Restore Point: A little peace of mind

Many of the computer problems that I come across would be relatively simple to resolve with a little foresight.  Easy to say but, like life insurance, it's not something you generally imagine you're going to need.  A recent problem with a system saw a blue screen and a mouse pointer but no fix could bring the windows installation back to life.  Ironically, even though its owner had sensibly installed a tape backup device in the computer and there were backups available to restore the computer to its pre-crash state, the particular tape drive and the Windows had a conflict and it was impossible to get the restore to work. 

So, here is something simple that you can do to provide a little insurance in the event that your computer crashes horribly and won't come back to life.  Create a 'system restore point'.  System restore point are generally created automatically by the computer when significant changes happen such as installing updates to Windows or programs.  However, it doesn't do any harm to create one of your own.  Bear in mind that this doesn't backup all your documents, pictures and such but important system files that will be needed if the computer ever needs to be brought back to life from the brink of electronic death.

To do this in Windows XP,

Open the Start menu
Open the Programs menu
Open the Accessories menu
Open the System Tools menu
Click on System Restore
Pick the option for setting a System Restore Point and click on the Next button
Fill in a name for the restore point so you can find it and click on the Create button
Click on the Close button when done

And that's it!  Even if you don't ever need to use this restore feature yourself it may be very useful to somebody else that's trying to solve the problem on your behalf.
 
Tony