Losing system restore points

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Chas - 10 Apr 2005 16:33 GMT

I'm at my wit's wit's end with this. My computer will only retain restore
points in system restore for no longer than 10 days, then it will eliminate
the bolden dates from existance.I understand the FIFo(first come) concept
however I have 25 GB of free space left out of 36 in the first partition(C
drive), and 2 GB of free space in the second partiton(D).I have 512 MB of
memory and the slider for system restore disc space is at 4439MB. The shop
technican I took my computer say he could find no reason for my puter to
behave as it does. I have checked for loose connections, replaced wires.I
haven't added any new large programs but I do have System Mechanic a program
that removes junk and obselete files to maintain space.

I noticed Mike M told Big Duck to reset system restore,should I do that
procedure?

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Mike M - 10 Apr 2005 17:36 GMT

Chas,

The first thing to remember is that it is very dangerous to roll a system
back as much as 10 days so not having checkpoints older than that is
nothing to be worried about.

You say you have 4.4GB allocated to the restore archive which, although in
my opinion wildly excessive, should allow you to have many more
checkpoints than just ten days worth unless you have been making a large
number of changes to your system. Something you say you have not done.

Two questions if I may. How large is the C:\_RESTORE archive? To see
this properly you will however forest have to enable the proper viewing of
such a folder by checking the box "Show hidden files and folders" and
UNchecking the box "Hide protected operating system files" found at
Control Panel | Folder Options | View. Secondly did you suddenly lose
your older checkpoints or do you seem roughly to lose an old point each
time a new checkpoint is created?

Whilst I do not use applications such as System Mechanic this might be
worth checking out as it could well be configured to automatically discard
older system restore checkpoints.

Signature

Mike Maltby MS-MVP
mike.maltby@gmail.com

> I'm at my wit's wit's end with this. My computer will only retain
> restore points in system restore for no longer than 10 days, then it
[quoted text clipped - 10 lines]
> I noticed Mike M told Big Duck to reset system restore,should I do
> that procedure?

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Chas - 12 Apr 2005 13:55 GMT

Thanks Mike for responsing. I am not able to pull up this site any more at
home which is the reason it took so long to response to you. My restore
archive is 82.5MB's and now it's roughly as I add new points I lose the older
ones,however I retain restore points in system restore for 5 days instead of
ten.

I'am ok with your explantion of it's dangerous to roll back more that 10
days. Mircosoft Article # 301224 in part says that 90 days is the default
time system restore uses to retain points, so I thought 90 days is what I
shuld have and I do remember 90 days is what I used to have .

> Chas,
>
[quoted text clipped - 33 lines]
> > I noticed Mike M told Big Duck to reset system restore,should I do
> > that procedure?

Reply to this Message

Mike M - 12 Apr 2005 14:44 GMT

KB301224 is an article for those running XP rather than those running Win
Me. At least XP's updated version of system restore (SR) now
automatically discards very old checkpoints unlike the earlier version of
SR included as part of Win Me. I would however never recommend anyone
rolling back more than a few days, further than that it is better to use
ones backup - you do make backups don't you? <g> Nevertheless when push
comes to shove and ones already in a deep hole there is little to be lost
in trying anything and that could include using SR to roll back a month or
more.

I do find it somewhat odd that SR seems to be maintaining a restore
archive of around 100MB given your earlier comment that the archive size
is set to the maximum of 4.3GB and you have 25GB of free space on your
windows drive. It might be worth trying a) resetting system restore
(disable, immediately reboot, enable, immediately reboot) and b) adjusting
the space allocated to some other setting even if only temporarily just in
case the problem is due to a damaged control file (fixed by resetting) or
a corrupt space setting in the registry (hopefully fixed by adjusting the
space allocated).

Regards,

Signature

Mike Maltby MS-MVP
mike.maltby@gmail.com

> Thanks Mike for responsing. I am not able to pull up this site any
> more at home which is the reason it took so long to response to you.
[quoted text clipped - 7 lines]
> days is what I shuld have and I do remember 90 days is what I used to
> have .

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