System Restore in Windows ME

[raden0887]

Im working on a clients computer,

It is a Dell Inspiron 4300

P4 1.6 512k L2
256mb SDRAM
Windows ME

The problem with it are numerous, Im hoping t get rid of them all by using system restore. I would just reformat, but there are progrms on there that the person needs and doesnt have a backup copy of.

I boot in safe mode, I open system restore, try to restore it to an earlier time like months before the problem started.

the process will start, I followed all the directions, the progress bar would go to the middle then the system restarts.

when it reboots, it says system restore was unsuccessful.

i tried scandisk, chkdsk, spybot, and so far nothing is happening


what can i do to fix this PC with out losing those damn programs???

[pip22]

You should perform a System Restore with Windows in normal mode if possible. That is the generally accepted method. However, SR's success rate is very low in ME (even in XP it can fail) and most system-builders I know actually disable SR before the customer takes delivery of it because it is so unreliable they believe it to be largely a waste of disk-space and gives the customer a false sense of security as far as system backup is concerned. Regarding your actual problems, you need to be more specific in order to receive any relevant repair advice. It's been said many times before, I know, but a disk-image backup is the only trustworthy thing you can fall back on, though I realise it's too late for that now. But it's sound advice you should pass on to your client when he's up and running again.

[MacG]

Do any of those programs still have their installers on the drive? If so copy them to a CDR, clean re-install ME and re-install the programs.

System Restore is useless in ME. I struggled with ME for four years and moved on to XP Pro. I finally disabled System Restore and made a drive image to restore from, which I still have. But there is a LOT of tuning to do to get ME to run well.

His system seems good enough for XP if he has 512Mb RAM installed. Programs may not be compatible though.

ME prefers to run on a small drive volume. I used to use a 4096Mb drive C: (I now use an 8192Mb drive for XP Pro.)

Scanning with SpyBot SD, AdAware SE and using SpywareBlaster helps.

Cleaning up the drive with delindex.bat on a bootdiskette (for ME) with:

A:\>delindex run , (Press Enter)

Using CCleaner also removes a lot of junk and one of the main problems is trapping virii in the hidden: C:\_RESTORE Folder

A:\>DELTREE C:\_RESTORE , press Enter, and delete all of the sub-folders too.

I would give up on using System Restore if I were you.

Which make and model of computer does he have? Packard-Bell?

Can you be more specific about the problems?