Back Up, Restore Registry

Note: Print and keep this page, as you won't be able to read this if your computer won't boot.

How To: Manually Back Up the Windows 98/Me Registry

Make a backup copy of the registry using the following steps:

• Click Start, click Run, type scanregw, and then click OK.
• When you receive a prompt to back up the registry, click Yes.
• When you receive the "Backup complete" message, click OK.

How To: Manually Restore the Windows 98/Me Registry

Under normal circumstances, Windows is capable of detecting and recovering from registry errors automatically. If Windows is incapable of this, a previous copy of the registry can be restored manually. By default, five previous copies or the registry are stored. To restore one of these previous copies:

• Start your computer, press and hold CTRL, and then choose Safe Mode Command Prompt Only from the Windows 98 Startup menu. If you are running Windows Me, start your computer with the startup disk.
• At the MS-DOS prompt, type "cd\windows\command", and then press ENTER. Where windows is the name of the folder in which Windows is installed.
• At the C: prompt, type "scanreg /restore", and then press ENTER.
• Select the previous registry you want to restore, and then press ENTER. NOTE: A properly working registry has the word "Started" next to the date.
• When you receive notification that you restored a properly working registry, press ENTER to restart your computer.

How To: Use Backup to Back Up Registry in Windows XP/2000

We can use the Ntbackup (ntbackup.exe) to back up the registry.

• Click Start, point to All Programs, point to Accessories, point to System Tools, and then click Backup. The Backup or Restore Wizard starts. (Or type ntbackup  in the Start Menu/Run dialog box and click OK)
• Click Advanced Mode.
  NOTE: If the Backup and Restore Wizard does not start automatically, click Backup Wizard on the Tools menu to back up files.
• Click the Backup tab.
• On the Job menu, click New.
• Click to select the System State check box that is located under My Computer in the left pane.
• In the Backup destination list, click the backup destination that you want to use.
  If you clicked File in the previous step, type the full path and file name that you want in the Backup media or file name box.
• Click Start Backup. The Backup Job Information dialog box appears.
• Under If the media already contains backups, use one of the following steps:
      If you want to append this backup to previous backups, click Append this backup to the media.
      If you want to overwrite previous backups with this backup, click Replace the data on the media with this backup.
• Click Advanced.
• Select the Verify data after backup check box.
• In the Backup Type box, click the type of backup that you want. When you click a backup type, a description of that backup type is displayed under "Description."
• Click OK, and then click Start Backup. A Backup Progress dialog box appears, and the backup starts.
• When the backup is complete, click Close.

This back up procedure backs up the five system registry  hives (security, software, system, default, and SAM) in %windir%\repair. You can use the Recovery Console to restore the backup system hives.

How To: Recover When XP Won't Boot Due To Corrupt Registry

Follow these steps:
 

1) Reboot and press F8 when the Windows logo appears and select "Last Known Good". This will restore the system registry hives, if it works.

2) If that doesn't work, we will have to boot to Recovery Console and recover those five backed up files from \Windows\repair to \Windows\system32\config. Then after a successful boot, run System Restore and restore the latest restore point.

For this, follow these steps:

• Restart your computer and select the Recovery Console option from the list of available operating Systems. If your computer will not start, you can run the Recovery Console from the Setup CD.
• At the Recovery Console command prompt, type the following lines, pressing ENTER after you type each line:
  
      md tmp
      copy c:\windows\system32\config\system c:\windows\tmp\system.bak
      copy c:\windows\system32\config\software c:\windows\tmp\software.bak
      copy c:\windows\system32\config\sam c:\windows\tmp\sam.bak
      copy c:\windows\system32\config\security c:\windows\tmp\security.bak
      copy c:\windows\system32\config\default c:\windows\tmp\default.bak
  
      delete c:\windows\system32\config\system
      delete c:\windows\system32\config\software
      delete c:\windows\system32\config\sam
      delete c:\windows\system32\config\security
      delete c:\windows\system32\config\default
  
      copy c:\windows\repair\system c:\windows\system32\config\system
      copy c:\windows\repair\software c:\windows\system32\config\software
      copy c:\windows\repair\sam c:\windows\system32\config\sam
      copy c:\windows\repair\security c:\windows\system32\config\security
      copy c:\windows\repair\default c:\windows\system32\config\default
  Type exit to quit Recovery Console. Your computer will restart.
• Click Start, and then click All Programs. Click Accessories, and then click System Tools.
• Click System Restore, and then click Restore to a previous RestorePoint.

The ability to run System Restore from the Recovery Console is yet to implemented by Microsoft. Until then you need NTbackup to create the backups of the registry. Or you can try the procedure in "How to Recover from a Corrupted Registry" in http://support.microsoft.com/?id=kb;en-us;Q307545 . This describes a process to extract the system hives from the SVI folder where SR keeps its restore points, if you don't have NTbackup system state backups.

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