After doing some research, I found KB articles from Microsoft which talked about the need to have Service Pack 1 (SP1) installed in similar cases.  Sure enough, once SP1 was installed and the system was rebooted, Windows accepted the system key and the system was validated.

I’m also guessing that this probably only applies to restore media that may have been issued prior to SP1.  For example, I know that if you purchase replacement restore media from HP, they include many updates that have been released since the system was first released.

I’m hopeful that Microsoft has corrected this problem in Windows 7 so that a fresh install doesn’t require consumers to hire a computer technican to complete a system restore.

To complete the restore process, I’ve been using Partition Commander, which is a great tool when it comes to quickly formatting and converting a volume to NTFS. 

While there may be various reasons why a computer is misbehaving or acting funny, such as an infected computer or the start of a hard drive failure, I always tell clients that this is an opportune time to back up data if you don’t already have a process in place, especially before the situation gets worse.

I cannot tell you how many times I have had to replace a hard drive and the horror on a client’s face when they find out they have lost everything.  I just can’t say it enough.  Backup, backup, backup.  And when I say backup, I’m mainly talking about all the content that did not come with your computer, such as pictures, music, video, and documents.

Personally, I try to use the 3-2-1 backup rule, which is basically keeping 3 copies of files on 2 different media types with 1 copy offsite.   The offsite part of the rule used to be tricky, but online backups have made this much easier now.

In fact, I recently became a Carbonite customer, which is an online or ‘in the cloud’ solution.  So far I’ve been extremely happy. I’m not trying to make this a Carbonite commercial.  There are a few other solutions out there too, such as mozy, ibackup, and idrive. I mainly tried Carbonite because I hear them mentioned on many of the podcasts I listen to.

And if you’re not sure you need a backup solution, just think about what value you would put on your data.  If you’re like me, I can’t when it comes to family videos and photographs.

So no matter what type of backup solution you decide to implement (external hard drive, flash drive, online, or a combination of all), don’t take the chance of losing data, especially when your computer starts giving signs that something is awry.

In my opinion and experience, cleaning a computer should be the last option, while restoring a computer should be the first option.  Hopefully this article will give you some insight and advice as to the differences.

When a computer has been infected by a virus or malware, I generally find that no matter how well the computer has been ‘cleaned’ there is always remnants leftover, which continues to impact the performance of the computer.  

In fact, most computer I’ve worked on that are 2-3 years old, are already running slow because of excessive programs being installed and unnecessary applications running in the background.  Catch a virus or malware and performance really takes a dive.

Restore Options

So let’s talk about restore options.  If your computer didn’t come with restore media, you may want to see if you are able to create it yourself using an existing application on the computer.  This would entail running a program that is supplied by your computer which will allow you to create the restore media using either CDs or DVDs.  In fact, regardless if you are having performance problems, it’s always a good idea to have a restore option for your computer.

Another option is to see if your computer has a restore partition on the hard drive.  A restore partition is a section of your hard drive that has been designated to contain just the data needed to restore the operating system and any programs that originally came with it.  To start the restore process from the hard drive, you probably need to hit a designated function key (the F1-12 keys at the top of the keyboard) when the computer first boots up.

Finally, if you don’t have the restore media or the option to create it, and your hard drive doesn’t have a restore partition, some manufacturers will actually allow you to purchase it.  Some are reasonable, others are not.

And if none of the above restore options are available, then it’s probably time to look into having the computer cleaned as well as possible.  

Restore Issues

There are some drawbacks to restoring your computer versus cleaning it.  First, if you’ve installed a lot of applications besides what came with the computer, they will all need to be reinstalled after the restore process.  This can be problematic, in that if you don’t have the application CDs or originally purchased them online, you may not be able to reinstall them.  This in itself may dictate the decision of cleaning versus restoring.  

The other issue is related to restoring is user-created content, such as pictures, videos, music, documents, etc.  Basically anything you created that did not come with the computer.  All of this content will need to be backed up prior to doing a restore, as most of the time it’s wiped out after the process.  

Some restore options allow you to restore without eliminating this data, but in most cases I would recommend doing what’s called a ‘destructive’ restore, where the hard drive is completely wiped clean prior to reinstalling the operating system.  By doing a destructive restore, you ensure that nothing is leftover from the previous installation, so viruses and performance issues are eliminated.

The final drawback of restoring your system has to do with operating system updates.  Chances are when you restore your system, updates that have been released since the system was brought home will need downloaded again and reinstalled.  While this seems like a lot of work, the payoff is increased system performance and knowing you have a completely clean system.

To recap, if you have the ability to restore your system; reinstall applications; and backup user-created content, I would recommend restoring a system back to its default state.  If there is no way to restore the system and reinstall applications, or there is too much user-created to backup, you may want to look into cleaning the system as best as possible. 

If you have any questions about this article, feel free to contact me and I will be glad to give you a free assessment via email or phone.

Recently, some in-house warranty customers have been asking me if the economy has reduced volume.  Right off the bat, I realized that in the majority of these calls this does not currently affect me because in terms of the computers I usually work on, I’m somewhat living in the past.

In other words, when it comes to making a claim on an extended warranty, in most cases, one year has already passed, otherwise the service claim would be made with the manufacturer.  

Secondly, I think you can just add-in the factor that computer faliures are going to be rare during the first few years of a computer if it’s maintained correctly.

So what’s interesting to me is what is going to happen in the next 2-3 years–will volume drop off?  If people are even buying computers as of this writing (I don’t know one way or the other), are they skipping on the extended warranty?  

Or is it the other way around?  Maybe this is the time to invest the additional cost for some assurance that in the future, especially if parts and/or labor costs rise, it will be taken care of.

Or perhaps this is a benefit to non-warranty work, in that in this future timeframe customers will have to make a decision similar to that of a used car.  Spend some money to fix their exising unit, or invest in a new one.

I’m sure warranty companies will know during these trying times what future trends may hold, but I doubt if this will trickle down to field technicians as to what kind of volume to expect.