If Windows is running well, take the following steps to protect your system from a crash.

Please note that only the Administrator (in WinNT/2000/XP) has the ability to backup and restore the registry with WinRescue.

Make a WinRescue Backup - press the big Backup button on the Backup tab of WinRescue or use the Backup Wizard to backup the registry (to backup the registry, you must check the Registry item in Backup Preferences).  You should make WinRescue Backups regularly.

Make a Boot Disk - go to the Boot Disk tab.  Insert a blank diskette in the diskette drive, select XP/2000/NT Boot Disk from the dropdown box (this is only available and necessary in WinXP/2000/NT), and press the Boot Disk button.

Create a bootable diskette with DOS (see instructions for the Boot Disk tab) and insert it in the diskette drive.  Select DOS Boot Disk from the dropdown box (only in WinNT/2000/XP is the dropdown box available, in other versions of Windows, the DOS Boot Disk is created when clicking on the big Boot Disk button) and click on the Boot Disk button.

New Boot Disks don't have to be made unless you move the Windows directory or change to a different version of Windows.

 

 

When Windows starts to do unexpected things, the registry is usually to blame.  You can change the registry back to the way it was before by restoring to a WinRescue backup that was made before the problems started occuring.  Without a tool such as WinRescue, there is no way to restore or backup the registry in WinNT/2000/XP.

If Windows will not start, see the next section.

 

 

There are basically two things that will usually go bad with Windows:  one is the boot up process and the other is the registry.

If the tips below don't work, try the slower solution of using the Windows CD.  Most Windows CDs are also bootable CDs.  If all else fails, you can change the settings in BIOS (usually accessible by pressing Delete when your computer first starts) to have it boot to the CD drive first.  If Windows is on a NTFS partition, for security reasons the only way to restore is by using the Windows CD or the Recovery Console.  Using the Windows CD to start up the computer, the XP/2000/NT Boot Disk can be used as a repair disk or you can reinstall Windows.  Once you are in Windows, you can use WinRescue to restore the registry to the latest backup.

 

Boot up Process (only for WinNT/2000/XP)- if something goes wrong before the beginning menu is shown or immediately after an item is chosen from the beginning menu, then something is wrong with the boot up process.  Use the XP/2000/NT Boot Disk made in WinRescue to start up.  Once into Windows, use the Crash Fixer of WinRescue to restore from another type of crash (WinConfig).  These files can also be restored from another operating system, like, Win95, Win98, or DOS, using the DOS version of WinRescue, wnresq.exe.

If you still cannot get into Windows with the Boot Disk, there must be something wrong with the registry.  See the next section.

 

The Registry - if something goes wrong with the registry, Windows NT/2000/XP does not have a DOS system to fall back on, so if you cannot get into Windows NT/2000/XP, you will have to restore the registry from another operating system, use the Windows CD, or the Recovery Console (if you have installed it).  The Recovery Console does very little, so I do not recommend installing it.  If you have Windows 95/98/ME, you can use DOS or the Boot Disk (see below).

The DOS that comes with Windows NT/2000/XP (accessible by pressing F8 during startup) is actually run in Windows, so if Windows doesn't work, it's DOS will not work either.

If you have a DOS Boot Disk, you can use it to run the DOS version of WinRescue, whether Windows works or not.

To restore from another operating system, start that operating system and run the DOS version of WinRescue.  Restoring using the Windows version of WinRescue from a different version of Windows will not work (use the DOS version for the Windows version that WinRescue was on).

 

 

More detailed instructions for restoring the registry without WinRescue may be found in the Manual Restore for Win95/98/ME section of this Help file, if you are restoring Win95, Win98, or WinME or in the Manual Restore for WinXP/2000/NT section of WinRescue Help, if you are restoring WinXP, Win2000, or WinNT.