Solved Previous Versions not working-There are no previous versions available

[Rave79x]

Hi,

Whenever I try to restore a file (right click > "Restore previous versions") that I know has recently changed, I see:
"There are no previous versions available" on the file's "Previous Versions" tab.

I've been running Windows 7 x64 Business for a long time now, and I have never seen it available for any of my files.

On "System Properties" > "System Protection", it says "On" under "Protection" for my only drive - C:. I have been able to manually create a system restore point.

I have "Restore system settings and previous versions of files" checked upon clicking the "Configure" button. 10% (93.14GB) is dedicated to "Disk Space Usage" on that same dialogue box.

Some threads have suggested that not having administrative shares enabled can prevent this service and suggest enabling it by adding a reg key, which I have done.:
Administrative share - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

TCP/IP netbios helper service is automatically starting successfully.

Any ideas how I can get this working?

TIA,

 

[Imperfect1]

You might want to take a look at this tutorial for restoring Previous Versions in Vista. The process might be the same (or very similar) in Windows 7. How to Restore Previous Versions of a File and Folder in Vista

I can't help you with any other suggestions to get your Previous Versions working, but as a workaround in the mean time, if you need to repair or restore previous versions of any files, you can download the free app ShadowExplorer http://www.shadowexplorer.com/ which is an alternative program for Vista and Windows 7 for the Previous Versions feature that is not available for all editions.

ShadowExplorer latest version - ShadowExplorer 0.8

ShadowExplorer Manual (for Version 0.8) - http://www.shadowexplorer.com/news/11/55.html

 

[Rave79x]

You might want to take a look at this tutorial for restoring Previous Versions in Vista. The process might be the same (or very similar) in Windows 7. How to Restore Previous Versions of a File and Folder in Vista

Thanks. Here is the equivalent article for Windows 7. I read read them both, but thanks anyway:
How to Restore Files and Folders in Windows 7 with Previous Versions

I meet all five requirements shown below from that article:

Warning
Previous Versions Requirements

• Turn on System Protection for the drive(s) that you want to have previous versions of it's files and folders available.
• Volume Shadow Copy - Service set as default of Manual.
• Server - Service set as default of Started and Automatic.
• TCP/IP NetBios Helper - Service set as default of Started and Automatic.
• Workstation - Service set as default of Started and Automatic.

I can't help you with any other suggestions to get your Previous Versions working, but as a workaround in the mean time, if you need to repair or restore previous versions of any files, you can download the free app ShadowExplorer http://www.shadowexplorer.com/ which is an alternative program for Vista and Windows 7 for the Previous Versions feature that is not available for all editions.

ShadowExplorer latest version - ShadowExplorer 0.8

ShadowExplorer Manual (for Version 0.8) - http://www.shadowexplorer.com/news/11/55.html

Thanks - if I don't receive any more information, I will give that a try.

Can anyone else help?

 

[Rave79x]

Bump - can anyone help?

 

[cluberti]

If you've never made a system backup or have not made a system restore point, you won't have anything in the previous versions tab.

Previous versions of files: frequently asked questions

 

[Rave79x]

If you've never made a system backup or have not made a system restore point, you won't have anything in the previous versions tab.

Previous versions of files: frequently asked questions

Thanks for the reply, but as per my initial post:

I have "Restore system settings and previous versions of files" checked upon clicking the "Configure" button. 10% (93.14GB) is dedicated to "Disk Space Usage" on that same dialogue box.

When I view the 5 restore points, I have: x2 manual, x1 critical update, x1 install and x1 system (automatic) restore points.

I just did the following:

1. Upped the "Disk Space Usage" to 30% (280GB)
2. Created a manual restore point. Current usage showed as 139GB after taking the restore point.
3. Edited a Word doc and saved it.
4. Opened "Restore previous versions" of that file but it's still not showing any previous versions.

Can anyone else help?

 

[cluberti]

Do you have any defragmentation software running in the background, perhaps? Previous versions is based on VSS (the same thing restore points are), and anything that hits the disk in large chunks regularly can cause VSS to not work (unless your file system uses 16K clusters, which is not the default - you would have had to preformat manually at that size). I'm just trying to think of things that cause VSS to not do it's thing...

 

[Rave79x]

unless your file system uses 16K clusters, which is not the default - you would have had to preformat manually at that size.

No, I didn't do that.

Do you have any defragmentation software running in the background, perhaps? Previous versions is based on VSS (the same thing restore points are), and anything that hits the disk in large chunks regularly can cause VSS to not work

Yes, I do! I run Diskeeper (which I'm sure you know is an auto defrag tool).

As a test, here is what I did:

1. I went into Diskeeper and shut down all background defrag options.
2. I went into services.msc and stopped it from starting when Windows boots up, then I restarted.
3. I deleted all previous restore points.
4. I created a new, manual, restore point. Bizarrely, even though I have "Restore system settings and previous versions of files" checked, the usage went up to only 80MB. That just doesn't seem right.
5. I edited a Word doc and saved it.
6. I still do not see any previous versions.

I have 46MB of .docx files and 293MB of .doc files (and obviously plenty of other files types beyond those).

Any comments about the test I just did? I assume that takes Diskeeper out the equation temporarily?

I am assuming the 80MB is significant?

Can anyone offer any help?

 

[cluberti]

If you make a Windows backup, as that's the only other thing I know that allows previous versions, that might do it. I can't really explain it otherwise, honestly.

 

[notacyborg]

I have the same exact problem on my system. I have been searching high and low, but cannot find a connection as to what may be wrong. All I can think of is that I have something installed that is causing the problem, but I cannot imagine what. I tried asking on ExpertsExchange on Sunday night, but of course that was a waste of time since that site is horrible. If I find anything I will let you know.

 

[Rave79x]

I have the same exact problem on my system. I have been searching high and low, but cannot find a connection as to what may be wrong. All I can think of is that I have something installed that is causing the problem, but I cannot imagine what. I tried asking on ExpertsExchange on Sunday night, but of course that was a waste of time since that site is horrible. If I find anything I will let you know.

Thanks buddy - that would be great.

If you make a Windows backup, as that's the only other thing I know that allows previous versions, that might do it. I can't really explain it otherwise, honestly.

I'll stick my old hard drive in as a second drive, just as a test. I would be surprised if that didn't get it going. Will report back either way.

Thanks.

 

[bethel95]

Previous Versions are now working!

I'm happy to report that some digging around on the 'net has uncovered a solution (or solutions--I'm not sure which) that have enabled Restore Previous Versions (RPV) on my system. I'm going to try to lay this out for everyone, but realize that since I tried a number of suggested solutions, my summary may not represent the shortest path.

First, my relevant system specs (in case yours are different and this doesn't work, we may have a clue why):

• Windows 7 Pro x64 SP1 with all recommended patches installed (per Patch Watch)
• File and printer sharing on (which may be important)
• HomeGroup connections off (which may be important); I.e., set to "Use user accounts and passwords..."

The key seems to be that network shares (aka administrative shares or disk shares) must be enabled for RPV to work.

Here's my best guess at the simplest troubleshooting and resolution process:

1. Open the Computer Management control panel; expand System Tools\Shared Folders\ and select Shares.
2. You should see something like this, where all of your logical drives are present in the center-panel list with the "$" behind them:
   
   If you already see that "shares" exist for all of your logical drives: You can try going to the Network & Sharing control panel, selecting "Change advanced sharing settings," and verifying that "File and printer sharing" is on and "HomeGroup connections" is set to "Use user accounts..." (assuming that you're willing to live with those settings). After making any necessary changes, restart Windows, cross your fingers, and retry Restore Previous Versions from any logical drive that has System Protection enabled.
   If you already had those settings in place, skip to step 7.
   Otherwise, continue with step 3.
3. Go to the Microsoft Support article "Overview of problems that may occur when administrative shares are missing".
   Note: This article has a lot of scary things to say about possible malware infections; don't necessary assume that this is your problem. If following all the remaining steps in thie procedure doesn't restore your disk shares, however, you may want to consider this possibility and follow the recommended actions for detecting and removing malware infections.
4. Scroll down to the "Resolution" section.
5. Under "To verify whether a computer is affected by this issue...," follow steps 1 and 2.
6. After rebooting, restart the Computer Management control panel; expand System Tools\Shared Folders\ and select Shares.
   If your disk shares now exist, retry Restore Previous Versions from any logical drive that has System Protection enabled.
   If your disk shares still don't exist, or if they do, but RPV still doesn't work, continue with step 7 of this procedure.
7. Disclaimer: I cannot vouch for the helpfulness of this step (but I did it, so it may help you).
   Go to the blog article "Administrative Shares In Windows 7" and complete the second procedure (just below the
   
   ; what he confusingly calls "step 2") and restart Windows; note that you've already done everything else that he recommends.

Hopefully, if you've gotten this far, RPV is now working for you.

Why shares were turned off on my system to begin with is beyond me. Perhaps some other third-party utility that I've installed turned them off (I'll be looking for a consequential malfunction) or else a decision I made during the initial Windows 7 install is at fault (I did my own clean install on a bare drive). I'm sure that malware wasn't at the root of the missing shares on my system, as the significant behavior in that instance would be that shares wouldn't automatically turn on on system start-up, even after making the above changes (and that, as a former IT manager, I practice the system and network security philosophy of "it's not paranoia if they really are out to get you").

 

[Rave79x]

Thanks. I forgot to update this because I lost some of my bookmarks.

Even though I have Windows backup running, I still can't get previous versions to work, so I will work through your suggestions.

Thanks for taking the time to write everything out so clearly.

I'll post back this time with how I get on.

 

[Rave79x]

Finally got round to looking into this after a new install.

I followed your steps and have got it working! Thanks so much for taking the time to write this out. And sorry it took so long to reply properly.

File and printer sharing on (which may be important)
HomeGroup connections off (which may be important); I.e., set to "Use user accounts and passwords..."

Just to clarify to others, these settings can be found in:
Control Panel > Network and Internet > Network and Sharing Center > Change Advanced sharing settings

I will add that after getting restore previous files to work, I turned "HomeGroup connections" back to "Allow Windows to manage..." and restore previous files still worked OK.

Open the Computer Management control panel; expand System Tools\Shared Folders\ and select Shares.

The Computer Management control panel can be found be searching for those words in the start menu's search.

ou should see something like this, where all of your logical drives are present in the center-panel list with the "$" behind them:

An admin has removed a broken image link and I suspect it was from this section. Under System Tools > Share Folders > Shares, I see:

• One folder on c:\ root that I purposely shared.
• IPC$
• print$
• Users (on d:\Users, which is where all my user data is)

After completing the next action in the registry, I now also see:

• ADMIN$
• C$
• D$

Under "To verify whether a computer is affected by this issue...," follow steps 1 and 2.

Note to others, to change the value of an item in the registry, right click it, then select "Modify". I had to change the value of "AutoShareWks" to "1" on my system. The other item did not exist, which apparently is OK.

Step 7 wasn't necessary for me.

Note: in order to test, search for "Create a restore point" in the start menu search. Then edit a Word doc and save, then test the feature again.

Once again, thank you sir for the help.

@Admins/Brink: Does any of the above need adding to the tutorial: "How to Restore Files and Folders in Windows 7 with Previous Versions"?

I've had 3 recent Win7 installations using the same disc and this feature did not work once.

 

[zlot]

A lot of good stuff on this thread - hopefully the answer lies therein. However, being of a lazy type, I am going to try removing and reinstating previous versions on each drive. I do have a BUNCH of drives and sometimes find the share disappears for no apparent reason also, so there may be something to the posts, but I'm hoping for an easy fix. Having just glanced at the contents of this thread, I'm not sure if it was stated that anyone tried removing and reinstalling system protection....

 

[maxseven]

Bumping this old thread because after lots of searching the 'net, as usual it was SevenForums to the rescue! But for me, the solution was absolutely this easy, as described under Resolution here:

1. Open a command prompt, type net share, and observe you don't have ADMIN$ or C$ or any other of your hard drives shown there (this was indeed what I saw) which is your problem

2. Go into regedit and find you have zeros in the values below, change them both to 1 and reboot. Try net share again and see the missing values!

This worked straight-off for me, I can see all my "Previous versions" again, though it takes a nervous while to search all my Restore Points:

First backup your registry. Then click Start, click Run, type regedit, and then press ENTER.

1. Locate and then click the following registry sub-key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\LanmanServer\Parameters
2. If the AutoShareServer and AutoShareWks DWORD values in the LanmanServer\Parameters
   sub-key are configured with a value data of 0, change that value to 1.

I looked at another of my computers, which does not have this problem, and its net share is good, Previous Versions works, and it does NOT have the above two registry settings (at all). So why this much older, and much more used/abused computer both had these reg entries and that they were at wrong 0 I dunno. Dunno how it got this way but changing those fixed it and I don't argue with success.

 

[Rave79x]

Thanks for posting.

Agreed, if that works, it looks a whole lot simpler.

 

[Jcantdecide]

I'm new here and joined to to reply to Maxseven. I have been searching high and low for a solution for this problem and with an 8 second tweak and reboot you fixed my problem. Just wanted to say thank you so much, this problem has been vexing me for years on and off.This solution worked great and once again thank you so much for saving me many hours of aggravation.

 

[maxseven]

You're very welcome.

FWIW I joined sevenforums years ago when I noticed that many of my problem searches found good answers HERE. Now I try to contribute where I can although "I am not a professional"!

 

[a15995]

Hello!

I have trawled the internet for a solution for this problem and have tried everything. What worked for me was this:

http://www.sevenforums.com/network-...access-own-folders-through-network-share.html

Which is related to the RPV-error/administrative shares being unreachable.

If nothing else worked, try setting TCP Window Auto-Tuning to "disabled" (or at least not "experimental") as suggested in the above post.