System restore Points

[markaz]

Vista Home Premium
Deleted a Linux distro today and everything was removed except for the Linux bootloader. Wanted to do a System restore as I was concerned that the Windows MBR might be compromised. Opened SysRestore and every restore point is gone EXCEPT the Windows Update done last night.
1. Where did they go (please tell me something other than SysRestore heaven, and
2. How do I get my windows bootloader back.

Thanks in advance.

-Mark

 

[richc46]

Afraid that the points may be gone. You asked us not to tell you where
This may help the bootloader problem
Download EasyBCD 2.0.2 - NeoSmart Technologies

 

[markaz]

Thanks Rich-

The par t that tick me is that BCD ID'ed the Ubuntu bootloader and it was the same registry entry I deleted just before I posted her. It was mysteriously reborn, I guess.
I think I used BCD in the past but forgot all about it and it worked as advertised. That's taken care of and thank you.
Any ideas on what what happened that the restore points were deleted?
-Mark

 

[MilesAhead]

Were you using Grub? It's been awhile since I did Linux in any depth but I seem to remember one of the things Grub did was store a copy of the MBR before it overwrote it. You could uninstall Grub, get the original MBR back, then just trash the Linux partitions and give everything to Windows.

An advantage of Linux was the boot diskette. You could uninstall the boot loader and still get in by using the diskette that loaded Linux from the HD. Those type utilities are now being put on USB keys.

Check out this site for future reference:

reboot


Somebody there showed me how to make a Windows boot menu on USB key that worked just like the old Linux boot diskette. Trouble is, like the Linux boot diskette, each is specific to the machine and I forget which Key drive goes with which PC.

edit: afa the disappearing restore points, if you also have an XP partition and Vista is visible from it, it will erase the Vista restore points every time you boot into it. The only work around is sacrificing the Vista NTFS visibility by some registry setting. I believe it's in one of Brinks' Tutorials. (The Vista restore point is slightly different so XP thinks they are "corrupted" and gets rid of 'em without asking.)

 

[niemiro]

Any ideas on what what happened that the restore points were deleted?
-Mark

Hello Mark!

Yes, they are gone (Hell or Heaven, or just gone!)

Primarily, it is because of the System Restore cache size: http://www.vistax64.com/tutorials/76227-system-restore-disk-space.html

Why this is will take a little bit of explaining! Hold on tight while I rock the boat!

The System Restore cache is stored in the Hidden and protected (by Windows Resource Protection (WRP)) C:\System Volume Information.

This folder holds data for a few things. You can see what it holds here: What's the deal with the System Volume Information folder? - The Old New Thing - Site Home - MSDN Blogs

However, I want to talk about the Volume Shadow Copy Service cache which it holds.

Incremental backups or caches only store changes. So the first bit may be big, but subsequent ones won't store the same files over and over, but only files which have changed, and only the parts of files which have changed.

Therefore, you can go backwards and backwards along these incremental backups, and actually go back to a point in time.

However, this also means that if you break one link in the chain, due to deletion or corruption, you cannot restore to or beyond that point.

System Restore is incremental to save space, and it works out of two Services, Volume Shadow Copy, and Microsoft Shadow Copy Provider

It only restores System Files, by and large. However, it back up your ENTIRE hard disk.

It is exactly the same process which is used in Previous Versions. http://www.vistax64.com/tutorials/122127-previous-versions-shadow-copy.html

Previous Versions just doesn't stop at System files, but also allows you to restore your own files from the System Restore cache.

Although Previous Versions doesn't exist in all copies of Vista, System Restore and its cache do. So you can still restore your own files if you use a 3rd Party Program. There is one absolutely free, and amazing program to do this: ShadowExplorer.com - About

It is completely safe and amazing, and recommend by basically everyone here.

Here is the problem. Because it does your whole hard disk, installing a big program or file will bloat the cache.

If your cache is not large enough, it will delete from the oldest first to make space.

But because it is incremental, and each file does not take a lot of space, it can chew through a lot of restore points, but only gain an ineffectual couple of gigabytes for each one.

It ineffectually chews up all of your System Restore points, and leaves only one!

They are gone I am afraid to say. And not recoverable.

Was that more than asked for!?

Richard

 

[richc46]

I am truly glad that the BCD worked and that your SR questions were answered.

 

[niemiro]

I am truly glad that the BCD worked and that your SR questions were answered.

+1. I forgot that! Thanks Rich! Glad your BCD problem is resolved!

 

[markaz]

This is why http://www.vistax64.com is the BEST URL for Windows help on the internet. Members are always going out of their way to help solve a problem and then go the extra miles to explain everything. In Linux forums they somehow always tell you that Windows sucks and that Bill Gates is the anit-Christ. Here you get real help and no BS biased opinions.

MilesAhead – That’s really the part I just don’t get. I installed the Linux distro (Ubuntu) via the Windows installer that allows you to run ubuntu as a Windows program (albeit 17 GB). What was installed looked exactly like the GRUB bootloader but can’t say for 100% certain (I once had a dual boot XP/SimplyMepis system). I did not actually see GRUB at the top of the page, but the fonts were exact. So there were no partitions created, BUT, ubuntu\winboot\wubildr.mbr was created with the install. And this is the registry entry I deleted and thought would get Windows back. At restart it was recreated. Enter BCD and the problem was taken care of (thanks again rich).
And finally, I wish I did have an XP partition as your explanation would help explain why I lost ALL points, but I didn’t. I’ve just got the Factory Image partition and that’s it. It’s all Vista.

niemiro – Glad you spent the time explaining this in detail because it helped to dispel some things that I had heard in the past. I was under the impression that shadow copies (each restore point) were of the magnitude of 1GB each and thus why I made certain I’ve always had a large amount of free space and that the cache had room. That each point only involves system changes since the last point is interesting (but not comforting when you lose the whole damn thing). Would have been nice if a “link” was corrupted and lost everything prior to that date.
After reading the link you provided (SysRestore – disk space), now I’m really *&!%* because only the older points should have been deleted if the cache’s size was exceeded. No, they were ALL blown out.
I still don’t understand why the whole lot was deleted but will further investigate as this happened at the same time as a Windows update and SysRetore will not accept my parameters for a scheduled task (creating a restore point). I scheduled a restore point for 3:00am and one was not created (after checking and modifying the cache). This may end up being another thread.
A thanks again for everyone’s input. I still have questions, but understand a whole lot better the mechanics of System Restore.

-Mark

 

[MilesAhead]

I never got much into the Launch Linux from Windows thing. Those kind of hybrid things just about anything can happen. Also I was never impressed by Ubuntu. To me, Mandrake came out with better stuff first. Now they call it Mandriva. They still have a One CD install if you have broadband that's the best install setup I've seen for a real Linux on its own partition. It installs the system and XWindow desktop(s) and creates your accounts, then any packages you select it downloads and installs off the net. When you boot into your account, you're ready to rock & roll. It uses apt-get same as Debian and Ubuntu, but they just did it better.

 

[markaz]

Thanks for the info. Having compared Ubuntu to MEPIS and Suse, while I'm far from a Linux pro, I would have to agree that Ubuntu was a letdown. I will definitely give Mandriva a try. Thanks again and take care.

-Mark

 

[whs]

There are many ways that shadows can disappear. System Restore is an amazing system but unfortunately it is not very reliable. Very often you cannot restore from restore points although they exist.

As a better way to protect your system, I suggest you use imaging. Free Paragon or free Macrium would work well. Here is a tutorial about Macrium for Win7, Vista and XP: Imaging with free Macrium - Windows 7 Forums
And here is a short version: http://www.vistax64.com/software/261727-image-your-system-free-macrium.html

 

[MilesAhead]

There are many ways that shadows can disappear. System Restore is an amazing system but unfortunately it is not very reliable. Very often you cannot restore from restore points although they exist.

As a better way to protect your system, I suggest you use imaging. Free Paragon or free Macrium would work well. Here is a tutorial about Macrium for Win7, Vista and XP: Imaging with free Macrium - Windows 7 Forums
And here is a short version: http://www.vistax64.com/software/261727-image-your-system-free-macrium.html

+1 Restore Points are a convenient stop gap. Sometimes even a RP is too much I just use ERUNT if I'm going to edit the registry for some reason.

It's good to have layers of backup.