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| Set System Restore's Clock |
| Windows' System Restore is a very young utility. It got its start with the infamous Windows |
| Millennium Edition. It's funny to think back to the Me days. Why exactly did a lifesaver utility |
| such as System Restore make its debut in such a poor product? Microsoft knew all along that Me is |
| crash-prone. Hence the birth of System Restore. |
| What does System Restore do? |
| System Restore takes snapshots of your system status and archives them for retrieval, so if your PC |
| crashes, you can restore your system files. Your system files are critical to the smooth operation of |
| What doesn't System Restore do? |
| It won't restore Word documents, pictures, data folders, email, and so on. |
| It is not a backup utility. |
| Out of the box, System Restore creates a restore point every 24 hours. It also saves each restore |
| point for up to 90 days. Both of these can be adjusted, but not very easily. Here's how you modify |
| Open Regedit. Go to Start > Run and type "regedit" with the quotes. |
| Navigate to HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\WindowsNT\CurrentVersion\System Restore. |
| To modify how many restore points are created, double-click the RPGlobalInterval key. |
| Change the Value Data field from 86,400 (in seconds), which is 24 hours, to anything you'd like. |
| For example, 43,200 is 12 hours, so a restore point will automatically be created every 12 hours. If |
| the number in the default Value Field is different (it should be 86,400), then it's probably in |
| hexadecimal format. Click the radio button titled Decimal to display the correct default setting. |
| To modify how many restore points are saved, double-click the RPLifeInterval key. |
| Change the Value Data field from 7,776,000 (in seconds), which is 90 days, to anything you'd like. |
| For example, if you'd rather save precious hard-drive space, opt for 30 days instead. That should |
| equate to a value of 2,592,000 seconds. |
| Helpful tips for a successful System Restore |
| If your PC gets infected with a virus, you may be able to restore your system to a previous time. But |
| if the virus has infected an email or your documents, you're out of luck. Remember, System |
| Restore can restore only system files. |
| To manually delete your most recent System Restore, click Start > Accessories > System Tools > |
| Disk Cleanup. Choose the More Options tab and select the Clean Up button from the System |
| Your restore points are hidden (only in NTFS). Accidental deletion of these is very unlikely. |
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