Restoring files and folders

[leewilliams]

 

:confused: [color:orange][/color]Is there a simple way or formula to use in restoring my computer? Do I need to restore folders or files one at a time. The tutorials have me a little confused on how to go about it. Lee

[rhwalker]

It all depends on what you want to do. If you want to restore individual files (as you might want if just a few files were accidentally deleted), restore files.

 

If you want to restore an entire volume (as you might want to do if a disk was accidentally erased, or if you had to replace a disk, etc.), then restore the entire volume.

 

Does that help? Or perhaps I don't understand the question.

 

Russ

[leewilliams]

My computer is running o.k. but slow now and I wanted to try restoring the essentials, but wonder if there is a particular tutorial that would be helpful for me in the process of restoring. I have listed to the three Retrospect Tutorials and am confused as to what direction to take..

[leewilliams]

Is there one of the tutorials that covers restoriing better than the others? After listening to all three I am a little confused. I f I upgraded to Retrospect 7.7 would the task be easier?

 

lee

[rhwalker]

My computer is running o.k. but slow now and I wanted to try restoring the essentials

That's not a problem to be attacked by restoring files, and there would be an issue as to specifying what you consider "the essentials" to be.

 

It would be better for you to troubleshoot the problem rather than restoring files blindly.

 

Russ

[leewilliams]

[color:orange][/color] :confused:

Russ. I have so many files in my backup, that it appears that too much is being backed up. My computer C: drive shows 42GB used but my backup size is 53GB.. Is that normal, or am I backing up too much? That is what has me confused. If I have to Recover, or Restore my computer I want to be able to use the backup if I can. What about ugrading to 7.7 and cleaning out and starting over?

 

Lee

[rhwalker]

Without more information, it's hard to tell whether your backup size is correct.

 

Remember, a backup preserves history, so multiple versions of each changed file are kept. If you've been running backups into the same backup set for a while, it's conceivable that your backup set could be terabytes in size even for a source drive of 42 GB.

 

The whole point of a backup is to be able to go back to any point in time.

 

Russ

[leewilliams]

[color:orange][/color]

 

Russ............Can I restore my backup to a folder (within my computer) and later restore piece by piece from the folder? I guess, I was just being alarmed, because I thought the backup was just backing up new or changed files and it seemed like too much was being backed up...

 

Lee

[rhwalker]

I believe that you are confusing "backup" (which necessarily means preserving versions of each file) with "sync" (keeping the latest updates of files in a folder).

 

The two terms aren't synonymous.

 

Step back a bit and re-read what I wrote, and compare with your post.

 

You may be wanting "sync" rather than backup. If so, then Retrospect is not the best tool for that job. If you want "backup", then understand what that means, and it will make your use of Retrospect much more pleasant.

 

Russ

[leewilliams]

Russ:

 

I think I am understanding a little now, but my question is this: If I have done a System Recovery (which I have had to do a couple of times) then do I still have to go through the process of installing missing programs, etc or can I use my backup to install everything that was working on a specific time and date? That is what I basically want, but need to know the easiset way to go about it, should I have to do another recovery or buy a new computer and transfer programs etc from my backup to the new computer....(I realize that if and when I upg to Windows 7, that a lot of the programs I have now, I will have no need for, but for instance I would like to retain most of the things I have put into "My Documents"

 

Does that make a little more sense?

 

Lee

[rhwalker]

The answer is complex, and, basically, is "it depends".

 

A System Recovery pulls back a system checkpoint that was made at a given instant. There may have been System Updates (or software updates for some applications) that changed applications from that point forward. Applications from the present may be incompatible with a System Recovery from the dark past. Some applications, particularly on Windows variants (as contrasted with Unix variants) reach into System Files (e.g., the Registry) and install keys to enable them to work. A System Recovery, depending on the date of the checkpointed system, might not have all keys needed, and it might be necessary to do an application install process to bring the system to a runnable state for those applications.

 

And the converse can be true - if you blindly install a current Registry set into an old system recovery, that might confuse things as well.

 

I really wish that there was a simple answer. Remember, you seem to be dealing with an unknown problem cause ("system runs slowly").

 

Basically, there seem to be two approaches:

 

(1) Go back to the complete system you had when things were "working right", including applications in place at that time, then bring it forward (carefully) by updates to the system and to the applications. One way to do this approach is to periodically clone your drive(s), save the cloned drive(s) away. A quick way to do this is to create a RAID 1 mirror, let it rebuild in the background, shut down services, split the mirror - instant copy.

 

(2) Let Retrospect take you back to a certain place in time. The problem with this is that you have to make sure that Retrospect backed up all of the necessary files (see the Recovery Disk method provided by Retrospect), and Retrospect (or any program) can have problems backing up open files. Also, certain database programs (e.g., mail servers, etc.) need to have a consistent database from which to restore, and the database can't be changing while individual files in the database are being backed up. For such cases, you have to stop the service, checkpoint (or clone) the database, restart the service, and have Retrospect back up the checkpointed database rather than the live database.

 

Backup of User data is much simpler. Backup of live systems, though, is complicated. I wish that there was a simple answer.

 

In the case of a server (or even a user system), many people use a two-pronged approach. Make a working clone of the boot volume (see RAID 1 mirror split above) before any software update, save that away so that you can bring the system back up in case of disaster. Then segregate all user files on a different volume (or volumes), back that up using incremental approaches (e.g., Retrospect) so that you have the version history desired for such files. It all depends on your backup policy. You do have a backup policy against which you evaluate your backup strategy, don't you?

 

If not, I suggest you see this web page, which raises some of the issues that need to be addressed:

What Should a Good Backup Policy Address?

Here's another link to the same page if that link doesn't work - some browsers have problems:

http://iwiring.net/#[[What%20Should%20a%20Good%20Backup%20Policy%20Address%3F]]

 

Russ