reinstalling : Java Glossary

by Roedy Green ©1996-2009 Canadian Mind Products
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reinstalling

Here are some tips in reinstalling software after a crash. The information about you programs is stored in three places:

The registry. This is the most vulnerable. It is also the hardest to repair.
In various configuration files in C:\windows, C:\Documents and Settings on C:\users.
In the various X:\Program File directories.

Usually only the registry is damaged. You simply reinstall the software and you are golden. The catch is some programs will erase all your configuration files when they install. So you must discover them and back them up so you can restore then after you have reinstalled. For my personal machine, I wrote a snap.btm file that collects are such configuration files in a directory for backup.

Image Backups

Image backups are large and take a snapshot in time of your entire set of hard disks. When you restore, you put all your programs and configuration files the way they were, but also your data files. So you should separately back up your data files more frequently (as individuals files, not as an image) so you can restore them after you restore the image. At the time of a crash, if you don’t have recent data file backups, you can sometimes rescue them using Linux to sift through the rubble.

Vista does not come with a reinstall disk. Your only option after a crash is to restore to a snapshot point, a backup image point, or to put things back to factory conditions with empty disks (other than Windows and factory-installed software.)

Restoring the Registry

You can’t take a backup of the registry and just restore it. Yet if even one entry in the registry is wrong, your entire machine will not work. You can use regedit.exe to save the registry, or parts of the registry in text form. You can restore these snippets, but the registry as a whole must work working ok with no ruined crucial pieces, before you can do that. It also require some technical skill to find the varioues places your apps hide information in the registry. At least if you have a copy of the entire registry in text form you have a chance of doing a manual repair with help from an expert.

backup
registry

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