Problems Making A Registry Backup...

i'm using Windows XP and i have Service Pack 1 installed...

okay so i decided to look into making a backup of my registry...

i started using this tutorial:

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;308422

first problem is, when i click on System Tools, there is no "BackUp" selection... Screenshot

so i could not begin the process, and furthermore i just had a few questions about this...

1) What do i need to store the Registry backup on... Simply another location on my computer or can i burn it ot a CD-R (no CD-RW's left)?

2) When watching that tutorial video on the microsoft website, i noticed you can also back up things like your My Documents folder... what exactly is this for? If i made a backup of this folder would it be as large as all the contents within the folder? I have alot of mp3's stored in this folder (over 7 GB's), so I dont understand how it's possible to make a backup of it without doubling the disk space i'm taking up on the hard-drive

Basically i just want to have a backup of my registry so i can run a program like Regcleaner... having browsed this board in the past i notice people always advice others to backup their registries before using RegCleaner or editing it...

 

Hi Robo, thx for the advice... i do'nt know all that much about computers, so should i select just the "System Registry" box? and also, can i just save this to any old folder on my comp and then burn it onto a disk?

my comp runs fine right now and without any problems so i'm trying to plan for the future and keep things this way... i figured i'd make a backup of the registry incase i ran into anything down the road...

 

k, i did that, and this is what the folder looks like:

http://www.angelfire.com/nj4/craca0/images/RegBackup.txt

for future referene, if i needed to replace my reg with this backed up one, how would i do that?

and also, would it be safe to run RegCleaner now that i've backed it up?

 

yes, thanks again...

 

I'm assuming you've got XP Home... Here's how to install Backup from your XP CD:

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?kbid=302894

 

As for backing up your my documents folder, yes, the backup will be huge, close to the size of the my documents folder (so, with your 7gb of music...it the backup will be at least 7gb, essentially)