Best Alternative Program to Windows' System Restore?

Does anyone know of a better system restore program other than Windows' version? I've heard of Rollback Rx but I've read some questionable things and that's basically the only thing I've found.

I'm not looking for a hard drive mirror/full backup program in case my computer crashes. I back up weekly but this is a major time consuming process that I will only do if nothing else can be done. I just want a program that has a system image and can go back to a few days, few weeks, or to whenever I made a system restore point before I installed one program that makes my system a little buggy.

If there is something capable of doing a quick system restore (~20 minutes) instead of a COMPLETE hard drive wipe and re-mounting 2 TBs of files then direct me to it please. If there is a hard drive mirror/backup program that can do this too then I'm open to suggestions for those too.

I'm open to both Freeware or Paid for programs.

 

I forgot to mention I've read too many bad stories about Comodo so that's out. I'm okay with cloning my drive since I do this anyway but does Acronis or Easeus have a simple and quick restore option?

 

Great, I'll test that out then. Thanks for the suggestion.

 

Comodo Time Machine wasn't available on their website a few months ago, when I contacted them they told me they were no longer offering the product. Support may be difficult...

Acronis seems to be outstanding...

 

I use Acronis too for system backups, but I can't see that it's really an alternative to system restore, mainly because for ppl who keep their personal stuff on the C drive, as most do, restoring an Acronis image will remove any personal files added since the previous backup. System Restore doesn't do that.

There is another type of backup program that you might be interested in, one that takes snapshots of your system and can restore any snapshot in a few seconds plus reboot time. The best known is Rollback RX, but I used one called Wondershare Time Shuttle which was pretty amazing in the ease and speed with which it could restore your system. I only stopped using it because if you dual or multi-boot as I do, all systems get restored, not just the active one.

 

If you have some hardware you can't beat a Window Home Server, its cheap $50 (covers 5 PCs for backup) , and you can schedule back ups to run at night, it is a set it and forget it type system. You just install the backup client and setup the backup. This can take the place of your timely backup and you have a good image for system restores. Those other programs usually use up a bit of disk space for snapshots, then if it is the disk going bad you loose it all anyways.
Plus the server gives you shares, and multimedia streaming or you can install Servio and stream 'anywhere'.

I know it is not what you asked for, but I thought I'd mention it in case you didn't know about WHS.

 

Is System Restore a little bit underrated itself for this? If you're willing to reinstall your programs, just back up your D&S and count on System Restore for all other problems.

I've used this method and restored a system from the D&S backup (backed up every other day at 3:30 A.M. on a schedule) pretty quickly after a HD failure. I do admit that System Restore takes some time to actually grow to rely on.

Anyone know if there is a program that will schedule the automatic creation of System Restore restore points? I would add something like that in a heart beat...

 

Hey guys. I found this neat software today called Returnil.

Basically you turn on a "Virtual Mode" as if you were using VMWare or VirtualBox but using your current set up. From there you can install a program, visit a website, open up an email, etc that you might have a iffy feeling about and if there is some malware that charges in or your windowsexplorer starts stuttering and everything goes bonkers then you just do a restart and everything is back to the way it was before you enabled the virtual mode. Everything you installed, saved, etc will have completley vanished via a nice etch a sketch shaking haha.

There is a form of this on Acronis but this is just an added on portion of the program and isn't as fleshed out. Once you do install something in Returnil and it works fine and it's clean of viruses, then you can enable that program to access your hard drive outside of the sandbox mode. Also very handy if you forget you are on virtual mode.

This paired with Acronis sounds like a home run for me. Thanks for the help guys I appreciate it. I'm checking out Rollback as well but heard it can mess up your MBR but I'll test the trial and see if it's something worth keeping as well.

 

There are a few restrictions you have to abide by when using snapshot programs like Rollback, like no booting from boot disks that access the hard drive, no restoring of disk images and no defragging. Ppl who have hit trouble haven't stuck to the rules, but provided you do the program is just amazing. Someone also said it uses disk space but that's not an issue at all as it's just tiny, less than 1%.

So Rollback and imaging programs like Acronis aren't good companions at all, except that it's advisable to keep a disk image for the day the hard disk dies. It won't boot immediately after restoring an image but you only need to create a new MBR to rectify that.

I tried the Acronis Try & Decide feature recently. It did do what it says on the tin but it also removed my Grub style boot manager, so not for me but worth a try if you have a standard boot manager.

I do agree with the poster who said System Restore is under-appreciated. Despite being a long time user and tester of backup programs I still rely primarily on system restore. In your first post you said you didn't want a full disk image or mirror program, just a system imaging capability. Well that's an illusion - a system image is the same as a disk/partition image. Acronis cannot just restore your system files and leave everything else - it will always restore the entire disk or partition.

 

Finally, HERE is a useful utility for quickly recovering your registry after minor problems.

 

So to keep your data backed up using Acronis you can

a) Make regular and periodic images. You can keep a base image and the latest few images...

or

b) Make a base image, update when new apps are installed or updated and keep your data on external media, i.e. a USB disk

I'll admit to being a backup freak, having learned the hard way, and in addition to USB disk backup I try to keep several DVD copies of things that would make me cry like a schoolboy should I lose them.

To the old saying that sez you can't be too rich or too thin, I would add: Or have too many backup copies of data...

 

One small but important fact I'd like to add to this discussion. If you use several partitions on your hard drive, you must make certain that system restore is turned on all drives you need to have covered. It only covers the c: drive by default, I believe. But the point is to make sure that system restore is turned on. On the same point, I found out the hard way that some computer makers (Dell and HP among them) carve out a small partition on the main hard drive and place some system files on it. Your system restore is got to have that usually unlabeled partition included on it System Restore will also not work.

 

My vote goes to Keriver 1-Click Restore Free (keriver.com). Its saved my butt numerous times. Just recently, I had downloaded a nasty rogue program; 10 minutes and one restore later and it was completely gone. It overwrites your system drive and gives you a completely clean, fresh drive when finished.

Like any of these programs, its only as good as your most recent backup. It allows you to do differential, incremental, and full ("baseline") images, and of course it stores it on another drive (partition). It takes mine about 15 minutes to do the imaging, and about 10 minutes to do the restore. You can imagine from within Windows, or my preference, from outside of Windows. The restore of course is done from outside of Windows.

Short of what you name an image, and selecting the type of image, there are no options to confuse or get wrong. It simply restores your drive to the way it was before whatever problem you're going back to 'erase'. I do a full baseline image once a week, or whenever I do a major change to either the OS or my programs.