Tech Weekly

Why You Should Backup Your Registry

The registry is an important component of your Windows operating system, and may get corrupted due to unwanted storage of inaccurate or malicious registry keys. If you want to prevent this damage to your system, you must safeguard the registry by using a reliable registry cleaning tool. As automatic registry backup is not possible in Windows Vista, you may have to opt for a manual backup of your system’s registry. Let’s analyze the options, which would allow you to backup the Windows registry in Windows Vista:

Registry Editor Tool

You can use the Registry Editor tool to perform manual edits to your Windows registry. The tool enables you to make a backup of a part as well as the entire registry. You need to perform the following steps to back up the Windows Vista registry using a Registry Editor tool:

1. Select the Run command from the Start menu and type regedit, and then press Enter.
2. Click the File menu and select Export to display the File name box.
3. In the File name box, enter the name of the backup file.
4. In the Export range section, select All to back up entire registry, or to back up a small portion, choose Selected Branch and enter the name of the branch you want to back up in the text box provided.
5. In the end, select Save to create the backup file.

System Restore Tool

Other than using the Registry Editor tool, you can use the System Restore tool in Windows Vista, which allows you to rollback your computer to its previous working condition. You can use this option if your system crashes. The System Restore option is enabled by default on your Vista computer. The System Restore tool takes a snapshot of various system settings including the registry. Therefore, when you choose to restore your system by using System Restore utility, all related information returns to a state when the snapshot was taken. One disadvantage of System Restore is that it is not possible to back up and restore only the registry by using this tool.

Registry Cleaner Tool

If you want to go for a convenient registry backup, you can use registry cleaners. With the help of an advanced registry cleaner, you can perform quick and hassle-free registry backups. Again, you have an option to make both selective as well as full backups of your registry. A good registry tool allows you to perform registry backups and restore it with just few mouse clicks. As a result, a registry cleaner tool remains more popular among computer users.

Windows Complete PC Backup and Restore Tool

Windows Complete PC Backup and Restore is an important feature available on Business, Ultimate, and Enterprise editions of Windows Vista. This is an important tool that can help you recover your Vista system even during critical situations. If you want to make a complete Vista registry backup, you can use the Complete PC Backup and Restore feature. This would allow you to backup the operating system, installed applications, registry, user configuration, and data files. Just like System Restore tool, it is possible to make only a full backup of the registry by using this feature.

As you now know how to backup Windows Vista registry, you must now perform regular registry backups. To ensure complete safety, and peace of mind, you must save all your data not only in the hard drive, but also on some external devices, such as DVDs and CDs. This would allow you to immediately recover your system in case the hard disk of your system crashes.

Labels: Registry

I know that I have this happen alot. I will out of habit start clicking "X's" to close programs because my desktop and taskbar are getting to full. Or I am trying to re-center my thoughts and get rid of some clutter on my screen. And all of the sudden I have closed a program that I wanted to keep open either because I was still working on it or had not saved etc...

With today's find for Download of the day you can save yourself and your work. With GoneIn60s even when you click to close an application it delays its shutdown. It will hide the application from view as though it has closed but for up to 60 seconds you can right click on the lightening icon in the system tray, select the closed application and it will spring right back open.

This program is a must have if you are like me and have fingers that are faster than you sometimes think.

Labels: Download of the day

What do you see in the picture above? Look's like a bunch of seaweed and flotsam you say? Well believe it or not this is a picture of a cable landing site. A submarine communications cable specifically. Well I must admit prior to this week I had never heard of such a thing really. Of course I guess at one time or another I had heard of a trans-atlantic cable such as ones used for phone communications and such but I guess a bit naively I had thought in this day and age of the global Internet that such cables were a back-up and not something used heavily each day.

Boy was I wrong. In the past weekly several of these many submarine cables have been torn or disabled at sea effectively hindering a lot of Asia and the Middle East's ability to communicate both by phone and via the Internet. If you click the picture to the left you will see that the world is literally interconnected with these cables. Some of them spanning many 10's of thousands of miles. While like the rest of the Internet there is a certain amount of redundancy if enough of these cables were to be damaged the Internet could be severely crippled.

In the past week there have been 3 such crippling incidences which makes you wonder was it truly a bunch of ships dropping anchor in the wrong place at the wrong time or something more orchestrated?

As Alexander Harrowell pointed out this past week:

Alexander Harrowell remarked today on the message board of the North American Network Operators Group that these five points remain strategically important today, because of the landing stations where these international undersea cables intersect. The paths that international data traffic take today remain heavily rooted in the paths of colonial conquest of the 15th century British empire. "The similarity," Harrowell wrote, "is truly uncanny."

Labels: Editorial