Restoring Windows

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For disaster recovery, some of us use a cloned backup hard drive on a
removable tray ... and carefully backup to it after making sure we
aren't infested with malware. But what if we want to do a Windows
restore from that backup drive? You can't expect to write to Windows
files that are in use, and you can't restore from DOS because of path
length and LFN limitations.

Kan Yamamoto, the author of XXCOPY, just made a clever suggestion in a
post on the freeware n.g. I've spent the last hour or so checking it
out. The approach assumes you have plenty of spare h.d. space, and you
can boot into pure DOS. Quite suitable for many Win 9X/ME users. In
the following, I've modified and added to his sketchy outline.

Say your cloned backup drive is D:

1. Boot Into Safe mode and in your XXCOPY directory type
XXCOPY D:\WINDOWS C:\WINTEMP /CLONE/YY
2. Boot into DOS and type:
REN \WINDOWS WINOLD
REN \WINTEMP WINDOWS
3. Boot into Windows. From a DOS Window in the root directory:
DELTREE /Y WINOLD

As you can see, this procedure replaces your entire current Windows
installation with a backed up copy. (I'd do a defrag afterward).

Now, I'm certainly _not_ proposing that doing a restore in this way
using Safe mode covers all the bases from the POV of recovering from
any and all virus and malware infestations. There are probably some
nasties that definitely should not be handled in this way, and of
course there are some for which restoring Windows isn't the solution.

Yet for many restore purposes, I think it's an improvement over Win ME
System Restore in spite of its awkwardness. And it does afford a
system restore method for Win 95 and 98 users. I've tested it out on
my Win ME PC and it works fine. Dunno how it might confict though with
Win ME System Restore users. I've eradicated that from my PC.


Art
http://www.epix.net/~artnpeg
 
For disaster recovery, some of us use a cloned backup hard drive on a
removable tray ... and carefully backup to it after making sure we
aren't infested with malware. But what if we want to do a Windows
restore from that backup drive? You can't expect to write to Windows
files that are in use, and you can't restore from DOS because of path
length and LFN limitations.

Kan Yamamoto, the author of XXCOPY, just made a clever suggestion in a
post on the freeware n.g. I've spent the last hour or so checking it
out. The approach assumes you have plenty of spare h.d. space, and you
can boot into pure DOS. Quite suitable for many Win 9X/ME users. In
the following, I've modified and added to his sketchy outline.

Say your cloned backup drive is D:

1. Boot Into Safe mode and in your XXCOPY directory type
XXCOPY D:\WINDOWS C:\WINTEMP /CLONE/YY
2. Boot into DOS and type:
REN \WINDOWS WINOLD
REN \WINTEMP WINDOWS
3. Boot into Windows. From a DOS Window in the root directory:
DELTREE /Y WINOLD
Click to expand...

Another approach, in case you don't have spare hard disk space, is to use XXCOPY
/CLONE after starting Windows into the special mode provided by the ToggleMode
utility.

ToggleMode puts any Win 32 platform is a mode similar to "safe with command
prompt", including Windows 95/98,NT and ME. The latter have no such native
startup mode, and the ToggleMode utility creates it for them.

I have been using this method successfully for quite some time, for both
cleaning viruses, as well as cloning Windows and applications, back and forth.

The utility as well as instructions for using it are available from
http://invircible.com/item/80.

Regards, Zvi
 
Another approach, in case you don't have spare hard disk space, is to use XXCOPY
/CLONE after starting Windows into the special mode provided by the ToggleMode
utility.

ToggleMode puts any Win 32 platform is a mode similar to "safe with command
prompt", including Windows 95/98,NT and ME. The latter have no such native
startup mode, and the ToggleMode utility creates it for them.

I have been using this method successfully for quite some time, for both
cleaning viruses, as well as cloning Windows and applications, back and forth.

The utility as well as instructions for using it are available from
http://invircible.com/item/80.

Regards, Zvi
Click to expand...

That's really cool. Seems to work ok. Much simpler. I suggest making
copies of TOGGLMOD.EXE to your emergency boot disks and a couple of
places on your hard drive since you don't want to get stuck not being
able to boot up normally.

To those who are unfamiliar:

D/L Zvi's utility and run it. Select S. Reboot and in the DOS window
change to your XXCOPY directory and run:

XXCOPY D:\WINDOWS C:\WINDOWS /CLONE.YY

Run Zvi's utility and select N (Normal). Reboot and you're done.


Art
http://www.epix.net/~artnpeg
 
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