Hi,
Following on from my question, If my computer was infected with spyware, and all the other bad stuff, how would I re-image my computer?
I am part of a domain, and the admin has disabled system restore, which always results in me having to go and get it fixed, when it would be a whole lot easier for me to just do a system restore.
Is there any software I can use to make a system restore point?
Any help would be much, much appreciated
FoxTint.
System restore is not going to remove an infection so even the thought of that is useless. Many people don't have system restore enabled on their machines because of the small amount of things it backs up. System Restore only really only operates on a very small number of system files and settings. Basically it backs up your registry and that is it. When using System Restore to go back for whatever reason you also shouldn't count on going back more than a couple days. New restore points are made a various times and system restore is meant for only very recent changes. It is only so large, once the disk space for it is filled then older restore points are wiped out. System Restore does NOT save your data, does not keep copies of your files, doesn't keep old versions of programs so expecting it to restore your computer to "clean" after an infection just isn't going to happen.
From Ask Leo
System Restore will allow you to restore your system's configuration to a previous state. In some cases that means that viruses or spyware will be "undone" as part of the process. But system restore does not remove infected files from your system, and you can quickly get infected again. It also does nothing to prevent new threats from arriving.
There are a number of good image programs out there yes, BUT they don't REMOVE infections either. If the infections are not removed then all the drive images in the world aren't going to fix anything, the infection will still remain and will only re-infect.
The best way to remove infections is to prevent them in the first place. As the old saying goes, "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure".
A good anti-virus program, a good firewall are the two key things to install, but also safe surfing is an absolute must. Proper and safe settings in your browser a must, a fully updated system is another.
But if you do get an infection, and chances are certainly lessened if you are running good protection, but if you do get something on there then using good scanner removal programs are the only way to remove infections and in most cases save your data. 1st would be a thorough scan and removal with your anti-virus program, after that a full scan and removal with Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware which is one of the best at this time, then one or two online scans and removals ESET Online Scanner is a good one.
But thinking that just imaging your computer isn't enough. Prevention is the key.
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