AFAIK There is nothing native to Win2000 to restore the
registry. You can use tools such as regback.exe to save the
registry at regular intervals (e.g. weekly), then some other
tools to restore it when necessary.

Have a look in c:\winnt\repair. How old are the registry
files there?
Click to expand...

1/3/2004 and thanks!
 
If you feel the need to backup the registry, you should consider using another
approach in order to have a usable recovery method.

You can install a 3rd party utility called ERUNT that can easily backup and
restore your registry. The latest version of this utility has an autobackup
feature or one can use it with the Task Scheduler. Backups can easily be
restored from within Windows or the Recovery Console. I have mine setup to do a
daily backup.

I've rarely had to use it for recovery purposes..but it gives one a warm feeling
just having this option available.

If used, be sure to store your backup(s) in a subfolder of the %SystemRoot%
folder so that it's accessible when you're in the Recovery Console mode.

Download this freeware utility from here:

ERUNT
http://www.larshederer.homepage.t-online.de/erun

Be sure to read the readme.txt file contained in the zip archive. It not only
gives you all the various setup information you'll need but it includes some
history and weak points of native backups for Windows registry.

A few more comments:

Registry backups were an important and wise thing to do with the versions of Win
9x, but not so much with the more stable Win NT series. I've only used ERUNT
prior to testing or evaluating new applications. Should I decide to uninstall
the app, this gives me the option of restoring the registry and being sure that
there are no remaining traces of the new application.

I've never had any of my systems infected with a virus, worm, or any malware,
but having these backups does give me some confidence that I may be able to use
them to recover from any future attack.

For system and data backups I use Acronis True Image, on a monthly basis, to
make a complete image of each drive or partition. These images are kept on a
separate 160GB USB drive. I would use one of these backups if the restoration of
the registry did not solve the problem.

| Windows 98 has SCANREG /RESTORE
|
| Windows XP has the System Restore
|
| But is there something for Windows 2000 which has the same ability?
|
| --
| Bill
 
Wow David! Thanks for erunt and all of the fine techical information you
posted. It was great and very helpful. And best of all, it is also very
handy for Windows 2000/XP users if a bad driver or startup software
prevents the OS for booting in the first place. Thus you can just jump
back even if the OS refuses to boot. Kudos David!
 
Hi Bill - I, too, am a big Erunt/Erdnt fan. Here's my standard post about
it which may have some additional useful information for you:

Get Erunt here for all NT-based computers including XP:
http://home.t-online.de/home/lars.hederer/erunt/ I've set it up to take a
scheduled backup each night at 12:01AM on a weekly round-robin basis, and a
Monthly on the 1st of each month. See here for how to set that up:
http://www.larshederer.homepage.t-online.de/erunt/erunt.txt, and for some
useful information about this subject

The following tutorials are useful:

Installing & Using ERUNT
http://www.silentrunners.org/sr_eruntuse.html

To see an illustrated registry restore procedure
http://www.silentrunners.org/sr_erdntuse.html

This program is one of the best things around - saved my butt on many
occasions, and will also run very nicely from a DOS prompt (in case you've
done something that won't let you boot any more and need to revert to a
previous Registry) IF you're FAT32 OR have a DOS startup disk with NTFS
write drivers in an NTFS system. (There is also a way using the Recovery
Console to get back to being "bootable" even without separate DOS write NTFS
drivers, after which you can do a normal ERDNT restore. See erunt.txt for
detailed instructions. Basically, if you make your backup into a folder
inside your Windows or Winnt folder, you can restore at a Recovery Console
boot by copying the files from that ERDNT folder into the system32\config
folder. After a good boot, then do another normal ERDNT restore to also
restore the user hives also.) (BTW, it also includes a Registry defragger
program). Free, and very, very highly recommended.

FYI, quoting from the above document:

Note: The "Export registry" function in Regedit is USELESS (!) to make 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, leaving you with an absolute mess of old and new registry keys.


--
Regards, Jim Byrd, MVP, DTS, ASVOP
My Blog, Defending Your Machine,
http://defendingyourmachine.blogspot.com/



In BillW50 <[email protected]> typed:
|| Wow David! Thanks for erunt and all of the fine techical information
|| you posted. It was great and very helpful. And best of all, it is
|| also very handy for Windows 2000/XP users if a bad driver or startup
|| software prevents the OS for booting in the first place. Thus you
|| can just jump back even if the OS refuses to boot. Kudos David!
||
||
 
You're welcome...and thanks for the feedback!

|
| Wow David! Thanks for erunt and all of the fine techical information you
| posted. It was great and very helpful. And best of all, it is also very
| handy for Windows 2000/XP users if a bad driver or startup software
| prevents the OS for booting in the first place. Thus you can just jump
| back even if the OS refuses to boot. Kudos David!
|
|
| | > Thanks for the heads up on the link. I must have cut it short when I
| > copied it from my previous posting.
| >
| > | >> David Webb wrote:
| >>
| >>> Download this freeware utility from here:
| >>>
| >>> ERUNT
| >>> http://www.larshederer.homepage.t-online.de/erun
| >>
| >> This seems to work better:
| >>
| >> http://www.larshederer.homepage.t-online.de/erunt/index.htm
| >>
| >> ... and thanks for the link!
|
 
There is no system restore in Windows 2000

You can run Programs|Accessories|System Tools|Backup, then choose ERD, then
if you check the box for "Also backup....", then the reg will also be backed
up to
%systemroot%\repair\RegBack
leaving the
%systemroot%\repair\
directory files intact as original installation.

Then archive the files in
%systemroot%\repair\RegBack
These would, in effect, be registry restore points.

You can replace registry hives from within the recovery console by copying
the files from your archive to;
%systemroot%\system32\config

To start the Recovery Console, start the computer from the Windows 2000
Setup CD or the Windows 2000 Setup floppy disks. If you do not have Setup
floppy disks and your computer cannot start from the Windows 2000 Setup CD,
use another Windows 2000-based computer to create the Setup floppy disks. At
the "Welcome to Setup" screen. Press F10 or R to repair a Windows 2000
installation, and then press C to use the Recovery Console. The Recovery
Console then prompts you for the administrator password. If you do not have
the correct password, Recovery Console does not allow access to the
computer. If an incorrect password is entered three times, the Recovery
Console quits and restarts the computer. Note If the registry is corrupted
or missing or no valid installations are found, the Recovery Console starts
in the root of the startup volume without requiring a password. You cannot
access any folders, but you can carry out commands such as chkdsk, fixboot,
and fixmbr for limited disk repairs. Once the password has been validated,
you have full access to the Recovery Console, but limited access to the hard
disk. You can only access the following folders on your computer: drive
root, %systemroot% or %windir%

--

Regards,

Dave Patrick ....Please no email replies - reply in newsgroup.
Microsoft Certified Professional
Microsoft MVP [Windows]
http://www.microsoft.com/protect
 
BillW50 said:
Windows 98 has SCANREG /RESTORE

Windows XP has the System Restore

But is there something for Windows 2000 which has the same ability?
Click to expand...
If it's just the registry you want to restore there is no direct means
of restoring the registry in a single command. However you should ensure
that the Win2k repair console is on your hard drive. That way you can
always boot to this if the Win2k registry is corrupt and prevents Win2k
from booting. From the repair console you simply copy from
winnt/repair/regback folder all of the files (except the 2 dat files) to
winnt/system32/config. You simply use the console's COPY command to do
this like you would do under DOS.

To ensure that the regback folder always has up to date working registry
files, you need to frequently update this via NTBackup and use the ERD
option, ticking the registry option. Do this just after booting up as
any changes to the registry that occur via downloads/installations etc
might corrupt the registry, which you won't discover until you try to
boot up next time around.
 
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