System restore

kbz1960 said:

Yep that helps, so I have to remember what I changed to change it back or do a repair install I guess.

I'm assuming that a system image is the same thing you get when you do a system restore?

No a system image is like taking a picture of your entire hard drive... So if you changed settings backgrounds, colors programs, system files or anything, a system image will put it back exactly how you had it..

A system image is like a failsafe feature if nothing else works.. a system image will most likely fix the issue..(Let's say your hard drive failed and you bought a new hard drive, a system image will put the Operating system and all of your files and settings back how they were before old hard drive went out.. therefor you don't need to redownload, install or update anything...

A system image is only this great if you keep imaging your computer time to time.. I usually do mine once a week because I use and change alot of files a day.. Keep in mind that you should always save your system image on other hard drive (external or internal) as long as it is a different hard drive and is the same or more space than your current hard drive..

Hope this Helps..

whs said:

is the same or more space than your current hard drive

Just a little correction - if I may. The drive to which you image need not be the same size as e.g. your OS drive/partition (which could be huge with a lot of free space). It must be big enough to hold the footprint of the OS - and that probably for a few images. I found that a dedicated 250GB external or internal disk is a useful minimum for imaging (although I use 640GB drives because I prefer full images over incrementals).
An internal drive has the advantage of speed, the external drive is safer from malware because you can switch it easily off after the image was taken.

Thanks for the correction..:)