Ok, I hate to admit this was useful to read. Yes, I've
read the documentation and KB at various times, and it
has always seemed confusing on ntbackup functions that
work correctly, and what does not. I was hoping that
someone with direct expertise in the tool would respond
that there is not such a problem here, but no one has.
I am very disappointed that this function is advertised
whenever you ask about XP-Home backup. And you think you
are getting "value add" functions when you buy an XP-Home
CD. Then it is caveated in the documentation when you get
into it, and in fact seems to have basically been
disabled in a clumsy way just to waste your time and
differentiate the two XP versions. Not very classy. Now
I'm glad I could not get it to run.
-----Original Message-----
Dan, read this, there may be a clue in it:
The following is from Woody's XP Watch #2.05 (2/4/2002):
Last week I promised you that I would tell you about
backup techniques for Windows XP/Home. If you'll recall,
I told you that Windows XP/Pro has a downright decent
backup and restore wizard, which runs as part of
Automated System Recovery, accessible by clicking Start |
All Programs | Accessories | System Tools | Backup. I
also told you about the way Microsoft decided to include
the backup half of the wizard in Windows XP/Home but, uh,
neglected to include the restore part. In my WinXP book,
I say "that makes XP/Home's backup just about as useful
as a Ferrari Testarossa with no wheels."
If you really, really want to use the ASR backup routine
in XP/Home (it's the NTBackup program that Windows 2000
users have come to know and love), you can install it
from the Windows XP/Home CD. To do so, put the XP/Home CD
in your CD drive. When the installer asks, "What do you
want to do?" click "Perform additional tasks"
then "Browse this CD", navigate to VALUEADD\MSFT\NTBACKUP
and double-click NTBACKUP.MSI.
But don't bother installing the program until you've the
rest of this newsletter. It should send a chill down your
spine.
I tried a few experiments and learned a few surprising
things about XP/Home backup. There's an MS Knowledge Base
article that's supposed to tell you what you need to do
in order to perform an XP/Home restore, but I tried and
tried and couldn't make heads from tails out of the
article. The boot diskette generated by the backup
program, following the description in the KB article,
doesn't work on any of my systems. The steps detailed
there for creating a backup file do work - you have to
manually override the wizard's settings - but in the end,
the backup isn't much use.
Microsoft outright lies in their Knowledge Base article
Q309340 where it says the restore feature "applies to
Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition" when it most assuredly
does not - any backup that you make in XP/Home is
essentially worthless. Even if you tell the
XP/Home "Backup or Restore Wizard" to restore the entire
contents of the c: drive, it misses parts.
The only way I found to restore the c: drive, after
using NTBACKUP to create a backup file was to boot from
the Windows XP/Home CD, completely delete the partition
that held Windows, re-install WinXP/Home, re-install
NTBACKUP using the steps I outlined above, and
immediately run the restore using the Advanced settings
in the wizard.
You know the worst part of it all? At every turn, it
appears as if everything is working correctly, No error
message. No warnings. No nothing. The Knowledge Base
articles occasionally warn you that the procedures don't
work with XP/Home - then go ahead and give you specific
steps for performing the procedures that don't work!
Unless somebody's clued you in, you'll only get heartburn
over XP/Home's clueless backup when you need it - and
find out that it didn't do what it was supposed to do.
Trustworthy computing, eh?
So now I've spoiled all your illusions about Backups in
Windows XP what can you do? In the next issue I'll tell
you what I do and what options you can try.
From #2.06 (2/12/2002):
There are a million ways to back up your system, and at
least a half million of them work.
I've been playing the backup game for a long time, and
I've only bumped into three basic scenarios where I
really needed a backup. Mind you, I'm not a major
multinational corporation, and I don't have a server
farm. Although I do have an orchid farm. But that's
another story.
I need backups for three reasons.
First, sometimes my c: drive dies. When that happens, I
need to stick a new drive in the machine, boot, restore
the hard drive, restore my data, and get going. I also
lose at least two hanks of hair and at least one night of
sleep.
Second, sometimes I screw up a file so badly I need to
go back and retrieve an earlier copy. When that happens,
I know about it right away: I shout and kick the computer
and swear a few times, then go spelunking to look for an
old copy of the file.
Third, on rare occasions, I'll make a change that needs
to be undone and not catch it right away. I can only
think of a couple of times I've done that, and it usually
involves dial-up networking settings - I get the wrong
password typed in, or I forget the name of a mail server,
or something else equally obscure, and it's a couple of
days later before I realize that I changed something I
shouldn't have.
The technique I use for backup works very well for the
second kind of problem, and pretty well for the first
kind. It doesn't do beans for the third type.
My method is really simple. I like it that way.
1. All my PCs have two hard drives. The second one is
primarily for backups, but I'll also stick device drivers
and Service Packs and other not-critical-but-a-pain-to-
download files on the second drive. The second drive also
has copies of my old Outlook files, which I cycle
manually once a month.
2. Every week or two (or whenever I'm going to do
something fun like install new software) I run
PowerQuest's Drive Image and create a full backup image
of my main boot drive on the secondary drive. Drive Image
generates boot disks and all the other goodies necessary
to recovery from a crashed c: drive.
3. Every day - usually at the end of the day, I run a
little batch file that copies all of my important data
files from the main hard drive onto the backup drive.
This is really a bailing wire 'n chewing gum approach,
but it works fine for me. To make your own batch file
that copies your data files from the c: drive to the d:
drive, just do this:
a.. Right-click on the desktop, pick New | Text document
b.. Immediately type the name backup.bat and hit
Enter. Windows will warn you not to change the file name
extension. Which is really weird because Windows doesn't
bother to show you file name extensions in the first
place, but such is the Wonder of Windows. What you have
is an old-fashioned batch file.
c.. Right-click on the new backup.bat file and pick Edit
d.. Type in this line:
xcopy "c:\Documents and
Settings\*.*" "d:\Backup" /d /e /c /h /y
a.. Close backup.bat.
b.. When you want to run a backup, double-click on
backup.bat. The first time you run it, Windows will ask
if you're trying to create a file or directory. Type "d"
for directory. After the first time, it'll run without a
hitch.
Hate to disappoint you, but that's my entire backup strategy.
That strategy might not suit you, not all of us have to
install beta versions of Office and Windows from time to
time.
XP/Home users have some other options. For example,
Microsoft has a set of six (six!) setup boot diskettes
that you can download. Those diskettes will let you boot
from your floppy drive, so you can run Windows XP setup
from the CD, if your computer won't boot from the CD.
The archives are at
http://www.woodyswatch.com/winxp/archives.asp.
MS was originally not even going to include ntbackup in
XP home but (apparently) someone talked them into
including it, with reduced functionality.
I used ASR with XP pro, it worked as advertised.
However I now use an imaging program from
www.acronis.com
TrueImage which works very easily and does the job much
better.
--
Just my 2¢ worth
Jeff
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