Should System Protection be Enabled on a Data partition?

Some very useful tutorials there kado,

I've now got ffs set for versioning now, very useful feature.

I was just wondering what the option for "Symbolic Link Handling" actually does? I've left it set to exclude. Not exactly sure what symbolic links are!

I'm with Hoppy and Seavixen.

My data partition is not subject to System Restore and is not imaged at all. But it is backed up in several ways, all using a file-by-file method of some type (drag and drop to an internal, via automated program to an internal, drag and drop to a USB thumb drive, drag and drop to an external sitting in a dock, etc). I have never lost a file since I got halfway serious about backups.

Unlike some, I have had excellent luck with System Restore generally. I use it perhaps 10 or 15 times a year and it has failed to restore successfully only 2 or 3 times out of maybe 80 or 100 attempts. It works well enough that I have never had to restore an image of C.

I've never clearly understood why it does not work well for some users.

The only problem I have had after a system restore is a black screen and just a cursor after logon. If I then reboot into safe mode and reboot again the system restore completes ok. It's only happened a couple of times in the past few years.

It doesn't work too reliably anyway. I use Synctoy that permits me to back up what I want to multiple drives and it doesn't have the problem of propagating corruption - that, combined with checksumming data directories with cdcheck, saved a few of my photography images that were corrupted by a failing sector. In addition, the shadow copies are on the same disk and that doesn;t protect you from that disk failing.

kado897 said:

I don't think anyone is suggesting that System Protection is a substitute for backups. It is just another tool in the armory. I helped a guy here last Sunday to recover accidentally deleted folders using Previous Versions.

+1

Additionally, System Restore is not a substitute for images.