Introduction

As the saying goes, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. This statement applies perfectly to using your Windows XP computer. Unfortunately, most users ignore this golden piece of advice even though they are well aware of how important it is to put this advice into practice. Ask yourself this question: if your hard disk suddenly crashed, would you grimace in pain, knowing all of your data has been lost, or manage a smile, knowing that you'll be able to restore your important files?

In this chapter, you will learn how to back up your important files so that when not if disaster strikes, you will be able to recover whatever you saved on your computer. And when that disaster rears its ugly head, you will see the options open to you for recovering your system back to its pristine condition.

The recipes covered in this chapter all make use of the utilities that shipped with Windows XP and are applicable to both the Home and Professional Editions. You will see how to use the Microsoft Backup utility to back up your important files as well as Registry. You will also learn how to restore your system back if you made changes that resulted in your system becoming unstable. And if everything fails, you will see how to manually resuscitate your Windows XP installation using the Recovery Console.