Why was no Automatic Restore to XP included?

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J

jonah

DOWN CONOR - its not one of those "How do I get back to XP posts"

I was just wondering if there was any specific technical or other
reason why MSFT did not include a built in automatic backout in this
Public Beta to revert to XP. The results of not doing so were entirely
predictable and have caused a lot of grief to a lot of people, their
own fault entirely, but still if it was possible it would not have
been a bad idea.

Jonah
 
jonah said:
DOWN CONOR - its not one of those "How do I get back to XP posts"

I was just wondering if there was any specific technical or other
reason why MSFT did not include a built in automatic backout in this
Public Beta to revert to XP. The results of not doing so were entirely
predictable and have caused a lot of grief to a lot of people, their
own fault entirely, but still if it was possible it would not have
been a bad idea.

Jonah
Click to expand...

They did. It's called dual boot and the instructions were quite clear.

Along with the instructions to not put it on a machine where backing out to
XP would be important.
 
They did. It's called dual boot and the instructions were quite clear.

Along with the instructions to not put it on a machine where backing out to
XP would be important.
Click to expand...
Thats not what I mean, when upgrading from Win98SE to XP there was, as
I recall a backout to revert to Win98SE, I am wondering if it was
possible to have included a similar backout option in this beta and if
so why did MSFT not do so, was it for technical or other reasons.

It would have saved a lot of predictable trouble for those people who
cannot read instructions / warnings and incidently made it easier for
the responders in this NG to help people who did ill advised upgrades
to get back to XP.

I am not being critical its just a general interest question.

Jonah
 
I am glad they did not take the engineering time to do that.
This is a frikken BETA!!!! With 6 months left before any "non-techniical"
users should even see this, let alone install it.

I know what you are saying, but that functionality is goign to be
engineering/testing intensive.....
 
They should have not even let the install upgrade XP...they should have left
testing that functionality to the technical beta testers...
Then there would have been less confusion..though the warnings were all over
the place....
 
jonah said:
Thats not what I mean, when upgrading from Win98SE to XP there was, as
I recall a backout to revert to Win98SE, I am wondering if it was
possible to have included a similar backout option in this beta and if
so why did MSFT not do so, was it for technical or other reasons.

It would have saved a lot of predictable trouble for those people who
cannot read instructions / warnings and incidently made it easier for
the responders in this NG to help people who did ill advised upgrades
to get back to XP.

I am not being critical its just a general interest question.

Jonah
Click to expand...

98 = small
XP = big

I see your point, but the complexity would have been pretty high.
 
Hi,

People are used to Win9x upgrades where reversion to a previous OS was the
norm. In NT systems, the option to "uninstall" has never been a part of the
standard installation. Win2K, XP, and Vista are all NT systems, and
upgrading any of them are a one way street.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org
 
You can get back to your XP the same way you would get your XP back due to a
hardware failure, by using your backup.
People can not get back to their XP if the hard drive containing the O/S
fails, unless they have a backup, so if they are complaining that they can't
get back to XP after upgrading to Vista, it makes little difference. They
should always have a backup plan.

You can always reinstall XP and reinstall your apps. You will not lose any
of your personal files. Unless of course you over write them or reformat the
disk they are on (and don't have a backup).
 
DOWN CONOR - its not one of those "How do I get back to XP posts"

I was just wondering if there was any specific technical or other
reason why MSFT did not include a built in automatic backout in this
Public Beta to revert to XP. The results of not doing so were entirely
predictable and have caused a lot of grief to a lot of people, their
own fault entirely, but still if it was possible it would not have
been a bad idea.
Click to expand...

They might have that in the final retail version but I'm sure they did it
ON PURPOSE to teach all those little morons who should not touch a beta a
nice lesson. If only they had included the black ice like I suggested.
 
All in all Jonah, I think it is a good question. But MSFT screwed the
pooch when the System Restore team forgot to backport the infrastructure of
Volume Shadow Services restore points to Win XP keep an XP/Vista dual boot
from loosing them on Vista. It can be done but whether the Microsoft System
Restore team will do it is up in the air. Also it would be great if they
can get system restore to reliably manufacture restore points at the default
times it is supposed to before they start putting Vista on choppers and
waving to it and putting it in stores and on sites to sell.

I think you raise a good point although I agree a dual boot is a very good
solution because I find:

1) I can go right to my XP desktop and use its shortcuts, files, folders and
even access some of its OE by going to the stored folders.:

C:\Documents and Settings\Jonah's XP Profile\Desktop (if XP were on C:\ and
you dual booted).

2) I also find that if say you have several users on the Vista box (as a
family might or room mates might or couples) that you can access the other
user's desktop (I'm not sure that password protection might not require the
password this way--don't know--I'd have to try that) by simply typing:

C:\(or whatever drive)\Users\whatever profile\desktop and this is faster
than logging off or fast user switching and there are times when Fast User
Switching will corrupt a profile and this is one way to use it--some of the
recovery options may help get it back or trying to repair the profile.

How to check user profiles on a Windows XP-based computer
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/q294887/

For additional information, visit the following Microsoft Web sites:
http://www.microsoft.com/windows200...ws2000/en/advanced/help/sag_UPconcepts_14.htm
(http://www.microsoft.com/windows200...ws2000/en/advanced/help/sag_UPconcepts_14.htm)

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/winxppro/support/dataprot.mspx

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/archive/termsrv/evaluate/indcomp/tsunix.mspx?mfr=true

How to Recover a Damaged User Profile in Windows XP
http://channels.lockergnome.com/it/...cover_a_damaged_windows_xp_user_profile.phtml

CH
 
Based on a live meeting I attended yesterday on System Restore, VSS, and
CompletePC Backup, backporting the VSS changes to XP is not in the works.
The reason given was that it would break a lot of stuff.
 
The One Care Live team says on their blog that 65% of people have no backup
in discussing their nice backup feature (not as robust as the one in
Vista--Vista will back up media files). I put that figure at 80% at the
minimum. Using a Beta should be a more compelling reason for having a good
backup. I wish there were a way to check to see if a backup were in place
before Vista would install.

CH
 
If you read the articles you just posted, you'll see they support what I
just said. If you upgraded Win2K or WinNT4 to WinXP (both of which are NT
systems), then you will find that there is no uninstall. Uninstall was/is
only an option when the upgrade is *from* a Win9x system (and even then only
under certain conditions). Vista is an NT system, and an upgrade from XP is
like any other NT upgrade, ie: not reversible.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org
 
They should have not even let the install upgrade XP...they should have left
testing that functionality to the technical beta testers...
Then there would have been less confusion..though the warnings were all over
the place....
Click to expand...

yeah agreed

Jonah
 
Based on a live meeting I attended yesterday on System Restore, VSS, and
CompletePC Backup, backporting the VSS changes to XP is not in the works.
The reason given was that it would break a lot of stuff.
snip
Click to expand...
Aha, between you and Chad I think the answer has emerged.

8-)

Jonah
 
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