Windows 7 : Preparing for Trouble

With that gloomy mindset, the only sensible thing to do is prepare for that dire day so that you’re ready to get your system back on its feet. So part of your Windows 7 maintenance chores should be getting a few things ready that will serve you well on the day your PC decides to go haywire on you. Besides performing a system image backup (which I describe a bit later), you should be setting system restore points and creating a system recovery disc. The next two sections cover these last two techniques.

Setting System Restore Points

One of the biggest causes of Windows instability in the past was the tendency of some newly installed programs simply to not get along with Windows. The problem could be an executable file that didn’t mesh with the Windows system or a Registry change that caused havoc on other programs or on Windows. Similarly, hardware installs often caused problems by adding faulty device drivers to the system or by corrupting the Registry.

To help guard against software or hardware installations that bring down the system, Windows 7 offers the System Restore feature. Its job is straightforward, yet clever: to take periodic snapshots—called restore points or protection points—of your system, each of which includes the currently installed program files, Registry settings, and other crucial system data. The idea is that if a program or device installation causes problems on your system, you use System Restore to revert your system to the most recent restore point before the installation.

System Restore automatically creates restore points under the following conditions:

• Every 24 hours— This is called a system checkpoint, and it’s set once a day as long as your computer is running. If your computer isn’t running, the system checkpoint is created the next time you start your computer, assuming that it has been at least 24 hours since that previous system checkpoint was set.

  Note

  The system checkpoint interval is governed by a task in the Task Scheduler (select Start, type scheduler, and then click Task Scheduler in the search results). Open the Task Scheduler Library, Microsoft, Windows branch, and then click the SystemRestore task. To make changes to the task, click Properties in the Action pane to display the SR Properties dialog box. To change the schedule that Windows 7 uses to create system checkpoints, display the Triggers tab, click the trigger you want to change (Daily or At Startup), and then click Edit.

  
  

• Before installing certain applications— Some newer applications (notably Office 2000 and later) are aware of System Restore and will ask it to create a restore point prior to installation.

• Before installing a Windows Update patch— System Restore creates a restore point before you install a patch either by hand via the Windows Update site or via the Automatic Updates feature.

• Before installing an unsigned device driver— Windows 7 warns you about installing unsigned drivers. If you choose to go ahead, the system creates a restore point before installing the driver.

• Before restoring backed-up files— When you use the Windows 7 Backup program to restore one or more backed-up files, System Restore creates a restore point just in case the restore causes problems with system files.

• Before reverting to a previous configuration using System Restore— Sometimes reverting to an earlier configuration doesn’t fix the current problem or it creates its own set of problems. In these cases, System Restore creates a restore point before reverting so that you can undo the restoration.

It’s also possible to create a restore point manually using the System Protection feature. Here are the steps to follow:

If you find yourself setting restore points frequently, it can be a pain to go through those steps every time. A much faster way to go about this is to use a script that creates a restore point instantly. Listing 1 shows just such a script.

Listing 1. A Script That Creates a Restore Point

Option Explicit
Dim strComputer, objWMI, objSR, strDesc, intResult
'
' Get the SystemRestore object
'
strComputer = "."
Set objWMI = GetObject("winmgmts:\\" & strComputer & "\root\default")
Set objSR = objWMI.Get("SystemRestore")
'
' Ask for a restore point description
'
strDesc = InputBox ("Enter a description for the restore point:", , _
                    "Instant Restore Point")
'
' Create the restore point
'
intResult = objSR.CreateRestorePoint (strDesc, 0, 100)
'
' Check the result
'
If intResult = 0 Then
    '
    ' Success!
    '
    WScript.Echo "Instant restore point '" & strDesc & "' created!"
Else
    '
    ' Failure!
    '
    WScript.Echo "Instant restore point '" & strDesc & "' failed!" & _
                 vbCrLf & "Error code: " & intResult
End If
'
' Release the objects
'
Set objWMI = Nothing
Set objSR = Nothing

					  

This script uses Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) to return the SystemRestore class. The script displays a dialog box so that you can type a description of the restore point, and it then uses that description when it runs the CreateRestorePoint method. The script checks the result and displays a dialog box letting you know whether the restore point was created successfully.

Creating a System Repair Disc

In Windows Vista, you could attempt to get a badly behaving machine up and running again by booting to the Vista install disc and then accessing the system recovery options. That was a nice feature, but only if you could find your install disc (or if you ever had one in the first place)! Windows 7 fixes that problem by giving you the option of creating your own system repair disc. Here’s how you go about this:

Eject the disc, label it, and then put it someplace where you’ll be able to find it later on.