XP restore function

Richie Hardwick wrote:
"Bill in Co." wrote:

But the way System Restore works (as I understand it) is that it needs to
keep track of ALL the system *CHANGES* made, and if you used an ERUNT
backup, ERUNT will of course put back some older system files, and System
Restore may not know of those "changes" later so that it can *reverse the
changes* ERUNT made. The key point here being that System Restore
depends
on an accurate log of ALL system *changes*, and NOT just current
snapshots
of the system.

System Restore doesn't keep track of - OR use - logs. It makes
snapshots of the system at the time that restore points are made.

Let me further explain:

IOW, I'm operating under the assumption that System Restore does NOT
simply
keep an independent snapshot of the system, but instead keeps one based
on
all the *changes* that have been made, and relies on that being
completely
accurate (i.e., that all CHANGES have been recorded, item by item).
Not
that it is somehow able to look at the current system and figure out what
has changed since the last restore point (by doing a comparison right
there
on the spot).

Richie Hardwick

OK, maybe my use of the term "logs" is a bit incorrect here. I mean
logging the incremental file changes in the "System Volume Information"
folders (RPxxx) throughout the day.

In those System Volume Information folders you will find a whole bunch of
ini, exe, dll, inf, etc, files (and indeed, some "change.log" files), being
stored throughout the day. So System Restore IS keeping track of the
*changes*, as per my just recent response back to Ken.

"Bill in Co." wrote:

System Restore doesn't keep track of - OR use - logs. It makes
snapshots of the system at the time that restore points are made.


Richie Hardwick

OK, maybe my use of the term "logs" is a bit incorrect here. I mean
logging the incremental file changes in the "System Volume Information"
folders (RPxxx) throughout the day.

In those System Volume Information folders you will find a whole bunch of
ini, exe, dll, inf, etc, files (and indeed, some "change.log" files), being
stored throughout the day. So System Restore IS keeping track of the
*changes*, as per my just recent response back to Ken.

Whether or not it is collecting that info - and that is NOT clear to
me - the ONLY fall back in case of a problem is a restore point
previous to the appearance of the problem. SO... it's
snapshot-to-snapshot, not snapshot-to-incremental.

For someone who like simplicity, you surely do have an uncanny ability
to complicate matters.

Richie Hardwick

Richie Hardwick wrote:
"Bill in Co." wrote:

System Restore doesn't keep track of - OR use - logs. It makes
snapshots of the system at the time that restore points are made.


Richie Hardwick

OK, maybe my use of the term "logs" is a bit incorrect here. I mean
logging the incremental file changes in the "System Volume Information"
folders (RPxxx) throughout the day.

In those System Volume Information folders you will find a whole bunch of
ini, exe, dll, inf, etc, files (and indeed, some "change.log" files),
being
stored throughout the day. So System Restore IS keeping track of the
*changes*, as per my just recent response back to Ken.

Whether or not it is collecting that info - and that is NOT clear to
me -

It's easy to tell, Richie. Go look at the System Volume Information folder
contents for yourself. (That's what I did and discovered there, firsthand,
via Windows Explorer, of course, once you can access it).

the ONLY fall back in case of a problem is a restore point
previous to the appearance of the problem. SO... it's
snapshot-to-snapshot, not snapshot-to-incremental.

For someone who like simplicity, you surely do have an uncanny ability
to complicate matters.

Because I'm trying to resolve a somewhat complicated system problem now.
(I'm having some (seemingly) "out of the blue" svchost crashes while I'm
online, that's why. And using System Restore (to a point preceding all
this) didn't resolve it), so I'm trying to understand it and its limitations
a bit better (also in conjunction with ERUNT, which I've also been using).

The worst part about this is that whatever is causing this occasional crash
is tied into svchost. (at least I get that much out of the Dr. Watson file).
I mean, like lots of "help" that is, seeing is how svchost runs so many
services! :-)

"Bill in Co." wrote:

Richie Hardwick wrote:
"Bill in Co." wrote:

System Restore doesn't keep track of - OR use - logs. It makes
snapshots of the system at the time that restore points are made.


Richie Hardwick

OK, maybe my use of the term "logs" is a bit incorrect here. I mean
logging the incremental file changes in the "System Volume Information"
folders (RPxxx) throughout the day.

In those System Volume Information folders you will find a whole bunch of
ini, exe, dll, inf, etc, files (and indeed, some "change.log" files),
being
stored throughout the day. So System Restore IS keeping track of the
*changes*, as per my just recent response back to Ken.

Whether or not it is collecting that info - and that is NOT clear to
me -

It's easy to tell, Richie. Go look at the System Volume Information folder
contents for yourself. (That's what I did and discovered there, firsthand,
via Windows Explorer, of course, once you can access it).

the ONLY fall back in case of a problem is a restore point
previous to the appearance of the problem. SO... it's
snapshot-to-snapshot, not snapshot-to-incremental.

For someone who like simplicity, you surely do have an uncanny ability
to complicate matters.

Because I'm trying to resolve a somewhat complicated system problem now.
(I'm having some (seemingly) "out of the blue" svchost crashes while I'm
online, that's why. And using System Restore (to a point preceding all
this) didn't resolve it), so I'm trying to understand it and its limitations
a bit better (also in conjunction with ERUNT, which I've also been using).

The worst part about this is that whatever is causing this occasional crash
is tied into svchost. (at least I get that much out of the Dr. Watson file).
I mean, like lots of "help" that is, seeing is how svchost runs so many
services! :-)

How do you know it's tied to svchost.exe? And by "when I'm online" do
you mean when you're accessing the Internet?

Richie Hardwick

Richie Hardwick wrote:
"Bill in Co." wrote:

Richie Hardwick wrote:
"Bill in Co." wrote:

System Restore doesn't keep track of - OR use - logs. It makes
snapshots of the system at the time that restore points are made.


Richie Hardwick

OK, maybe my use of the term "logs" is a bit incorrect here. I mean
logging the incremental file changes in the "System Volume Information"
folders (RPxxx) throughout the day.

In those System Volume Information folders you will find a whole bunch
of
ini, exe, dll, inf, etc, files (and indeed, some "change.log" files),
being
stored throughout the day. So System Restore IS keeping track of the
*changes*, as per my just recent response back to Ken.

Whether or not it is collecting that info - and that is NOT clear to
me -

It's easy to tell, Richie. Go look at the System Volume Information
folder
contents for yourself. (That's what I did and discovered there,
firsthand,
via Windows Explorer, of course, once you can access it).

the ONLY fall back in case of a problem is a restore point
previous to the appearance of the problem. SO... it's
snapshot-to-snapshot, not snapshot-to-incremental.

For someone who like simplicity, you surely do have an uncanny ability
to complicate matters.

Because I'm trying to resolve a somewhat complicated system problem now.
(I'm having some (seemingly) "out of the blue" svchost crashes while I'm
online, that's why. And using System Restore (to a point preceding all
this) didn't resolve it), so I'm trying to understand it and its
limitations
a bit better (also in conjunction with ERUNT, which I've also been
using).

The worst part about this is that whatever is causing this occasional
crash
is tied into svchost. (at least I get that much out of the Dr. Watson
file).
I mean, like lots of "help" that is, seeing is how svchost runs so many
services! :-)

How do you know it's tied to svchost.exe?

Because I examined the drwatson log file, and found it in there. To quote
it:
Application exception occurred:
App: C:\WINDOWS\System32\svchost.exe (pid=1060)
When: 12/17/2008 @ 20:02:43.562
Exception number: c0000005 (access violation)

And by "when I'm online" do you mean when you're accessing the Internet?

I'm on dialup, so yes, that's what I meant. I haven't had the problem yet
when I'm offline, but I'm often online, so it may not be 100% conclusive,
but I'd bet a beer on it. :-)

I forgot to mention that I even restored a previous complete C: partition
image backup (prior to having this problem), and THAT didn't resolve it!!
So I'm pretty much concluding this bug is due to some other issues (and not
my windows and programs installations).

But I'm also using AdMuncher, AdShield, CallWave, CacheSentryPro, for
example), and figure there may be something going on in there.

"Bill in Co." wrote:

How do you know it's tied to svchost.exe?

Because I examined the drwatson log file, and found it in there. To quote
it:
Application exception occurred:
App: C:\WINDOWS\System32\svchost.exe (pid=1060)
When: 12/17/2008 @ 20:02:43.562
Exception number: c0000005 (access violation)

And by "when I'm online" do you mean when you're accessing the Internet?

I'm on dialup, so yes, that's what I meant. I haven't had the problem yet
when I'm offline, but I'm often online, so it may not be 100% conclusive,
but I'd bet a beer on it. :-)

I forgot to mention that I even restored a previous complete C: partition
image backup (prior to having this problem), and THAT didn't resolve it!!
So I'm pretty much concluding this bug is due to some other issues (and not
my windows and programs installations).

Not Windows, anyway.

But I'm also using AdMuncher, AdShield, CallWave, CacheSentryPro, for
example), and figure there may be something going on in there.

One - or a combo - of the above is probably the culprit. Start
stopping the one you've most recently begun to use.

Callwave... that one brings back memories of the olden dialup days for
me! Just the name of "CacheSentryPro" looks suspicious.


Richie Hardwick

Richie Hardwick wrote:
"Bill in Co." wrote:

How do you know it's tied to svchost.exe?

Because I examined the drwatson log file, and found it in there. To
quote
it:
Application exception occurred:
App: C:\WINDOWS\System32\svchost.exe (pid=1060)
When: 12/17/2008 @ 20:02:43.562
Exception number: c0000005 (access violation)

And by "when I'm online" do you mean when you're accessing the Internet?

I'm on dialup, so yes, that's what I meant. I haven't had the problem
yet
when I'm offline, but I'm often online, so it may not be 100% conclusive,
but I'd bet a beer on it. :-)

I forgot to mention that I even restored a previous complete C: partition
image backup (prior to having this problem), and THAT didn't resolve it!!
So I'm pretty much concluding this bug is due to some other issues (and
not
my windows and programs installations).

Not Windows, anyway.

Right. That's a bit more accurate.

But I'm also using AdMuncher, AdShield, CallWave, CacheSentryPro, for
example), and figure there may be something going on in there.

One - or a combo - of the above is probably the culprit. Start
stopping the one you've most recently begun to use.

We'll, I'm working on these guys one at a time, so thanks! Unfortunately,
they were all in use around the same time.

Callwave... that one brings back memories of the olden dialup days for
me! Just the name of "CacheSentryPro" looks suspicious.

CacheSentry and CacheSentryPro are pretty good, and do a better job of
managing the TIF than IE does. And are much more customizable (like you
can decide which cached items should be retained longer, and not rely on IE
to (more or less) randomly dispose of them when the cache gets full
(although it's supposed to be a last in, last out thing, so the oldest guys
go first). Plus it has an option to clear the TIF's index.dat file at
reboot, which is not an easy task to accomplish in Windows XP for a somewhat
corrupted TIF! (in Win98SE you could do it by booting into real mode DOS,
and doing it down there)

Here is a link related to CacheSentry (free) and CacheSentryPro
(inexpensive): http://www.enigmaticsoftware.com/cac...pro/index.html

It's pretty useful for those of us on dialup to be able to retain some
select pages in the cache as we see fit (otherwise it takes forever to
reload them). :-)

"Bill in Co." wrote:

Richie Hardwick wrote:
"Bill in Co." wrote:

How do you know it's tied to svchost.exe?

Because I examined the drwatson log file, and found it in there. To
quote
it:
Application exception occurred:
App: C:\WINDOWS\System32\svchost.exe (pid=1060)
When: 12/17/2008 @ 20:02:43.562
Exception number: c0000005 (access violation)

And by "when I'm online" do you mean when you're accessing the Internet?

I'm on dialup, so yes, that's what I meant. I haven't had the problem
yet
when I'm offline, but I'm often online, so it may not be 100% conclusive,
but I'd bet a beer on it. :-)

I forgot to mention that I even restored a previous complete C: partition
image backup (prior to having this problem), and THAT didn't resolve it!!
So I'm pretty much concluding this bug is due to some other issues (and
not
my windows and programs installations).

Not Windows, anyway.

Right. That's a bit more accurate.

But I'm also using AdMuncher, AdShield, CallWave, CacheSentryPro, for
example), and figure there may be something going on in there.

One - or a combo - of the above is probably the culprit. Start
stopping the one you've most recently begun to use.

We'll, I'm working on these guys one at a time, so thanks! Unfortunately,
they were all in use around the same time.

Callwave... that one brings back memories of the olden dialup days for
me! Just the name of "CacheSentryPro" looks suspicious.

CacheSentry and CacheSentryPro are pretty good, and do a better job of
managing the TIF than IE does. And are much more customizable (like you
can decide which cached items should be retained longer, and not rely on IE
to (more or less) randomly dispose of them when the cache gets full
(although it's supposed to be a last in, last out thing, so the oldest guys
go first). Plus it has an option to clear the TIF's index.dat file at
reboot, which is not an easy task to accomplish in Windows XP for a somewhat
corrupted TIF! (in Win98SE you could do it by booting into real mode DOS,
and doing it down there)

Here is a link related to CacheSentry (free) and CacheSentryPro
(inexpensive): http://www.enigmaticsoftware.com/cac...pro/index.html

It's pretty useful for those of us on dialup to be able to retain some
select pages in the cache as we see fit (otherwise it takes forever to
reload them). :-)

Personally, I'd dump that program and just make my TIF folder HUGE.

I've never had a corrupted TIF index.dat file... and I've been playing
around online since about two years before Mosaic became available.

Richie Hardwick

On Dec 17, 5:04 am, "bobster" wrote:
I have been reading up on ERUNT as a substitute for the XP "restore"
function. It sounds like it is a more complete and reliable function than
"restore".

Opinions?

NO its wrong,ERUNT is a good program for backing up the registry but
isnt a complete restore program like system restore.System restore
offers wizard based restore option also backups the registry
automatically on daily basis.When its the question of which one is
best and more complete i would say "system restore" is more complete
then erunt because system restore backups up both registry and also
some other settings

On Dec 17, 5:04 am, "bobster" wrote:
I have been reading up on ERUNT as a substitute for the XP "restore"
function. It sounds like it is a more complete and reliable function than
"restore".

Opinions?

NO its wrong,ERUNT is a good program for backing up the registry but
isnt a complete restore program like system restore.System restore
offers wizard based restore option also backups the registry
automatically on daily basis.When its the question of which one is
best and more complete i would say "system restore" is more complete
then erunt because system restore backups up both registry and also
some other settings

Richie Hardwick wrote:
"Bill in Co." wrote:

Richie Hardwick wrote:
"Bill in Co." wrote:

How do you know it's tied to svchost.exe?

Because I examined the drwatson log file, and found it in there. To
quote
it:
Application exception occurred:
App: C:\WINDOWS\System32\svchost.exe (pid=1060)
When: 12/17/2008 @ 20:02:43.562
Exception number: c0000005 (access violation)

And by "when I'm online" do you mean when you're accessing the
Internet?

I'm on dialup, so yes, that's what I meant. I haven't had the problem
yet
when I'm offline, but I'm often online, so it may not be 100%
conclusive,
but I'd bet a beer on it. :-)

I forgot to mention that I even restored a previous complete C:
partition
image backup (prior to having this problem), and THAT didn't resolve
it!!
So I'm pretty much concluding this bug is due to some other issues (and
not
my windows and programs installations).

Not Windows, anyway.

Right. That's a bit more accurate.

But I'm also using AdMuncher, AdShield, CallWave, CacheSentryPro, for
example), and figure there may be something going on in there.

One - or a combo - of the above is probably the culprit. Start
stopping the one you've most recently begun to use.

We'll, I'm working on these guys one at a time, so thanks!
Unfortunately,
they were all in use around the same time.

Callwave... that one brings back memories of the olden dialup days for
me! Just the name of "CacheSentryPro" looks suspicious.

CacheSentry and CacheSentryPro are pretty good, and do a better job of
managing the TIF than IE does. And are much more customizable (like you
can decide which cached items should be retained longer, and not rely on
IE
to (more or less) randomly dispose of them when the cache gets full
(although it's supposed to be a last in, last out thing, so the oldest
guys
go first). Plus it has an option to clear the TIF's index.dat file at
reboot, which is not an easy task to accomplish in Windows XP for a
somewhat
corrupted TIF! (in Win98SE you could do it by booting into real mode
DOS,
and doing it down there)

Here is a link related to CacheSentry (free) and CacheSentryPro
(inexpensive):
http://www.enigmaticsoftware.com/cac...pro/index.html

It's pretty useful for those of us on dialup to be able to retain some
select pages in the cache as we see fit (otherwise it takes forever to
reload them). :-)

Personally, I'd dump that program and just make my TIF folder HUGE.

But that also has its drawback and potential problems (i.e., I believe
increases the likelyhood of getting a corrupted TIF should power go out or
after a blue screen, while online). As the TIF gets larger, more TIF
subfolders are created, all of which have to be routinely indexed and
maintained by IE. (As it is now, I already have 12 subfolders in the TIF).
And as I recall, there comes a point where it can take longer to find an
entry in a larger TIF than it would take to just load it in fresh. My TIF
is currently set at 100 MB, which is on the high end for the recommended
size.

I've never had a corrupted TIF index.dat file... and I've been playing
around online since about two years before Mosaic became available.

Richie Hardwick

Well ok, in implying that I had a truly corrupted TIF, I may have overstated
it. (but at this point in time, and over all the years of using Windows
through its various "incarnations", I can't even recall for sure).

But I *do* remember that after clearing the TIF in IE, many old TIF files
are not removed, and its "index.dat" file often remains bloated (as in:
several megabytes). The only way to clear the index.dat file (for a clean
TIF) is to delete it, and then it will get rebuilt on the next bootup. (the
default size for a clean index.dat file is around 32 KB, and NOT several
Megabytes).

windmap wrote:
On Dec 17, 5:04 am, "bobster" wrote:
I have been reading up on ERUNT as a substitute for the XP "restore"
function. It sounds like it is a more complete and reliable function
than
"restore".

Opinions?

NO its wrong,ERUNT is a good program for backing up the registry but
isnt a complete restore program like system restore.System restore
offers wizard based restore option also backups the registry
automatically on daily basis.When its the question of which one is
best and more complete i would say "system restore" is more complete
then erunt because system restore backups up both registry and also
some other settings

Well, truth be told, even System Restore is not a full and complete restore
program. It will not replace everything (like all the files it doesn't
monitor, for example). I don't think there truly exists such a thing, short
of restoring an image or clone backup of the system. THAT is the only
truly complete restore path.

Addended.

Richie Hardwick wrote:
"Bill in Co." wrote:

Richie Hardwick wrote:
"Bill in Co." wrote:

How do you know it's tied to svchost.exe?

Because I examined the drwatson log file, and found it in there. To
quote
it:
Application exception occurred:
App: C:\WINDOWS\System32\svchost.exe (pid=1060)
When: 12/17/2008 @ 20:02:43.562
Exception number: c0000005 (access violation)

And by "when I'm online" do you mean when you're accessing the
Internet?

I'm on dialup, so yes, that's what I meant. I haven't had the
problem
yet
when I'm offline, but I'm often online, so it may not be 100%
conclusive,
but I'd bet a beer on it. :-)

I forgot to mention that I even restored a previous complete C:
partition
image backup (prior to having this problem), and THAT didn't resolve
it!!
So I'm pretty much concluding this bug is due to some other issues
(and
not
my windows and programs installations).

Not Windows, anyway.

Right. That's a bit more accurate.

But I'm also using AdMuncher, AdShield, CallWave, CacheSentryPro, for
example), and figure there may be something going on in there.

One - or a combo - of the above is probably the culprit. Start
stopping the one you've most recently begun to use.

We'll, I'm working on these guys one at a time, so thanks!
Unfortunately,
they were all in use around the same time.

Callwave... that one brings back memories of the olden dialup days for
me! Just the name of "CacheSentryPro" looks suspicious.

CacheSentry and CacheSentryPro are pretty good, and do a better job of
managing the TIF than IE does. And are much more customizable (like
you
can decide which cached items should be retained longer, and not rely on
IE
to (more or less) randomly dispose of them when the cache gets full
(although it's supposed to be a last in, last out thing, so the oldest
guys
go first). Plus it has an option to clear the TIF's index.dat file at
reboot, which is not an easy task to accomplish in Windows XP for a
somewhat
corrupted TIF! (in Win98SE you could do it by booting into real mode
DOS,
and doing it down there)

Here is a link related to CacheSentry (free) and CacheSentryPro
(inexpensive):
http://www.enigmaticsoftware.com/cac...pro/index.html

It's pretty useful for those of us on dialup to be able to retain some
select pages in the cache as we see fit (otherwise it takes forever to
reload them). :-)

Personally, I'd dump that program and just make my TIF folder HUGE.

But that also has its drawback and potential problems (i.e., I believe
increases the likelyhood of getting a corrupted TIF should power go out or
after a blue screen, while online). As the TIF gets larger, more TIF
subfolders are created, all of which have to be routinely indexed and
maintained by IE. (As it is now, I already have 12 subfolders in the
TIF).
And as I recall, there comes a point where it can take longer to find an
entry in a larger TIF than it would take to just load it in fresh. My
TIF
is currently set at 100 MB, which is on the high end for the recommended
size.

I've never had a corrupted TIF index.dat file... and I've been playing
around online since about two years before Mosaic became available.

Richie Hardwick

Well ok, in implying that I had a truly corrupted TIF, I may have
overstated
it. (but at this point in time, and over all the years of using Windows
through its various "incarnations", I can't even recall for sure).

But I *do* remember that after clearing the TIF in IE, many old TIF files
are not removed, and its "index.dat" file often remains bloated (as in:
several megabytes). The only way to clear the index.dat file (for a clean
TIF) is to delete it, and then it will get rebuilt on the next bootup.
(the
default size for a clean index.dat file is around 32 KB, and NOT several
Megabytes).

Ooops, spoke too soon. I forgot about those cases where, after visiting
some sites, and then looking at the TIF (within IE options), it appeared as
if the almost all of the TIF files there had mysteriously vanished! That
has happened to me on several occasions. I discovered it by looking
under "Tools, Internet Options, Settings, View Files", where I saw hardly
anything in there anymore, and yet in Windows Explorer, I could see the TIF
was quiot full (e:g: 100 MB worth), and had thousands of files still in
there! IOW: a corrupted TIF and index.dat file.

On Dec 19, 12:53*am, "Bill in Co."
wrote:
windmap wrote:
On Dec 17, 5:04 am, "bobster" wrote:
I have been reading up on ERUNT as a substitute for the XP "restore"
function. *It sounds like it is a more complete and reliable function
than
"restore".

Opinions?

NO its wrong,ERUNT is a good program for backing up the registry but
isnt a complete restore program like system restore.System restore
offers wizard based restore option also backups the registry
automatically on daily basis.When its the question of which one is
best and more complete i would say "system restore" is more complete
then erunt because system restore backups up both registry and also
some other settings

Well, truth be told, even System Restore is not a full and complete restore
program. * It will not replace everything (like all the files it doesn't
monitor, for example). *I don't think there truly exists such a thing, short
of restoring an image or clone backup of the system. * THAT is the only
truly complete restore path.

Yes i understand that System restore is not a complete restore program
like Disk Imaging program.I also admit that there is no such software
as complete backup software.
However when it comes to the Question of which one is better of the
two.Its should be System Restore.

"windmap" wrote in message
...
Yes i understand that System restore is not a complete restore program
like Disk Imaging program.I also admit that there is no such software
as complete backup software.
However when it comes to the Question of which one is better of the
two.Its should be System Restore.


windmap:
Well, what about a disk-to-disk cloning program? Would you not consider this
"as complete backup software"?
Anna