Disaster Recovery Made Easy (When In Doubt, Restore It! Part 1)
Posted by Jon Deliz on Mon, Feb 08, 2010 @ 09:55 AM
How many times have you done something on your computer and wished that you could go back in time and do something different? Well I am going to introduce you to some free versions and some not so free versions that can save you time, effort and most importantly money!
Ok so let’s start with something free, easy, and probably already installed on your computer. System Restore is an easy fix for anybody who has installed something or has had a virus affect their computer. System Restore is found by clicking your start button; then either Programs or All Programs (depending on which version of
Windows you are running); Accessories; System Tools and there you should see System Restore. Now just follow the onscreen prompts and select a date (if it is a virus I would select the last known date the computer actually worked). There are some important things to consider: 1.) System Restore can only work if it is turned on, or hasn’t been disabled by a virus. The settings for System Restore can be found in the control panel under System and then click the System Restore tab. 2.) System Restore is only for the Window’s Operating System, so if your Excel spreadsheet doesn’t work then this won’t fix it! (I will be referring to a product that will below). 3.)
Also System Restore won’t affect files that aren’t part of the OS, so your documents, pictures, and emails are all safe.
Another free program to check out is if you have purchased an external hard drive, not a flash key or thumb drive. Most of the drives come preloaded with software that will do a backup of your documents. Although there are far too many preloaded software packages to mention in this article, feel free to contact DataCentric, as your Atlanta computer support specialist, so we can help you get setup and backing up correctly. Don't forget to ask about our online data backup solutions which will be covered in Part 2!