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O.T. Missing Folder/files
I have a Dell XPS 8500, with Windows 7 Professional, SP1,
with Spywareblaster, Malwarebytes, Avast , Windows Defender and Windows firewall. (1) TB HD Intel (R) Core (TM) i7-33-3770 CPU @ 3.40 GHz Ram 12.0 GB System type : 64-bit operating system I also have I have a Dell Optiplex 780 Tower, with Windows 7 Professional, SP1, with Spywareblaster, Malwarebytes, Avast , Windows Defender and Windows firewall. Seagate Desktop HDD ST2000DM001 2TB 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal System type : 64-bit operating system and (external hard drives) (8500) WD BLACK SERIES WD2003FZEX 2TB 7200 RPM 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive (780) Seagate Desktop HDD ST2000DM001 2TB 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive The problem lies with the 8500. I inadvertently deleted or moved a folder and I can't find it. Before I do any more damage I thought I had better post it here and maybe I can recover the folder/files? Thanks, Robert -- This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software. https://www.avast.com/antivirus |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
Robert in CA wrote:
I have a Dell XPS 8500, with Windows 7 Professional, SP1, with Spywareblaster, Malwarebytes, Avast , Windows Defender and Windows firewall. (1) TB HD Intel (R) Core (TM) i7-33-3770 CPU @ 3.40 GHz Ram 12.0 GB System type : 64-bit operating system I also have I have a Dell Optiplex 780 Tower, with Windows 7 Professional, SP1, with Spywareblaster, Malwarebytes, Avast , Windows Defender and Windows firewall. Seagate Desktop HDD ST2000DM001 2TB 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal System type : 64-bit operating system and (external hard drives) (8500) WD BLACK SERIES WD2003FZEX 2TB 7200 RPM 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive (780) Seagate Desktop HDD ST2000DM001 2TB 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive The problem lies with the 8500. I inadvertently deleted or moved a folder and I can't find it. Before I do any more damage I thought I had better post it here and maybe I can recover the folder/files? Thanks, Robert You must stop using the partition immediately, to avoid damage to the missing items. Like, don't use Firefox or any other program which causes writes to the C: with the "missing files". https://www.ccleaner.com/recuva The colored dot next to the file name, indicates how damaged the file is. If it has already been overwritten (the clusters reused by the file system), the dot will be red. If the file is in perfect condition, the dot will be green. A color of yellow is bad news too. Let's draw an example to illustrate. This is the drive, when the accident happens. +-----+--------------------------------+ | MBR | C: Windows with deleted files | +-----+--------------------------------+ Plug in your emergency boot drive, boot from it. +-----+--------------------------------+ | MBR | C: Emergency Boot Drive | === download Recuva onto this one. +-----+--------------------------------+ Then, point it to E: to scan. Store the recovered files on C: of Emergency Boot Drive, not on E: +-----+--------------------------------+ | MBR | E: Windows with deleted files | === we're not running this one, we're +-----+--------------------------------+ trying to recover the files while this operates as a "data drive". Now, maybe you would be sticking one drive inside your machine, and the second drive in your USB enclosure. But, you get the idea. C: would be inside the machine, E: would be in the enclosure. Note: Piriform is the company that invented Recuva. There are many similar programs, it's not the only one. Piriform was bought by Avast, and when you download Recuva, there is a danger that other garbage software will get installed. Read all prompts carefully, and do your best to avoid getting unnecessary passengers from the Recuva installer. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recuva Paul |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
I don't quite know what you mean by I must stop using
the partition? I just had a folder named 'Shopping' and I had files in it of things like books, DVD's etc that were on my list. I have lots of folders/files like that. You're saying it's bad? Isn't that what Favorites/folders/files are for? Hmmmm, I already downloaded CCleaner on the 8500 but I haven't opened it. I then removed them from the download history. When I click your link it doesn't give me any option to download in another location, then the dialog box pops up to save it or open. So how do I download it to a USB flash drive? Then I run a scan from there correct? Thanks, Robert |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
On 3/24/2021 7:47 PM, Robert in CA wrote:
I don't quite know what you mean by I must stop using the partition? You stop as much disk activity as possible because when ANYTHING is written to the disk there is a chance it will get written over one of your deleted files and it will be gone forever. I just had a folder named 'Shopping' and I had files in it of things like books, DVD's etc that were on my list. I have lots of folders/files like that. You're saying it's bad? Isn't that what Favorites/folders/files are for? Hmmmm, I already downloaded CCleaner on the 8500 but I haven't opened it. I then removed them from the download history. When I click your link it doesn't give me any option to download in another location, then the dialog box pops up to save it or open. So how do I download it to a USB flash drive? Then I run a scan from there correct? Thanks, Robert Robert: I have used "restoration" in the past with good results. https://www.download3k.com/Install-Restoration.html The sooner you use it the better your chances of getting deleted files back. BTW have you checked in the "Recycle Bin"? If you think you have just MOVED it to some obscure place you can use the "Search" function of Windows explorer. Enter a remembered folder or file name, point it at the root of the disk drive (C:\) and check the "advanced" setting to "Search Subfolders". HTH & GL John -- \\\||/// ------------------o000----(o)(o)----000o---------------- ----------------------------()-------------------------- '' Madness takes its toll - Please have exact change. '' |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
Robert in CA wrote:
I don't quite know what you mean by I must stop using the partition? I just had a folder named 'Shopping' and I had files in it of things like books, DVD's etc that were on my list. I have lots of folders/files like that. You're saying it's bad? Isn't that what Favorites/folders/files are for? Hmmmm, I already downloaded CCleaner on the 8500 but I haven't opened it. I then removed them from the download history. When I click your link it doesn't give me any option to download in another location, then the dialog box pops up to save it or open. So how do I download it to a USB flash drive? Then I run a scan from there correct? Thanks, Robert The objective, is to treat the partition that had the accident, as read-only. The C: partition, while the machine is booted and Windows is running, is constantly writing to C: . Maybe the search indexer is running and doing writes. If files are lost (accidental delete), you would shut down the machine immediately. Now, we're not doing read or write. You have other drives with a copy of the OS on them. Imagine that drive is used to boot the computer. Now the C: writes are happening to a partition you don't care about. Using that drive, you download Recuva Free. Install Recuva Free on that drive. Now you are ready to scan. Now, connect the original drive, using a USB enclosure. There is no constant activity to the enclosure when it is connected. It's ready to do what you wish to it. It is treated as a data drive, because it has not been used to boot the computer. If you were to look in Disk Management, the swapped in drive has +-----+-----------------+------------+ | MBR | ..."System" | ..."Boot" } === the drive being used to boot +-----+-----------------+------------+ Windows writes to this C: Recovered files go to this drive, until recovery from the other drive is complete. +-----+-----------------+------------+ | MBR | | } === no special designations, +-----+-----------------+------------+ now a "data" drive and ready to be scanned with Recuva Once you are sure you've Un-Deleted as many files as the job requires, then it is "safe" to write to the bottom drive, so that when that drive becomes the main boot drive again, the recovered materials are there for you to use. You don't write to the bottom drive, until you're absolutely sure each and every file is intact, and no further forensics on the bottom drive are needed. At that point, the bottom drive is safe to write and update as you wish. Then, shut down the computer, and the bottom drive can be put back inside the machine. There is nothing special about being inside or outside the machine. I'm just taking your usual usage pattern into account. On my machines here, pretty well all drive activity is internal. If I needed to do this... +-----+-----------------+------------+ | MBR | ..."System" | ..."Boot" } +-----+-----------------+------------+ +-----+-----------------+------------+ | MBR | | } === needs UnDelete +-----+-----------------+------------+ it would be done with two adjacent trays that slide in. I would need to know the names and sizes of the drive, so I booted from the correct one (the un-damaged one) and not boot from the damaged one. We don't want writes on the bottom one. When a file is deleted, its resources can be reused at any time. We seek to stop writing to the drive, to protect those resources. If the resources have not been tampered with, Recuva simply flips a single byte value in the $MFT and the file is instantly available again. If you continue to write to the drive and don't act quickly enough (use the drive for the rest of the day), the freed-up clusters from the files that were deleted, they get overwritten. Even if you flipped the byte in the $MFT, the file is corrupt. It is for this reason that the filenames have the colored dots next to them. A file with a "red dot", is unfit for recovery. A file with a "green dot" or all the files having "green dots", means you stopped usage of the drive soon enough to keep them green. All it would take, is writing one giant movie file, to overwrite all the deleted files and turn all the dots "red" and nothing could be recovered. You can flip the byte on a "red" file and make the file appear again in the listing. But if you do that, practically none of the original data is inside it. It contains portions of other files that have been stored. Thus, if you open the file, your picture viewer crashes or there are other anomalies. You have to check the files. If the files had green dots next to them, testing the files should take only a short time. If the files are red, expect trouble, and the testing is likely to fail (and hopefully, in not too spectacular a fashion - *don't* run tools with built-in automated repair capability because they can make a mess of a file with random bits of other files in it). To test a file, you want dumb tools that don't take liberties with the files. Your data is there, but it is only there until the clusters get overwritten. Every write operation on the partition with the problem, risks overwriting the freed-up resources. That's why there is a rush to stop using that drive for writes. And the OS loves to write to the drive. The more modern the version of Windows, the more it likes to write. An accidental deletion then, the files will be unrecoverable in a short time, if the OS is writing stuff to C: . That's why, if you notice files are missing several days or a week later, it's not very likely they're coming back. They'll all have red dots next to their name. Or, if the $MFT entries get reused (which happens!), not even the file names will be locatable by Recuva. I've watched how the $MFT is used, and it really doesn't take that long for the filename to disappear either. The other technique is scavenging. That's when Recuva doesn't work, the filename is missing or the filename is there but has a red dot. You can use Photorec and scan the drive for "fragments of files". But the output is such a mess, don't waste the time. I tried once. I got 100,000 chunks of stuff, that when opened were all corrupted and useless. It's wishful thinking to think doing more work than the Recuva approach, is going to pay off. If the file is still mostly intact, flipping the $MFT byte brings it back. If it's damaged, there's a good chance it is never coming back. I've tested undelete, by deleting a JPEG and immediately doing a scan, and the file was located and had a green dot. So it can work. But don't be "testing it", until your recovery project is complete. Then you can be messing around if you want. You'll only get the one chance to get these back, so concentrate on that. Paul |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
On Wednesday, March 24, 2021 at 5:33:27 PM UTC-7, Paul wrote:
Robert in CA wrote: I don't quite know what you mean by I must stop using the partition? I just had a folder named 'Shopping' and I had files in it of things like books, DVD's etc that were on my list. I have lots of folders/files like that. You're saying it's bad? Isn't that what Favorites/folders/files are for? Hmmmm, I already downloaded CCleaner on the 8500 but I haven't opened it. I then removed them from the download history. When I click your link it doesn't give me any option to download in another location, then the dialog box pops up to save it or open. So how do I download it to a USB flash drive? Then I run a scan from there correct? Thanks, Robert The objective, is to treat the partition that had the accident, as read-only. The C: partition, while the machine is booted and Windows is running, is constantly writing to C: . Maybe the search indexer is running and doing writes. If files are lost (accidental delete), you would shut down the machine immediately. Now, we're not doing read or write. You have other drives with a copy of the OS on them. Imagine that drive is used to boot the computer. Now the C: writes are happening to a partition you don't care about. Using that drive, you download Recuva Free. Install Recuva Free on that drive. Now you are ready to scan. Now, connect the original drive, using a USB enclosure. There is no constant activity to the enclosure when it is connected. It's ready to do what you wish to it. It is treated as a data drive, because it has not been used to boot the computer. If you were to look in Disk Management, the swapped in drive has +-----+-----------------+------------+ | MBR | ..."System" | ..."Boot" } === the drive being used to boot +-----+-----------------+------------+ Windows writes to this C: Recovered files go to this drive, until recovery from the other drive is complete. +-----+-----------------+------------+ | MBR | | } === no special designations, +-----+-----------------+------------+ now a "data" drive and ready to be scanned with Recuva Once you are sure you've Un-Deleted as many files as the job requires, then it is "safe" to write to the bottom drive, so that when that drive becomes the main boot drive again, the recovered materials are there for you to use. You don't write to the bottom drive, until you're absolutely sure each and every file is intact, and no further forensics on the bottom drive are needed. At that point, the bottom drive is safe to write and update as you wish. Then, shut down the computer, and the bottom drive can be put back inside the machine. There is nothing special about being inside or outside the machine. I'm just taking your usual usage pattern into account. On my machines here, pretty well all drive activity is internal. If I needed to do this... +-----+-----------------+------------+ | MBR | ..."System" | ..."Boot" } +-----+-----------------+------------+ +-----+-----------------+------------+ | MBR | | } === needs UnDelete +-----+-----------------+------------+ it would be done with two adjacent trays that slide in. I would need to know the names and sizes of the drive, so I booted from the correct one (the un-damaged one) and not boot from the damaged one. We don't want writes on the bottom one. When a file is deleted, its resources can be reused at any time. We seek to stop writing to the drive, to protect those resources. If the resources have not been tampered with, Recuva simply flips a single byte value in the $MFT and the file is instantly available again. If you continue to write to the drive and don't act quickly enough (use the drive for the rest of the day), the freed-up clusters from the files that were deleted, they get overwritten. Even if you flipped the byte in the $MFT, the file is corrupt. It is for this reason that the filenames have the colored dots next to them. A file with a "red dot", is unfit for recovery. A file with a "green dot" or all the files having "green dots", means you stopped usage of the drive soon enough to keep them green. All it would take, is writing one giant movie file, to overwrite all the deleted files and turn all the dots "red" and nothing could be recovered. You can flip the byte on a "red" file and make the file appear again in the listing. But if you do that, practically none of the original data is inside it. It contains portions of other files that have been stored. Thus, if you open the file, your picture viewer crashes or there are other anomalies. You have to check the files. If the files had green dots next to them, testing the files should take only a short time. If the files are red, expect trouble, and the testing is likely to fail (and hopefully, in not too spectacular a fashion - *don't* run tools with built-in automated repair capability because they can make a mess of a file with random bits of other files in it). To test a file, you want dumb tools that don't take liberties with the files. Your data is there, but it is only there until the clusters get overwritten. Every write operation on the partition with the problem, risks overwriting the freed-up resources. That's why there is a rush to stop using that drive for writes. And the OS loves to write to the drive. The more modern the version of Windows, the more it likes to write. An accidental deletion then, the files will be unrecoverable in a short time, if the OS is writing stuff to C: . That's why, if you notice files are missing several days or a week later, it's not very likely they're coming back. They'll all have red dots next to their name. Or, if the $MFT entries get reused (which happens!), not even the file names will be locatable by Recuva. I've watched how the $MFT is used, and it really doesn't take that long for the filename to disappear either. The other technique is scavenging. That's when Recuva doesn't work, the filename is missing or the filename is there but has a red dot. You can use Photorec and scan the drive for "fragments of files". But the output is such a mess, don't waste the time. I tried once. I got 100,000 chunks of stuff, that when opened were all corrupted and useless. It's wishful thinking to think doing more work than the Recuva approach, is going to pay off. If the file is still mostly intact, flipping the $MFT byte brings it back. If it's damaged, there's a good chance it is never coming back. I've tested undelete, by deleting a JPEG and immediately doing a scan, and the file was located and had a green dot. So it can work. But don't be "testing it", until your recovery project is complete. Then you can be messing around if you want. You'll only get the one chance to get these back, so concentrate on that. Paul OK, I understand now,..... I did do a search after reading John's post and I did find the missing Folder/files https://postimg.cc/0M83SSP7 I opened the one highlighted to confirm they were there. If I understand you I'm suppose to remove the HD and put in another HD then download Recuva then attach my original HD via USB and scan it that way? Is that correct? Ok,.. here I go I hope I don't screw this up. Thanks, Robert |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
On Wednesday, March 24, 2021 at 5:33:27 PM UTC-7, Paul wrote:
I changed HD's on the 8500 and now in Windows Boot Manager it says Windows failed to start. A recent hardware or software change might be the cause. To fix the problem: 1. insert your Windows installation disc and restart your computer. 2. choose your language settings, and then click 'next' 3. click 'repair your computer'. If you do not have this disc, contact your system administator or computer manufacturer for assistance. Status 0xc000000e Info: The boot selection failed because a required device is inaccessible. Great, now the problem is worst than before! I knew something this would happen. I never liked opening up the computers. I'm going to switch back the hard drives. I sure hope I haven't lost the 8500 because of this!! Robert |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
I'm back on the 8500, that was a little scary I was wondering if I would get the 8500 back! Whew! Here's what I was looking at: https://postimg.cc/Cd9M2Cfk I think it was a bad HD. I checked and I have (2) HD's for the 780 with Win 10 and (1) HD for the 8500 with Win 10 but I thought we made more than one HD for the 8500 with Win 7 Pro? So it means I have to buy some HD's and we have to make up at least (2) for the 8500 and (1) for the 780 although I may of just mislabeled them. I would have to put each one in to check for sure but in any case more Win 7 Pro OS is called for and I still need to buy a APC surge protector. btw how do I use CcCleaner? I seem to remember you can really screw things up with it. Are there allot of checdk boxes etc? So at this point, I would rather have an operational 8500 and I can just rebuild the lost folder/files from the bookmarks I found but there's a couple of other things that have happened. My mouse seems over sensitive when I click it and I haven't messed with any of the settings and I've noticed recently that my backspace key doesn't function. It's weird how they changed by themselves. Thanks, Robert |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
btw, I realize I could use my Win 10 HD to do this but it seems
allot of effort just to recover bookmarks. Is there something else were looking for? I just would hate to loose my Win 7 on the 8500 because I depend on it allot and I don't particularly like opening it up to change HD's because with my past history it can create more problems. Robert Robert |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
Robert in CA wrote:
I'm back on the 8500, that was a little scary I was wondering if I would get the 8500 back! Whew! Here's what I was looking at: https://postimg.cc/Cd9M2Cfk I think it was a bad HD. I checked and I have (2) HD's for the 780 with Win 10 and (1) HD for the 8500 with Win 10 but I thought we made more than one HD for the 8500 with Win 7 Pro? So it means I have to buy some HD's and we have to make up at least (2) for the 8500 and (1) for the 780 although I may of just mislabeled them. I would have to put each one in to check for sure but in any case more Win 7 Pro OS is called for and I still need to buy a APC surge protector. btw how do I use CcCleaner? I seem to remember you can really screw things up with it. Are there allot of checdk boxes etc? So at this point, I would rather have an operational 8500 and I can just rebuild the lost folder/files from the bookmarks I found but there's a couple of other things that have happened. My mouse seems over sensitive when I click it and I haven't messed with any of the settings and I've noticed recently that my backspace key doesn't function. It's weird how they changed by themselves. Thanks, Robert There's probably nothing wrong with the hard drive, particularly. Carefully maintain your labeling, so cloned drives are being plugged into the correct machine. Your favorite model of new hard drive, may have been supplanted by a more crappy version. The three platter one you were using, seemed to be nice. But that may have been replaced by a two platter one, and some of those are a bit slower and jerky when loaded up with Windows. We know you don't like the WDC Black, because they're a bit noisy. And they keep messing around with the models anyway, and you have to be careful to not pick something that's taken a turn for the worse. ******* Using the Macrium boot CD, you can select "boot repair" while *only* the defective 8500 drive in in the 8500 tray. And no other drives, not even connected via USB. Just the one drive. One of the menus has a "Boot Repair" item, and this will locate trivially lost items and bolt them back together. If C: on the emergency 8500 drive had been absolutely destroyed (which could happen), then Macrium Boot Repair will not help. The hard drive will remain unbootable if the C: was trashed. Using your collection of backup images, your knowledge of which ones aren't infected, you can put back a good copy of C: over top. But this generally requires two drives (one USB connected), so that you have a source ..mrimg file to use to restore the C: that needs repairing. ******* With regard to what happened to your bookmarks, either you have the correct collection of bookmarks, or you don't. You have to decide, whether your recovery was successful and "the fire is out". I can't tell from here, whether any more forensic effort is required or not. You make it sound like this is a misplacement issue (drag and drop with a sticky mouse button will do that). In which case, you'd make sure your mouse was fully functional, so it doesn't happen a second time. I had to open up my Logitech mouse and do some cleaning up near the buttons on the casing, to restore decent drag (without dropping). I've on occasion, dropped a folder in some obscure spot, and yes, Agent Ransack search finds it for me :-) As long as you haven't deleted the files or the folder, then we don't really need to be using Recuva. It's only if Agent Ransack can't find the correct version, that tools like Recuva (and the correct discipline while using the tool) are required. Try to keep track of your most important materials. If C: became infected, you can restore it from backup. But if you overwrote C: with a really old image, then your bookmarks would take significant damage. You should keep some sort of Exported copy of Bookmarks.html for days like that. It should be stored separately somewhere, and while your regular backups will capture a copy of the bookmarks, to not lose daily bookmark changes, you'd need a daily copy of them. If you absolutely rely on browser-stored password management, then the browser profile folder could be captured as a backup item as well. An Agent Ransack search on C: for "Profiles", will find all sorts of important profiles. Here, I've located the one for the browser I use, Seamonkey. C:\... \Mozilla\SeaMonkey\Profiles\1234abcd.default -------- The Profiles folder for the various software products, has things like key3.db or key4.db and some other file similar to that, and that's where persistent password storage is located. Capturing the named folder, the "1234abcd.default" style folder, will capture individual files like key4.db . The easily infectable prefs.js is in there too (the one the adwares like to attack). To make sure you have the correct Profiles item, you'd want to make sure there was a key4.db type file in it, as that indicates it's the correct folder for the job. That 1234abcd.default folder also has "bookmarkbackups", which is the browser version of bookmarks. Doing an Export of Bookmarks, reads the current file from that collection, and delivers it as an HTML file. The HTML file is "the one humans use". It's a wee bit more portable. Paul |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
I have to really concentrate when I read your stuff *L*
First,.. I have started to rebuild my Shopping folder/files and part of the reason was the point you hit on. My link to buying HD's. This is the one we've been using. https://www.newegg.com/seagate-deskt...2E16822148834# I have one Star Tech case left: https://www.newegg.com/startech-sat3...82E16817707227 It says they are out of stock can you suggest another case? What happens with the mouse is that for example, if I'm in my Dell imaging where I usually have 2 screens displayed. Lets say I open a third to do some work but when I close it the mouse closes one of the 2 screens that were open. It didn't use to do that. So I have to set the screens up all over like I had them. That's what happened with the bookmarks it just kept going and did whatever it did. In a way I'm glad this happened because I realized I have zero HD backups for Windows 7 Pro for either computer. I think what happened was that we did have the Win7 Pro OS but we took advantage of the Windows 10 option. Thats why all the HD's were Win 10. So here's the plan; around the end of April I get paid again and will buy (4) HD's so we can create Win 7 Pro OS for both the 8500 and 780 and we can pick up again then. I checked and I do have rescue disks etc that we made before so I'm sure I have something there. You made sure I did everything correct. Oh btw what do you think of me using brushes or compressed air to clean the inside of the computer out? Thoughts/suggestions? Robert |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
btw I have a logitech m310 mouse and cleaned the lens with
some Windex on a q-tip. It seems to have made a difference. Thanks, Robert |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
Robert in CA wrote:
btw I have a logitech m310 mouse and cleaned the lens with some Windex on a q-tip. It seems to have made a difference. Thanks, Robert Yes, test with a working mouse and see if the symptoms of mis-behavior go away. That would tend to support either a cleaning issue with the defective mouse, or an electrical issue. And if the mouse cable has an open in it, you'd probably have a wider variety of symptoms. The optical part of modern mice is pretty good, when it comes to dust preventing the lens from working. The sensor is more of an array than a single sensor. Don't let the grotty appearance of the plastics they use for those, deceive. I know some people, assume the appearance is a defect, and scrub them, but they don't really need to be scrubbed particularly. Whoever makes the sensor assemblies for those, just doesn't care what the mold plastic looks like :-) Only if some sort of foreign matter (like the mouse fell into a bowl of chili), would it need the real cleaning treatment. But dust does pack in other places, especially around where the mouse button cover plastic on top, meets the microswitch. You can get enough dust impacted, to prevent the microswitch from depressing. When you disassemble a mouse for cleaning, be careful around the scroll wheel. Some scroll wheels have a tiny bit of a clear gel grease on them. And you would not want to remove stuff like that. There are all sorts of fiddly springs on those scroll wheels. When you tilt up the hinged cover, do the tilting in the upright position, so the scroll wheel doesn't fall out of its mount, onto the desk. And all those blasted small parts with it. I learned my lesson when I took my Logitech apart - what I can't believe, is they design them with that many parts inside. It must take a ton of human assemblers to be putting those together. Paul |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
Robert in CA wrote:
I have to really concentrate when I read your stuff *L* First,.. I have started to rebuild my Shopping folder/files and part of the reason was the point you hit on. My link to buying HD's. This is the one we've been using. https://www.newegg.com/seagate-deskt...2E16822148834# I have one Star Tech case left: https://www.newegg.com/startech-sat3...82E16817707227 It says they are out of stock can you suggest another case? What happens with the mouse is that for example, if I'm in my Dell imaging where I usually have 2 screens displayed. Lets say I open a third to do some work but when I close it the mouse closes one of the 2 screens that were open. It didn't use to do that. So I have to set the screens up all over like I had them. That's what happened with the bookmarks it just kept going and did whatever it did. In a way I'm glad this happened because I realized I have zero HD backups for Windows 7 Pro for either computer. I think what happened was that we did have the Win7 Pro OS but we took advantage of the Windows 10 option. Thats why all the HD's were Win 10. So here's the plan; around the end of April I get paid again and will buy (4) HD's so we can create Win 7 Pro OS for both the 8500 and 780 and we can pick up again then. I checked and I do have rescue disks etc that we made before so I'm sure I have something there. You made sure I did everything correct. Oh btw what do you think of me using brushes or compressed air to clean the inside of the computer out? Thoughts/suggestions? Robert The Startech seems to have moved to putting fans, only on their multi-bay enclosures. And those are too expensive for a little occasional usage with a single drive. There is the Rosewill one. This has a fan on it. https://www.newegg.com/rosewill-rx30...82E16817182316 But it's so hard to tell how the drive installs in there, and you know how important that is when they get it wrong. https://www.rosewill.com/product/ros...display-panel/ There is a 55MB user manual with pictures. Their download page is a bit slow, so this will take a bit of time. https://www.rosewill.com/download/us...dl=37249&ind=0 ( from https://www.rosewill.com/download/us...u3-35b-ol-pdf/ ) There aren't going to be as many options with fans. They like to make enclosures without fans, to try to cook the drives. ******* A lot of cleaning methods, to remove dust from computers, generate static electricity. And that isn't always the best for the equipment. If you use the duster-in-a-can, that's a refrigerant, and can drop the temperature of the chips you point it at, quite drastically. They don't have windowed DIP EPROMS in computers any more, but when they did, the low temperature materials in spray cans could kill those. That's the only component I know of, that could be killed by sudden temperature shock. A less-concentrated airflow, like maybe a reversed vacuum cleaner, used outdoors on a table, might be a way to dislodge the dust. Some vacuum cleaners, had fittings so you could reverse the flow for blower applications. Using a vacuum in vacuum mode, isn't recommended. Static discharge can come off the barrel of the metal tube. It's the movement of dust particulate, over the black plastic surfaces of the ICs, that can generate static, and that is static right next to the electrical pins on them. But some static can also be generated on vacuum hoses or tubing, and if the vacuum metal tube touches something, there could be a discharge. It's really hard to give iron-clad guarantees about this topic. If the anti-static police at work were here, they'd be constantly rapping me on the knuckles, for "bad technique". We had some guys, entrusted with that role. Anti-static police. Paul |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
I read all your info,. and bookmarked the cases and the 55mb file
thanks *s* btw I liked your comment,... if the mouse fell into a bowl of chili *L* I was a bit premature with the mouse and my backspace key still doesn't function. I didn't spill anything etc to cause this it just stopped functioning like the mouse is too sensitive when I open/close things it keeps on going and closes or opens more than I want. Like the Dell Imaging example I gave you. So how do I restore my backspace key and mouse so they are back to 'normal'? hmm I have to check and see if I have a spare mouse or maybe I should just buy a new one? What do you think about restoring the 8500 with the last Mrimg? wouldn't that restore all the bookmarks and maybe fix the mouse and backspace problem or maybe do a system restore? Although I'm a bit iffy of doing so until I have a backup Win 7 Pro created. Ok, this just happened,..... How weird, the 8500 just started up like it was a fan going and then died down again! and now alls quiet! I have never heard it do that! Whats going on ? That was very weird!!! p.s. while were talking about mice, I haven't seen any since you gave me the great advice 8 months ago? Thoughts/suggestions? Robert |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
Robert in CA wrote:
I read all your info,. and bookmarked the cases and the 55mb file thanks *s* btw I liked your comment,... if the mouse fell into a bowl of chili *L* I was a bit premature with the mouse and my backspace key still doesn't function. I didn't spill anything etc to cause this it just stopped functioning like the mouse is too sensitive when I open/close things it keeps on going and closes or opens more than I want. Like the Dell Imaging example I gave you. So how do I restore my backspace key and mouse so they are back to 'normal'? hmm I have to check and see if I have a spare mouse or maybe I should just buy a new one? What do you think about restoring the 8500 with the last Mrimg? wouldn't that restore all the bookmarks and maybe fix the mouse and backspace problem or maybe do a system restore? Although I'm a bit iffy of doing so until I have a backup Win 7 Pro created. Ok, this just happened,..... How weird, the 8500 just started up like it was a fan going and then died down again! and now alls quiet! I have never heard it do that! Whats going on ? That was very weird!!! p.s. while were talking about mice, I haven't seen any since you gave me the great advice 8 months ago? Thoughts/suggestions? Robert You should open Task Manager and see if something is using CPU cycles. Maybe you have a coin miner running on the machine, complements of some malware or something. Usually on Dells, the fan only goes to "high speed", if the register that controls it hasn't been loaded yet. When the programming logic is present, it uses lesser setting values and does not sound like a vacuum cleaner. Whatever is going on, it sounds like it's interfering with hardware. Yes, restoring from a backup might be something to try. Maybe we're past the point of testing another mouse, for correct operation. Paul |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
I actually tried testing with two other mouse's
but I couldn't get them to replicate what's happening because they were too slow. I don't know if it makes a difference but the part that plugs into the USB port was red on the two I tried and on the one I'm using it's white. If we restore from a backup I would still like to wait until I have another copy of Win 7 Pro on another HD as a backup just in case something goes wrong. I opened Task Manager: https://postimg.cc/XpYNyPST - applications https://postimg.cc/RNpS1Tvq - processes https://postimg.cc/kVFLsnWw - services https://postimg.cc/zH3MqK6P - performance https://postimg.cc/VJXhsYZ1 - networking https://postimg.cc/34fSfWNj - users Thanks, Robert |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
I'm on the 780 at present. I had just run a normal scan and afterwards it suggested a boot scan and also suggested I download paramets for a more accurate scan. I didn't download anything but I did select a boot scan (which is running at present )as a good way of checking out the system before we backup the HD. SInce I'm on the 780 it also noticed it has the same exact problem as the 8500 where the backspace key doesn't function. Now thats odd,... so we have to do both computers. Also could you give me a reliable link to download the Microsoft 4000 ergonomic keyboard manual? I searched for it but there' so many I'm afraid of downloading some malware with my past history. Thoughts/suggestions,.? Robert |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
Robert in CA wrote:
I'm on the 780 at present. I had just run a normal scan and afterwards it suggested a boot scan and also suggested I download paramets for a more accurate scan. I didn't download anything but I did select a boot scan (which is running at present )as a good way of checking out the system before we backup the HD. SInce I'm on the 780 it also noticed it has the same exact problem as the 8500 where the backspace key doesn't function. Now thats odd,... so we have to do both computers. Also could you give me a reliable link to download the Microsoft 4000 ergonomic keyboard manual? I searched for it but there' so many I'm afraid of downloading some malware with my past history. Thoughts/suggestions,.? Robert The only manual I'm finding, is references to the product guide, which is that sheet of paper thing, written in a zillion languages, that says not to spill orange juice on the keyboard. I don't think a manual is going to help. https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/...1b9f930?page=2 "FelixValentin On Windows 7 Click Start - Right Click Computer - Click Properties - Open Device Manger - I couldn't find the Keyboard under key boards. I opened Other Devices and found the Natural Ergonomic Keyboard 4000 there. I right clicked on the Natural Ergonomic Keyboard 4000 and then clicked on Update Driver software. The drivers were updated. All my special keys became functional again. " That's in the year 2016. Another poster had a problem with backspace, and he went off to find the Support for hardware products. Which would only be applicable when the warranty was still in effect. There were no additional messages indicating whether there was a satisfactory conclusion. You may not have sufficient computers to give the keyboard a test on "a machine which has never seen an Intellitype driver". It may not be possible to test that way as a result. At the moment, rolling back the OS is as good of an experiment, as anything else. Paul |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
I followed the instructions and instead of showing a Microsoft 4000
keyboard and logitech M310 mouse it shows HID for the keyboard and mouse. which means the drivers aren't loaded correctly, correct? https://postimg.cc/9DGvqbxz Agreed, we will take this up again at the end of April when I order new HD's (same ones we've been using Seagate 2TB) and make fresh copies of WIN7 Pro using the Mrimgs. Thanks, Robert |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
Ok, I'm finally back! I've bought (4) Seagate 2TB HD's, (2) for each computer. I also bought a (2) new M310 mouse's for the computers and (2) Patriot XT flash drives, and a new APC surge protector. It's all here except the mouse's. They shipped the HD's in anti-static bags inside a manila envelopes vs a box as before. I think I have some bubble wrap holders and one of the leftover boxes and a external HD to put them in but I think maybe I should get more external HD's. The Startech is out of stock https://www.newegg.com/startech-sat3...82E16817707227 so is the Rosewill https://www.newegg.com/rosewill-rx30...82E16817182316 To summarize: • on the 780 when booting up the WBM asks which OS to choose from, but without me selecting anything it then boots normally. When it first did this (after I bumped against the keyboard when it was off) I choose Windows 7 but it keeps appearing whereas the 8500 just shows Windows 7 and boots. • Also someone sent me a zipped file in email and I tried to open it on the 780 but I couldn't extract the files. When I tried to do so it gave me this: https://postimg.cc/XXXsvcQy then it gave me this Encrypting File system: back up your file encryption key: https://postimg.cc/gxbsN9dv I said yes to encrypt the files when extracting because it wasn't extracting at all and I thought that might be the reason. Obviously not and I created another problem by doing so. I deleted the downloaded zip files and haven't touched the 780 since. I assume once we restore the 780 all these problems will disappear? I just checked and it's gone. Apparently it only shows during the process of trying to extract the files? In passing, he finally sent the screenshots one at a time each in separate emails although I don't understand why he couldn't of sent them all in one email? I didn't bother to ask. •I put my a few documents I have been working on the Patriot flash drive so I wouldn't loose any data when we restore the computers. However today I noticed a temp file that wasn't there before WRL1011.tmp I don't know what it is but its using 82.9MB. https://postimg.cc/rRF4yvp1 https://postimg.cc/nCWmZSfm but now today I don't see it? Is it some sort of Word file? • Both the 8500 and 780 backspace key doesn't work. How is it possible that both computers have this same problem? I barely use the 780 and only runs scans on it and the monthly backups. Which by the way I've stopped until we fix the problem on both computers. • the 8500 has lost some bookmarks • the 8500 mouse is way too sensitive. This is causing allot of problems with it opening and closing things I don't want it to and then have to open things back up but perhaps when the new mouse arrives it may go back to normal operation? Also the lack of a backspace key function has made this all very frustrating. It just started doing all this on it's own and I haven't messed around with any settings. • Avast Smart Scan shows FF out of date but when I checked FF its up to date? I checked to make sure Avast was also up to date. https://postimg.cc/8FYqfbQZ https://postimg.cc/PvWccsL7 • Also Adobe keeps sending msg's like this every once in awhile since I haven't un-installed Adobe. I believe my Dell imaging uses it so I'm leery of un-installing it even if it's not supported any longer as it may affect my Dell Imaging and I use it allot. What do you think? Should I remove it and would it make my system more secure? The thing is if Dell Imaging requires it and I remove it I can't get it back. Is there some way to check if Dell Imaging requires it? https://postimg.cc/WdZvmK8Q • In addition , sometimes when I'm working in Word, and I search for a document to open instead of My Documents it opens to totally unrelated page I've never visited. https://postimg.cc/DWTD8QHw Lastly, should we attempt a System Restore on both computers before we try a Mrimg restore? (even though we will still create (4) HD's with Win 7 Pro before trying to restore the present HD's. Although the normal procedure is to just let the newly created HD boot and show the desktop and then shutdown and remove it perhaps we should test it to see if the backspace function works first before shutting it down and removing the HD? Thoughts/suggestions? Robert |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
Robert in CA wrote:
Ok, I'm finally back! I've bought (4) Seagate 2TB HD's, (2) for each computer. I also bought a (2) new M310 mouse's for the computers and (2) Patriot XT flash drives, and a new APC surge protector. It's all here except the mouse's. They shipped the HD's in anti-static bags inside a manila envelopes vs a box as before. I think I have some bubble wrap holders and one of the leftover boxes and a external HD to put them in but I think maybe I should get more external HD's. The Startech is out of stock https://www.newegg.com/startech-sat3...82E16817707227 so is the Rosewill https://www.newegg.com/rosewill-rx30...82E16817182316 To summarize: • on the 780 when booting up the WBM asks which OS to choose from, but without me selecting anything it then boots normally. When it first did this (after I bumped against the keyboard when it was off) I choose Windows 7 but it keeps appearing whereas the 8500 just shows Windows 7 and boots. +++++ Two disks were present when the menu was rebuilt, and now the menu choices are both being shown. Rebuilding the menu with one disk only present, will fix it. Macrium boot CD has a "boot repair" menu item, which can be used to restore normal boot behavior with one disk. • Also someone sent me a zipped file in email and I tried to open it on the 780 but I couldn't extract the files. When I tried to do so it gave me this: https://postimg.cc/XXXsvcQy +++++ https://www.technipages.com/fix-an-unexpected-error-zip "The solution is to use an archive utility like WinZip or WinRAR to extract the file. You’ll also need the password that was set on the file to extract it." The strongest password on these things now is around 128 bits (not practical to brute force), whereas previously winzip was a joke. I don't know if I ever convinced you to install 7-ZIP, as that's another choice where the right-click menu has an "open archive" option. then it gave me this Encrypting File system: back up your file encryption key: https://postimg.cc/gxbsN9dv +++++++ That is described here. It spread, out of the ZIP you were working on! There are a couple things you can do. One involves a "cipher" command, which scans the partition and offers a list of things that are encrypted. Chances are, the output file will be empty (as in the example in this discussion thread. Then, you have to hunt down the certificates that got added, using another procedure here, and remove them. Then it will stop pestering you to back them up. https://social.technet.microsoft.com...10itprogeneral I said yes to encrypt the files when extracting because it wasn't extracting at all and I thought that might be the reason. Obviously not and I created another problem by doing so. I deleted the downloaded zip files and haven't touched the 780 since. I assume once we restore the 780 all these problems will disappear? I just checked and it's gone. Apparently it only shows during the process of trying to extract the files? +++++++ That's possible, that it's only while working on the ZIP. I don't know if there are any tools that can tell you what precisely is going on. The sender obviously has a sense of humor. In passing, he finally sent the screenshots one at a time each in separate emails although I don't understand why he couldn't of sent them all in one email? I didn't bother to ask. •I put my a few documents I have been working on the Patriot flash drive so I wouldn't loose any data when we restore the computers. However today I noticed a temp file that wasn't there before WRL1011.tmp I don't know what it is but its using 82.9MB. https://postimg.cc/rRF4yvp1 +++++++ Normally, tools place temporary files in %TEMP%. It's possible the tool placed the copy there, as it's more efficient to keep it on the same volume as the source file or something. Once all your tools are closed, such a file should be gone. Being a temporary file, it only has value if something crashed and your work is saved in there, and the tool knows about the file and will attempt to re-open it. https://postimg.cc/nCWmZSfm but now today I don't see it? Is it some sort of Word file? +++++++ Would this have been created while you were trying to unzip that file ? An extension of .tmp tells us nothing. The general format, the tilde on the front, suggests it might be Office, but it's hard to say for sure without some detective work. • Both the 8500 and 780 backspace key doesn't work. How is it possible that both computers have this same problem? I barely use the 780 and only runs scans on it and the monthly backups. Which by the way I've stopped until we fix the problem on both computers. • the 8500 has lost some bookmarks +++++++ There are some jsonlz4 files in the Firefox profile. I have code to unpack that format, but who knows what additional barriers are in there. Your bookmarks are supposed to be backed up once a day (as individual jsonlz4 files). • the 8500 mouse is way too sensitive. This is causing allot of problems with it opening and closing things I don't want it to and then have to open things back up but perhaps when the new mouse arrives it may go back to normal operation? Also the lack of a backspace key function has made this all very frustrating. It just started doing all this on it's own and I haven't messed around with any settings. +++++++ In control panels, there may be a Mouse panel for such things. Pointer Options, Select A Pointer Speed ? • Avast Smart Scan shows FF out of date but when I checked FF its up to date? I checked to make sure Avast was also up to date. https://postimg.cc/8FYqfbQZ +++++++ Firefox is up to 88. http://releases.mozilla.org/pub/firefox/releases/ http://releases.mozilla.org/pub/fire...0/win64/en-US/ # 64 bit installers https://postimg.cc/PvWccsL7 +++++++ It's possible you have both a 32 bit folder and a 64 bit folder for Firefox. But that's just a wild guess on my part. • Also Adobe keeps sending msg's like this every once in awhile since I haven't un-installed Adobe. I believe my Dell imaging uses it so I'm leery of un-installing it even if it's not supported any longer as it may affect my Dell Imaging and I use it allot. What do you think? Should I remove it and would it make my system more secure? The thing is if Dell Imaging requires it and I remove it I can't get it back. Is there some way to check if Dell Imaging requires it? https://postimg.cc/WdZvmK8Q +++++++ That's a good question. Some things use an npapi plugin and it would sit in a "plugins" folder for the software. Other than that, I don't know if the stuff uses COM to communicate. I would think the path or connection would be a more "visible" one, and a file from Adobe would have to be sitting in the Dell Imaging folder, to be able to use it. If Microsoft wrote it (like Silverlight), it might be easier for other sottware to get at. It would be nice if Adobe had a way of "listing all clients", but I don't know of any interface for that. • In addition , sometimes when I'm working in Word, and I search for a document to open instead of My Documents it opens to totally unrelated page I've never visited. https://postimg.cc/DWTD8QHw +++++++ It looks like it has jumped to the last folder it was working in. Not a folder you selected, but a folder it selected for temporary files. Lastly, should we attempt a System Restore on both computers before we try a Mrimg restore? (even though we will still create (4) HD's with Win 7 Pro before trying to restore the present HD's. Although the normal procedure is to just let the newly created HD boot and show the desktop and then shutdown and remove it perhaps we should test it to see if the backspace function works first before shutting it down and removing the HD? Thoughts/suggestions? Robert System Restore (System Protection) restore points, are mostly for incidents like software installs where you want to clean up after a software removal. For a problem like the BackSpace key, you might have to go too far back, and the restore point might not work, and it will tell you so when you attempt it. Restoring from a .mrimg is a more complete solution using a "back in time" idea, but it also upsets your Downloads folder. I know you are mostly worried about your Bookmarks file, and that gives you a good deal of freedom on .mrimg restoral. To make new "backup drives with boot OSes on them", one of the necessary materials is a golden good OS image. If every OS installation and .mrimg has a broken backspace key, then we would be using compromised materials for the backup drives. I think you understand the challenge here, and need to look at your inventory to decide what to do next. I've never restored goods, more than 2 years old, and even that case, it was in an attempt to "chase a certain Acronis driver out of a system". Normally, if I have concerns that my OS was tipped over, the backup used to restore is going to be well less than a year old. There would be too much damage otherwise. Paul |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
So I need to find my Macrium boot CD to correct the problem on the 780?
I thought I had 7-zip installed but I just checked and I don't. I hate zip files and all it was was a few pictures of older catalogs. It would of been much simplier to just send them as jpegs. I checked again and I'm showing FF as 88 (64 bit) So you want me to look in the external HD and the Mrimgs on it? and to show you what I have and then we select which one and restore the present HD from that so it's all clean again and then we create the copies? Is that correct? Robert |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
I connected my external HD and here are the Mrimgs:
https://postimg.cc/R3XyBGz1 I found a 780 System repair disc and a 780 Rescue disk which one should I use? Do I have to open up Macrium to use them? Thanks, Robert |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
Robert in CA wrote:
I connected my external HD and here are the Mrimgs: https://postimg.cc/R3XyBGz1 I found a 780 System repair disc and a 780 Rescue disk which one should I use? Do I have to open up Macrium to use them? Thanks, Robert I see MRIMG files of various sizes there. When you make backups, you could be putting comments in the file name, such a "kbd" for the backspace-key issue and so on. By noting the pattern of which failures occur ("mouse_jumpy") that gives you some minor criterion to judge the backups. Since the main purpose of the OS you will be putting on new disks, is as emergency boot provision, it doesn't really matter whether your Downloads folder is complete as such. You only use the emergency backup OS long enough to achieve a desired result, rather than necessarily "living there". If the main drive fails to boot some day, then you could "move control" to your backup drive and its operational OS. But that would also require moving your email profile from the old machine, moving the most recent bookmarks file, the contents of the Downloads folder, or whatever. So when I look at the MRIMG files on offer, my main concern is not dragging malware onto the new disk. Some image there has to be "clean enough, to be cloned". Macrium_CD == DVD tray Optiplex780 == the backup drive on USB which is providing the == New HDD on SATA, inside source MRIMG You have to restore a C: and a System Reserved, for the new disk to boot. If the Macrium CD is reasonably new, it may even have the "Power Off" option in the shutdown menu. Handy for rearranging stuff for the "first boot" of the new HDD. When you're using the Macrium CD, it'll be the Restore menu, then browsing to the external USB to find that "best" MRIMG. Paul |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
Robert in CA wrote:
So I need to find my Macrium boot CD to correct the problem on the 780? I thought I had 7-zip installed but I just checked and I don't. I hate zip files and all it was was a few pictures of older catalogs. It would of been much simplier to just send them as jpegs. I checked again and I'm showing FF as 88 (64 bit) So you want me to look in the external HD and the Mrimgs on it? and to show you what I have and then we select which one and restore the present HD from that so it's all clean again and then we create the copies? Is that correct? Robert The "encryption problem", appears to be a case of the machine having acquired "certificates" related to the Apple crypto. To correct the problem, most likely involves checking for the certificates and removing them. Then the machine will stop pestering to be doing "backups of the encryption keys". You should be able to execute some of the recipes here. https://social.technet.microsoft.com...10itprogeneral 1) The first step, is a safety procedure. The command is supposed to scan something and located all encrypted files. In your case, by not using encryption, the "Encrypted-Files.txt" should be an empty file with no contents. Command Prompt(Admin) cipher /u /h %UserProfile%\Desktop\Encrypted-Files.txt 2) "please navigate to: 1. Type certmgr.msc into search box, press Enter. === Start : Run would do... 2. In the certification management window, expand Personal -Certificates- There should have entry with "EFS intended Purpose", delete that certificate. 3. Same steps for Trusted People -Certificates - entry with "EFS intended purposes". Delete that certificate. After that, reboot the computer to check the result. Things with EFS should not matter, as long as the Step (1) shows no files are encrypted. ******* If you want a copy of 7ZIP, select the 64-bit version here to match your OS. https://www.7-zip.org/ Download .exe 64-bit x64 1.4 MB What 7ZIP does, is add some right-click context menu entries, such as Open Archive, so you can look inside ZIP files you receive. Clicking an item or a folder and selecting Extract, you can deposit the extracted thing in a location you select from a save dialog box. To go back-a-level in 7ZIP, use the backspace key. Most of the rest of it involves clicking. The graphical interface on 7ZIP is an acquired taste. Some people hate it for some reason. I don't have a problem with it. I use that tool all the time for forensic reasons (looking inside stuff, for hints). HTH, Paul |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
I'm confused with what were attempting to do.
I noted the various sizes of the backups as well but I followed your instructions you first gave me to the letter (I have all them saved as screenshots) and they all went smoothly. I usually make the comments you refer to whenever I create a system restore point but I will make it a point to add them to the Mrimgs from now on. So which mrimg from the 8500 do you think is best to clone? I assume that is going to be our first step. I went back to take a look at the 8500 Mrimgs and all the recent mrimgs are about the same size. The changes occur on early Mrimgs that I kept 'just in case' and that's the explanation of the difference in sizes. I'm not understanding exactly what you want me to do with the 780? Do I use the Rescue CD or System Repair CD? Or are you saying we need to clone a new OS onto the 780 before any of this works? In any case I want to do the 780 before the 8500. Here are the mrimgs for the 780 and they all are around the same size. https://postimg.cc/sM16GLvv The encryption problem went away on it's own . I don't see the icon anymore. Maybe it was just during the process that it occurs? We can download 7Zip once we get everything back working normally. Thoughts/suggestions? Robert |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
Robert in CA wrote:
I'm confused with what were attempting to do. I noted the various sizes of the backups as well but I followed your instructions you first gave me to the letter (I have all them saved as screenshots) and they all went smoothly. I usually make the comments you refer to whenever I create a system restore point but I will make it a point to add them to the Mrimgs from now on. So which mrimg from the 8500 do you think is best to clone? I assume that is going to be our first step. I went back to take a look at the 8500 Mrimgs and all the recent mrimgs are about the same size. The changes occur on early Mrimgs that I kept 'just in case' and that's the explanation of the difference in sizes. I'm not understanding exactly what you want me to do with the 780? Do I use the Rescue CD or System Repair CD? Or are you saying we need to clone a new OS onto the 780 before any of this works? In any case I want to do the 780 before the 8500. Here are the mrimgs for the 780 and they all are around the same size. https://postimg.cc/sM16GLvv The encryption problem went away on it's own . I don't see the icon anymore. Maybe it was just during the process that it occurs? We can download 7Zip once we get everything back working normally. Thoughts/suggestions? Robert Main Drive (C: and System Reserved) - does drive have malware? - a problem correctable by restore? New drive (C: and System Reserved) - needs an OS if just for the purposes of emergency booting and repairs I thought those were the two classes of problems you're interested in. ******* Generally, for the Main Drive, if the OS develops a problem, you restore using the most recent backup. This is intended to reduce to a minimum, the amount of "lost materials" from a Downloads folder. If you restore the Main Drive, you have ot take precautions not to lose any valuable files for which you don't currently have copies. ******* The New Drives, the emergency boot could really use any version. If you know that one of the older versions doesn't have a Backspace Key issue, then maybe that's the file to use. Of the newer images you've got (you seem to be taking the images once a month), it's hard to say which of those doesn't have the Backspace Key problem. If you install the old backup, then relatively soon when that New Drive is booted, both the Dell Updater, the NVidia Updater, and Windows Update are going to be working to fill the machine with recent stuff. In which case, if any of those caused the Backspace Key problem, the problem would soon return (just on the New Drive). The difference between the drives, is your Main Drive is a daily driver and has data content. The Emergency OS on the New Drive, does not have quite the same requirements. You can see in this picture of the world, that keeping data files on C: is a bit of a mistake, but the options for moving the storage off C: are not 100% free of issues. People in the newsgroups here do that, they move their personal storage off C: or move their Program Files off C: and onto another partition. I don't particularly recommend that - it just makes extra work at times. Work that I personally can do without. My Program Files stays on C: . But any large collection of personal files, I move those off manually to bring down the total size of C: . I have not undertaken to do that automatically, only manually, so I can watch what is going on. Paul |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
Ok so we select the most recent Mrimg to avoid the loss of data
and I've already put working documents on the Patriot drive for safe keeping. What about bookmarks? Do I have to save them as well? I understand what your saying and perhaps that's what I should be doing although I'm not using much of my C: drive as you can see: https://postimg.cc/zHFyRBNP https://postimg.cc/Yv9vhMsb https://postimg.cc/q6J3wn1d https://postimg.cc/gw4dRZLh Should we check the drive for errors on both computers before we clone an mrimg? Should I defrag both computers? I still have (2) Startech cases and perhaps I should dedicate one for all my personal files as another way to protect my data and just connect it daily to use it. I would also do it manually so I can see what's going on but it should be an easy matter. Once we create Win 7 Pro on the spare HD's I can use one for all my personal data. Basically, it would be the same exact setup I have now except all my persona data would off this computer and as you say I would free up this C: drive. Would that make it run faster? I went back and checked the 780 mrimgs because the ones I gave you had old dates and as you noted I create backups every month so there should be more current mrimgs for the 780 and I found them: https://postimg.cc/GBDgnwdm The most current being 3-4-21 for both the 780 and 8500 since I do them the same day. So should I clone the 780 ? Then if the backspace key returns we know it should for the 8500 as well. Thoughts/suggestions? Robert |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
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O.T. Missing Folder/files
My mistake, we're restoring the 780/8500? and then cloning correct? On cloning, I don't remember that we changed the partition size I think we did that once before but with the 8200. With the 8500 we've just done straight cloning. Robert |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
Robert in CA wrote:
I should of posted this earlier but here's the WBM screen: https://postimg.cc/KR22qbSQ Robert There is a diagram here, which helps explain the boot menu. There really should only be one Macrium item, not two, to my way of thinking. https://knowledgebase.macrium.com/di...+Media+Builder # At the very least, System Reserved has to be intact, for # this menu to even appear. Hopefully, to boot the WinRE, does not # require C: to be working. The Macrium CD on the other hand, # doesn't have these issues, and it should always boot. https://knowledgebase.macrium.com/do...73870&ap i=v2 One question would be, if the BCD is ever rebuilt, will all those optional materials end up in the BCD again. That I don't know. The Macrium CD, for example, if you select boot repair, it does not particularly preserve the structure of the existing BCD when it builds a new one. It just does a scan, detects the things it "sees" and adds them. The Macrium CD should always work. Any other items with the word "Macrium" in them, will work as long as the storage they sit on, is not corrupted. There is no particular performance difference. If a WinRE or a WinPE boots, the contents are stored in RAM (drive X: ), and all materials run at RAM speed. The largest item designed this way so far, is a "Hirens" disc, which stores several gigabytes in RAM (and then, the machines running such a disc, need at least that much RAM for the boot to finish). If you didn't have your CD, you could use a menu item like that, but it's unclear what issues might arise. Since the OS and X: are in RAM, you should (in theory) be able to *overwrite* the disk drive the thing booted from. How kooky is that ? Well, maybe for once they did a good thing. If the Macrium Restore went half way and stopped while doing that, you could very well be screwed (then you'd need the CD to finish the job). Paul |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
Robert in CA wrote:
My mistake, we're restoring the 780/8500? and then cloning correct? On cloning, I don't remember that we changed the partition size I think we did that once before but with the 8200. With the 8500 we've just done straight cloning. Robert First off, when doing your planning, for a given machine, we prefer to have the two "working" disk drives. Say you attempt to restore over the 780. Then we want the disk drive with that emergency OS on it, to still be available if there is trouble. You can restore over the existing C: on either machine and test if you want. Determine if your backspace key is working. My suspicion is, with the one month old backup, the backspace is still busted. But, you can test. You remember in the slide sets I made, you can click the "Back" button, select a partition and edit the size. So it is possible to adjust *any* restored OS to the size you want. When restoring the daily driver disk for the 780, you might want a slightly larger C: than for the emergency boot C: on the new drive. To control the size of *all* of them, you restore the partitions one at a time. +-----+------------------+ | MBR | First partition | +-----+------------------+ +-----+------------------+------------------+ | MBR | First partition | Second partition | +-----+------------------+------------------+ +-----+------------------+------------------+-----------------+ | MBR | First partition | Second partition | Third partition | +-----+------------------+------------------+-----------------+ You "drag and drop" a partition from the source MRIMG you browsed to, then place it on the drive you're "building". When you do a drag and drop restore like that, it's not likely to boot. That's because, when you "tease" it by doing one partition at a time, it does not engage its boot repair as a side effect. When we get here, and have finished this much... +-----+------------------+------------------+-----------------+ | MBR | First partition | Second partition | Third partition | +-----+------------------+------------------+-----------------+ now, it's time to shut down and disconnect the drive with the backups on it. We *don't* want the boot repair to see the C: on the emergency boot. The next step is to boot with the Macrium CD again, just the drive inside the 780 is present, now we use the menu item with "Boot Repair" in it. Now, we reboot and allow the 780 hard drive to boot, to prove it all works. Let's say the third partition was intended to hold backups. You would likely want to avoid copying excessive amounts of material from any backup partition. You can use Disk Management (diskmgmt.msc) to create a new NTFS partition, call it BACKUPS and format it, and then it's ready to take backups. That's an example of a "custom restore". Build it in pieces as you see fit. Click the Back button, highlight the partition, use the button to "Edit Partition Properties" and you can set the size you want. You can fix drives up, after the fact, with things like the free Paragon Disk Management 14 program, but Macrium can also do some of these things for you. ******* To erase the 780 main drive, you can do that as follows. 1) 780 main drive only. (*Don't* connect the backup drive, as that would be confusing!) 2) Boot from Macrium CD. 3) There is a Command Prompt icon on the taskbar. Click it. It runs as Administrator, so you don't need to worry about elevation. 4) Now, run "diskpart". diskpart list disk # only the one disk should now show select disk 0 # select the drive from the list, which is 0 clean # MBR and partitions blown away exit (Close Command Prompt window) 5) What that does, is make an unambiguously clean main drive, now ready for Restore. Don't do this, unless you are absolutely sure you have a good backup image to restore! Anyway, those are some ideas for "doing things your way" and getting what you want. Yes, we could just restore any old thing, and "fix it later", but that takes time, it slaps the disk heads around moving data blocks, and it's just not very efficient. ******* After a disk restore, you can move or resize partitions with this, but it's a bit clunky. The first thing you have to figure out, is (purple) "Switch to full scale launcher" before it's ready to go to work. It's filled with features that are not enabled (being "free"), but it can move and resize a bit more than the Windows-provided features (which only resize). Just use the "Move/Resize" if using this, nothing else. https://download.cnet.com/Paragon-Pa...-10904411.html Paul |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
Robert in CA wrote:
Ok so we select the most recent Mrimg to avoid the loss of data and I've already put working documents on the Patriot drive for safe keeping. What about bookmarks? Do I have to save them as well? I understand what your saying and perhaps that's what I should be doing although I'm not using much of my C: drive as you can see: https://postimg.cc/zHFyRBNP https://postimg.cc/Yv9vhMsb https://postimg.cc/q6J3wn1d === Previous Versions enabled ??? https://postimg.cc/gw4dRZLh ("Check now" picture) Should we check the drive for errors on both computers before we clone an mrimg? Should I defrag both computers? I still have (2) Startech cases and perhaps I should dedicate one for all my personal files as another way to protect my data and just connect it daily to use it. I would also do it manually so I can see what's going on but it should be an easy matter. Once we create Win 7 Pro on the spare HD's I can use one for all my personal data. Basically, it would be the same exact setup I have now except all my persona data would off this computer and as you say I would free up this C: drive. Would that make it run faster? I went back and checked the 780 mrimgs because the ones I gave you had old dates and as you noted I create backups every month so there should be more current mrimgs for the 780 and I found them: https://postimg.cc/GBDgnwdm The most current being 3-4-21 for both the 780 and 8500 since I do them the same day. So should I clone the 780 ? Then if the backspace key returns we know it should for the 8500 as well. Thoughts/suggestions? Robert You can do a CHKDSK if you want. In File Explorer, you highlight the partition needing a check, do Properties on it, then under the Tools tab is "Check Now". To be able to repair C: , the machine may tell you a reboot is required. At the beginning of the reboot, before C: is mounted, that's when it can run the check. That could take a while. The basic check just verifies any linkages. It does not verify that all files are readable. Your Previous Versions picture, is coming from System Restore points. So that's the storage area it uses on C: . It has a limited amount of storage for Previous Versions. The oldest Previous Version is thrown away, to make room for the latest one. https://www.howtogeek.com/56891/use-...ve-your-files/ I think that might get backed up, but I haven't verified that. THe actual storage location, could be vaguely related to "System Volume Information" at the top of C: , but you're not allowed to look in there. Taking materials off C: , the purpose of that is to de-duplicate your backups a bit. It depends on how many copies of the materials, make sense to keep. If you do full backups, one after another, then every one of those has a copy of Downloads for example. Storing materials in a separate partition, you still have to back up the separate partition. But, you can alter the frequency of such backups, to whatever makes sense to you. For example, I have 1.3TB of stuff off of C: , and that might get backed up twice a year. I could easily lose newer materials. But being as large as it is, first I have to find space to store the output :-/ Features such as Incremental Backups in Macrium, make the storage of backed-up material more efficient. But that's a function in the paid version. ******* You can do CHKDSK, before defragmenting, for safety. When you make backups with Macrium, the clusters are recorded in cluster-order. The hard drive head does not fly around trying to trace down chunks in "file name order". file1.txt cluster 1, cluster 3 === fragmented, two clusters file2.txt cluster 2, cluster 5 === fragmented, two clusters Macrium backup order is 1,2,3,5... to the MRIMG. During the Restoration process, if you resize the restored partition, it (as a side effect) can defragment a bit. So you can get a bit of defragmentation during restore, by resizing a partition. The defragmentation is not "done with a purpose", it's not "perfect", but you'll notice that it's been screwed around a bit. None of the defragmentation options work like the built-in feature in Windows XP. There, the files were shoulder to should, like a brick wall. The Windows 7 defragmenter doesn't do that. The Windows XP defragmenter could easily run for 8 hours. The Windows 7 one, maybe 10-15 minutes (because it doesn't work as hard). https://i.postimg.cc/zDxRR4yv/jkdefrag.gif In that example, JKDefrag is being used from the command line. These are some examples of JKDefrag commands: jkdefrag -a 1 -d 2 C: # Graphical representation of current fragments # This is how I can tell how hard it will be for # any tool to clean up. jkdefrag -a 5 -d 2 C: # Dumb function, to consolidate free space by # "shoving all the files downwards". Still needs # a defrag after this! (Now, run the Windows 7 defragmenter, which is sorta intelligent) jkdefrag -a 2 -d 2 C: # Defrag. Run this after Windows 7 defrag for # best results. It defragments the files larger than # about 50MB or so, that Win7 didn't process. -a N The action to perform. N is a number from 1 to 11, default is 3: 1 = Analyze, do not defragment and do not optimize. 2 = Defragment only, do not optimize. 3 = Defragment and fast optimize [recommended]. 5 = Force together. 6 = Move to end of disk. 7 = Optimize by sorting all files by name (folder + filename). 8 = Optimize by sorting all files by size (smallest first). 9 = Optimize by sorting all files by last access (newest first). 10 = Optimize by sorting all files by last change (oldest first). 11 = Optimize by sorting all files by creation time (oldest first). https://www.kessels.com/JkDefrag/ https://www.kessels.com/JkDefrag/JkDefrag64-3.36.zip # 64-bit version ******* That backspace key is going to haunt you. It's some application you've installed, and could have been one of your automatic updates. I would be surprised, if going backwards had good odds of fixing it. I just don't know how to debug keyboard issues. Yes, there's a translation table, but applications can install filter drivers too, devcon might list such things, but I don't know if there are any additional failure modes or holes in the scheme where they are messing about. Maybe it could be caught with ProcMon, seeing some compute activity captured at the instant the key is pressed. But generally, I don't have a warm feeling on the topic. ProcMon is always a "needle in a haystack" - analysis is a pain. And I can't help you from here, because I don't know what application is doing it, and it's pretty hard to simulate. (The new versions are Win7 and higher) https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sys...nloads/procmon I tried a fake test case here with that, and could not find the trigger event. Already, an easy test, I can't catch it. Paul |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
+++++ Two disks were present when the menu was rebuilt, and now the menu choices are both being shown. Rebuilding the menu with one disk only present, will fix it. Macrium boot CD has a "boot repair" menu item, which can be used to restore normal boot behavior with one disk. I tried running the boot repair off the rescue cd (ver 7.2) to correct the WBN screen logon on the 780 but I'm not sure which items to un-tick https://postimg.cc/p5M2g2BZ https://postimg.cc/GTPcRZ71 https://postimg.cc/t11pJ1Sk https://postimg.cc/fSvhpYyz Robert |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
Robert in CA wrote:
+++++ Two disks were present when the menu was rebuilt, and now the menu choices are both being shown. Rebuilding the menu with one disk only present, will fix it. Macrium boot CD has a "boot repair" menu item, which can be used to restore normal boot behavior with one disk. I tried running the boot repair off the rescue cd (ver 7.2) to correct the WBN screen logon on the 780 but I'm not sure which items to un-tick https://postimg.cc/p5M2g2BZ https://postimg.cc/GTPcRZ71 https://postimg.cc/t11pJ1Sk https://postimg.cc/fSvhpYyz Robert If you look in Disk Management, System Reserved is marked "Active" and "System". It is the Active (Boot Flag = 0x80) partition that the boot process starts on. You can see the Macrium menu identified a partition, and it did that by looking for the Boot Flag. Sometimes the Boot Flag is not in the right place and needs correction, but this does not happen too often. If two disk drives were present, there could be confusion about which one. You will be asked to identify the Active partition, because that's where the BCD file for the boot menu goes. You will be asked to identify all the C: partitions, so they can be added to the boot menu as boot-time-options. The four tick boxes a Reset the Boot Disk ID This is a four byte field in the MBR, near to the four entry partition table. The disk may be named ABCD1234 for example. When cloning a disk, initially two disks have the same ABCD1234. This is bad. If left this way, the first disk is "Online", the second disk goes "Offline". Not very useful for daily work. If ticking this box, a new DiskID is assigned to the drive needing boot work. When Macrium clones, the second disk is automatically given a new ABCD1234, so this tick box is not needed. If duplicating a disk drive using dd.exe (Disk Dump), then, a new DiskID is needed and the box should be ticked. It generally does not hurt anything. Replace the Master Boor Record (MBR) That's the boot code, in the first 440 bytes or so. I'd have to look up the exact number of bytes. There is boot code in there and the four primary partition table entries, as examples of materials that are present. If a disk was zeroed, then partitioned, the boot code would be missing. But Macrium prepared disks would not usually be missing this code. If the BIOS simply won't boot from the hard disk, claiming there is nothing there, you can tick this box. Replace Partition Sector Boot Code This is three sectors in the Active Partition. The MBR jumps to that code. If a partition is "formatted" with a format routine, the three sectors are lost. Generally, if Macrium clones a partition or restored from backup, everything there is OK and the tick box is not needed. Rebuild the Boot Configuration This is the one normally ticked. If you're going to use this feature, Boot Repair, you tick this one, as it's the only option that makes sense for the feature :-) So bare minimum, tick the last box. Tick other boxes, if the first attempt at boot repair, does not work. HTH, Paul |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
I ran the Rescue CD again with the 'Rebuild Boot Configuration' checked but it booted directly to the desktop and the WBM didn't appear at all. So I ran the Rescue CD again with all boxes ticked and it still does the same thing. It boots directly to the desktop. https://postimg.cc/YLhK62J6 https://postimg.cc/pmNbjHkj https://postimg.cc/V0BMF1nN https://postimg.cc/xXWvYsfn Thoughts/suggestions? Robert |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
Robert in CA wrote:
I ran the Rescue CD again with the 'Rebuild Boot Configuration' checked but it booted directly to the desktop and the WBM didn't appear at all. So I ran the Rescue CD again with all boxes ticked and it still does the same thing. It boots directly to the desktop. https://postimg.cc/YLhK62J6 https://postimg.cc/pmNbjHkj https://postimg.cc/V0BMF1nN https://postimg.cc/xXWvYsfn Thoughts/suggestions? Robert From the Rescue CD, Command Prompt window (which is administrator)... dir /AH C:\boot\BCD # verify it is there. bcdedit /store C:\boot\BCD /set {bootmgr} displaybootmenu True ******* Or, from the running system, using just the regular windows stuff. You want to run "cmd" and right-click on the returned item and select Run As Administrator. The following is "online" editing of boot menu. bcdedit /set {bootmgr} displaybootmenu True ******* Using the last one from my running OS, this is my result. https://i.postimg.cc/P5DfBhb7/boot-menu-edit.gif Paul |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
I tried it both ways: https://postimg.cc/Jt5KGSDp https://postimg.cc/k6c8g318 btw I like your idea of moving all the data to a dedicated external hd but I was thinking if I do that then I'll also have to create a backup hd for that, correct? I realized that I don't need to move anything once we clone the drives with Win 7 Pro. I just need to delete everything off the 8500, one folder at a time, correct? I thought what I would do is take a screenshot of all the folders of My Documents from the newly created hd that we'll use as a dedicated data drive and use it to check the folders as I delete them off the 8500 one by one Not get ahead of the problem were having with the 780 but how do I create a backup if my data is on an external drive? Can I do a backup from an external drive to an external drive? If so, could you please give me numbered step by step instructions like you did before when we get to that point? Since I'm already backing up the 8500 and the 780. I think I should buy more hd's next month so I have spare hd backup's for all the computers. Thoughts, suggestions? Robert |
O.T. Missing Folder/files
Robert in CA wrote:
I tried it both ways: https://postimg.cc/Jt5KGSDp https://postimg.cc/k6c8g318 The first picture is more likely to work. You need to put some space characters in that command, to separate the fields. bcdedit /set {bootmgr} displaybootmenu True btw I like your idea of moving all the data to a dedicated external hd but I was thinking if I do that then I'll also have to create a backup hd for that, correct? I realized that I don't need to move anything once we clone the drives with Win 7 Pro. I just need to delete everything off the 8500, one folder at a time, correct? I thought what I would do is take a screenshot of all the folders of My Documents from the newly created hd that we'll use as a dedicated data drive and use it to check the folders as I delete them off the 8500 one by one Not get ahead of the problem were having with the 780 but how do I create a backup if my data is on an external drive? Can I do a backup from an external drive to an external drive? If so, could you please give me numbered step by step instructions like you did before when we get to that point? Since I'm already backing up the 8500 and the 780. I think I should buy more hd's next month so I have spare hd backup's for all the computers. Thoughts, suggestions? I like your enthusiasm, but you don't want to fall into a trap like me, and end up with way too many hard drives around the house :-) You could partition a hard drive like this. You don't have to keep the Downloads on an external drive, you can just keep a partition next to C: . The advantage of this, is with C: being unloaded occasionally, you can keep C: from getting too big. +-----+-----------------+-------------+----------------+ | MBR | System Reserved | C: 100GB | D: Data 800GB | +-----+-----------------+-------------+----------------+ Maybe C: gets backed up once a month, D: is backed up once a year. My illustration, is to show that you can have two kinds of files, and have different backup practices for each. But really, you have a good scheme as is. A backup is a couple hundred GB so it hasn't gotten completely out of hand. If you purchased Macrium, then you could use a feature called "Incrementals Forever", and your first backup would be around 200GB, but the next month, the backup might only be 5GB. That's because the combination of the two, 200+5 is read back, to prepare the Restore later. Incremental backups rely on more than one backup file being intact. The "Incrementals Forever" feature, adds to that, the squashing of the 200+5 thing, down to the approximately 200GB it really represents, then adding more incrementals on the end. It's a kind of sliding window of incrementals. The purpose of all this manipulation, is to make the backup drive last longer, and hold more months of backup. By not doing the Free Version "Full" all the time, some space is saved. Incrementals de-duplicate, so if mypicture.png is already stored in a backup, it does not have to be recorded a second time. The Incremental feature keeps track of which files belong in the Restore, based on any time point you select for restoration. Again, that's an example of how some people arrange their backups. Now, me, I just use "Full" ones like you, and I occasionally toss some, to make room for new ones. But in any case, when making backups, the temptation is to hold onto too many backup images, buy too many hard drives, spend long hours moving files from one big drive to another and so on. It can easily turn into a zoo. And I don't want you to make the same mistakes I've made (with the buying drives thing). When I make suggestions, I'm trying to give examples of various ways you can slice a pie. But not everyone likes their pie that way, and you have to think through the consequences of these ideas, to their logical conclusion. You had a decent collection in that picture you showed me, because you had a series of monthly backups. And say the backspace key problem, wasn't fixed by restoring last months MRIMG. You could go back a second month, and test there. Only on one occasion, did I need to go back two years, and I did move forward again later, when via Googling, I found another solution to my problem, and then I didn't need to keep using the two year old restore. Would I keep monthly backups for two years ? The demonstrated need shows that once you have a year of backups, you can keep just one of them per year so that is your "yearly". So maybe a couple yearly ones, and a bunch of monthly ones. Jan 2019 Jan 2020 Jan 2021 Feb 2021 Mar 2021 Maybe later in the year it looks like Jan 2019 Jan 2020 Jan 2021 Apr 2021 == ditched a few monthly ones, so quarterly Jul 2021 Oct 2021 \ Nov 2021 \___ Monthly for the most recent Dec 2021 / And maybe that will fit on a single 2TB drive. And those can be "Fulls", like you're making now, because the storage device has just enough room for the proposed backup set. No need to purchase Macrium, within those constraints. Since you're no longer using Windows XP, you can use huge drives for backups. The ones you're using now, seem reliable enough, and there is nothing wrong with them. You can get drives, like 14TB, you prepare those with GPT partitioning on Windows 7 and you're allowed to have one giant 14TB partition. But I don't buy drives that big, because it takes too long to move the data off them. The biggest drives I have today are 6TB. That's enough to hold two 3TB sets of backups for me. The pricing curve for drives, sometimes there's a kink and sometimes not. When they're linear with capacity, then there isn't a lot to be gained from buying huge ones. If there was some economy from the bigger ones, it might be more fun to buy them. But if a big drive costs $500, who needs that exactly. It's like buying a steak which is too big for one meal, and some going to waste. And if the big drive breaks, now you're out $500 (unless you want to pursue the warranty, and at that price, you have an incentive to do so). If there was a Free backup with Incrementals, I'd be testing that for myself :-) But that tends to be a paid feature. I think you're in pretty good shape as is. You're making backups. If you get ransomware, there's a chance you'll be able to recover from it. You won't be like the guy in another group - he tells me he's got data files that end in myfile.xls.osiris and that osiris thing means "ransomware". And the guy has no backups. It took *months* for him to do clean installs, try and tip computers upright and so on. It was a real mess. That's the only case of ransomware I've heard of in the newsgroups. How did he get it ? He opened an email from GoDaddy domain registrar, with an attachment called "invoice" and when he clicked on the "invoice", ransomware took over. The email wasn't from GoDaddy, it was forged. And why did the forgers send it to him ? When he registered his GoDaddy domain, he used his real email address (and the registration can be seen publicly). The perps just grab all the email addresses from those registrations, and they "spray" all the victims with "invoice" emails. That was the infection vector. Email. Paul |
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