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System Restore has packed up
My System Restore suddenly seems to have stopped working and I’d be very grateful if someone could tell me how to get it working again. I have a one-year-old Vostro 1500 laptop running XP Professional. Everything seems to have been working fine. Last night, though, I discovered that my System Restore has stopped working properly. After I select a restore point, a box comes up that reads: “Changes made to drive(s) E: after this point cannot be reversed because the drive was either excluded from System Restore monitoring or was turned off or removed”. Drive E is the name usually given to the USB slot where I plug in a memory stick / my external hard drive. I have never wanted System Restore to monitor my memory stick / external hard drive but, as fas as I know, I’ve never done anything in System Restore to suggest that I might ever have wanted it to cover Drive E.
Ignoring this pop-up box mesage, I click on Next. My PC then seems to go through the normal preliminary stages for a restoration but, when Windows restarts, the system appears to hang for a bit at the home screen (I get to stare at my desktop theme for a while anyway) and then up comes a box that says: “Restoration incomplete. Your computer cannot be restored to [your chosen date]”. After some experimenting, I have discovered that it doesn’t matter what date I select for the Sytem Restore. In all cases, I get exactly the same message.
I don’t know what’s happened or what I’ve inadvertently done to cause this problem. But i would be very grateful if someone could help me solve it. Thank you. maxfindlay
jackshack
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August 1st, 2009 10:00
Am I correct in assuming that you have nothing plugged into the USB port when you attempt the restore?
System Restore doesn't seem to have a lot of resistance to file corruption. The only way to get it working again is to open your computer properties (one way to this is click Start, right click My Computer, click Properties), click on the System Restore tab, and click on the box next to the statement Turn Off System Restore. You likely need to restart the computer at this point. After you have restarted, go back to the System Restore tab and click on the box to remove the X and turn System Restore on again. This process eliminates all your old restore points, but as they are apparently corrupted you cannot access them anyway. You will then start making new restore points.
maxfindlay
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August 1st, 2009 12:00
You've been great, thank you. I've followed your advice and System Restore is indeed working again. As you say, its a pity about the old SR points but I couldn't access then anyway. Regards - maxfindlay
jackshack
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August 1st, 2009 17:00
You are very welcome. Best of luck to you.