Questions about reformatting and backing up files..

[TouchMeJackson]

I've had my computer (with Vista) since 2007 and I never had to reformat it... Until now. Whenever I had a problem I just did a simple system restore and it was fixed.

I need to reformat my computer because it's gotten to the point where I can't even do system restores anymore and my firewall refuses to start. I don't think I have a virus. I think it's a driver issue, my computer works fine in safe mode and I did scans in safe mode and nothing came up.

ANYWAY my point of this thread:

I need to back up my files before I reformat and just so everyone knows I'd rather use this piece of junk and have my files than use a brand new (...like) computer.

My computer has two hard drives built in. One is for the OS and the other is "recovery". I'm not sure how many computers have this second hard drive but I know my last one didn't.

The recovery drive has 5GB free which is plenty enough for my files. I don't wanna burn the files on to a disc because I get the blue screen of death regularly and I know with my luck i'll get it when my disc is 90% complete. Also I'm not going out to buy a external hard drive because I don't need one (almost 4 years with my computer and only have a 5GB stash of files).

If I moved my files to the recovery drive would I be able to reformat my OS drive and move the files back over when I'm done? Or will it clear out my recovery drive too? Please help.. And please don't say something like "OMG LEAVE RECOVERY ALONE!" because I don't give a shit about it, 4 years and I've never used it.. I'd delete the whole thing if it let me.

 

[Paws]

Are you sure you have two harddrives and not just two partitions?

If you get a BSOD when burning CDs/DVDs, did you try with a USB-stick instead?

 

[TouchMeJackson]

I don't know the difference between a partition and a hard drive. :s I probably have "two partitions" because I took my hard drive out once and well.. there was only one.

And the biggest USB drive we have in the house is 512MB and that's not enough. I could burn my files to a disc I guess since I have a few DVD-R discs but I don't want someone finding it and stumbling across my personal stash.

And I was googling and supposedly the recovery drive helps bring the computer to factory settings if you ever needed it to. The first thing I thought of was if I pasted my files in there then wouldn't I get factory settings + my files..?

 

[T-Rexx]

My computer has two hard drives built in. One is for the OS and the other is "recovery". I'm not sure how many computers have this second hard drive but I know my last one didn't.

You have two "partitions," one drive. The "recovery partition" is a cheap way for the manufacturer to avoid giving you the Windows Vista DVD. It contains the Windows installation files that would normally be included on the Windows Vista DVD. That saves the manufacturer a couple cents per computer (while it screws you).

The recovery drive has 5GB free which is plenty enough for my files. I don't wanna burn the files on to a disc because I get the blue screen of death regularly and I know with my luck i'll get it when my disc is 90% complete. Also I'm not going out to buy a external hard drive because I don't need one (almost 4 years with my computer and only have a 5GB stash of files).

You do NOT want to back up your files to the recovery partition. While the partition may be 5 GB in size, it is filled with the Windows recovery files, and very likely has no additional room to accommodate your data.

If CD/DVD backups don't work for you, you will need to make some other provision for backup. If you will not buy an external hard drive, then buy at least an 8 GB flash drive from Micro Center for $12 and back up your data to that.

Then, reformat and reinstall (from the recovery partition) and restore your backed up data to the new Windows partition from the flash drive.

And please don't say something like "OMG LEAVE RECOVERY ALONE!"

OMG LEAVE RECOVERY ALONE!

 

[trinket]

And the biggest USB drive we have in the house is 512MB and that's not enough. I could burn my files to a disc I guess since I have a few DVD-R discs but I don't want someone finding it and stumbling across my personal stash.

You could always go out and buy a bigger USB thumbdrive, or an external USB hard drive to improve your 512 MB situation. They're really cheap these days.

You could also use something like TrueCrypt to create an encrypted DVD-R volume. These instructions are for a CD, but as the author notes, you could adapt to a DVD-R disc. That way nobody could browse the discs and see the real files. A more simple way is that you could create password-protected RAR files (and choose the "Encrypt Filenames" option). The point being, you don't have to only put the files on the DVD-Rs "naked".

And I was googling and supposedly the recovery drive helps bring the computer to factory settings if you ever needed it to. The first thing I thought of was if I pasted my files in there then wouldn't I get factory settings + my files..?

What type of laptop do you have? HP, Toshiba, Dell, etc. I don't think you've mentioned that and it might help to understand the typical way the given manufacturer handles the recovery partition.

It is probably a partition, though (not a physical drive). You're likely to not really get your "factory settings + my files", at least not in an automated/direct way. By that I mean the recovery partition contains specific files and a procedure that the computer knows what to do with in order to rebuild the OS on your main drive. It's going to look to the recovery drive and do its re-installation thing; it will basically ignore your data files on that recovery drive because it doesn't know anything about those files in the rebuild process. That's not to say that, later, you can't copy them over yourself, manually. By the way, some people would suggest stashing your own data on a recovery partition maybe isn't necessarily the best practice or place for it - it's really only meant to hold recovery files and is often sized specifically for it, for instance.

 

[Xenos Morphe]

LEAVE RECOVERY ALONE! Seriously! These are the files you use to reformat the computer. If you start adding files or what ever to this drive, you'll be in serious trouble if you don't have the install disks. When you reformat create a 25GB partition for the operating system and leave whats left for your files and you should never have to move them again. Just to be clear, you have to get them off this time if you want to keep them. I'd suggest buying a 10 pack of DVDRWs then you can erase them after the transfer. XM

 

[TouchMeJackson]

I appreciate your responses/concern but I got sick of waiting and ended up putting my files in recovery and reformatting my computer anyway. I figured that if they were deleted then at least all the evidence is gone.. It all worked out fine, I was able to move them to my normal hard drive and delete them without any problems.. So yeah.

From now on I won't be stashing stuff in there if it makes you happy.

 

[Michiko]

Well, now that it works, BURN THE RECOVERY DISKS. All computers I know of have a way to burn the recovery partition to disks (mine does), so, do that before something messes it up.

 

[Paws]

I appreciate your responses/concern but I got sick of waiting and ended up putting my files in recovery and reformatting my computer anyway.

Kids, don't try this at home.

You were one lucky guy that everything went well

 

[foodandart]

Kids, don't try this at home.

You were one lucky guy that everything went well

You can do the same thing with Macs.

I routinely partition out the laptops I service and put a backup copy of the OS installer - basically a disk image of the OS - on to the second partition.

A lot of the older PowerBooks have super-drives that do not read dual layer disks, which is what Leopard comes on so I tuck a copy in via a networked install. (FireWire is the shit!)

As long as you put your data into a folder with a unique name that isn't related to something the OS uses, it works just fine. Installers have a packing list and will ignore anything (for the most part) that is also on the volume.

Deb.

 

[TouchMeJackson]

I don't know how to "burn recovery discs"... Plus I still have my Vista and drivers discs so do I really need to?

And I'm having a few problems.. My font looks a little off. I could probably fix this in the settings but I don't know where. ??? And youtube videos seem to be scratchy if I'm on a website that has a lot of content like facebook... And this is a minor problem but it's annoying: When I turn my computer on the screen is all black (longer than normal) and the brightness appears to be turned down all the way.. I reinstalled all the drivers under "My system".. Whatever shall I do?

 

[trinket]

TouchMeJackson, it's not unusual for a reinstall from a recovery partition to have pure default settings that might need a little tweaking or be barer-bones, or not quite match the active OS you've used for a few years because stuff's been added to the active one. For fonts, there's a process to apply the Vista system font Segoe UI across the OS. You can also tweak your Cleartype settings (see here as well).

Also, you can hit up your video card driver's website to get the latest drivers. If you haven't updated new patches for Windows as well since the reinstall, visit Windows Update and get those. They might include new display drivers.

For the Youtube problems, make sure you have the latest Flash. You might also want to tweak your graphic card hardware acceleration to improve performance.