Does restroe point work?

[Bob Day[_2_]]

Using xp pro on high end laptop...

I have had to rebuild the hard disk because of a MS software crash. While
rebuilding it, some of the MS software failed to install. So, I am trying to
use restore.

I picked one restore point, it took about 30 minutes to tell me it could not
restore to that point because nothing has changed.

I picked another and another and another restore point going further back in
time but I gett the same thing after waiting 30 minutes, that it cannot
restore because nothing has changed. I know things have changed, because I
have been doing nothing but installing software.

Why would restore show a restore point if it didn't acutally exists?

Since the software does not operate as advertised (surprise), can some
explain how it really works in the real world? Is it useless?

Thanks
bob