PC Diagnostic and Recovery Tools Diagnostic and Recovery Tools

 “Safe Mode”  Floppy Boot Discs  Recovery tools  Partition tools  Memtests  Hardware discovery and test  System recovery boot discs  Booting from Recovery CD's/DVD's.  Most new computers no longer include floppy drives.  Set Bios to boot from CD, USB, Floppy, HD  Create Rescue Boot CD's that load virtual floppy images. Recovery Tools

 Recovery Tools   Partition Magic  QTPartEd  Windows Recovery Console  Installation CD's  Rescue/Recovery CD's  EBD Recovery Tools 2

 Boot Floppy's, Boot CD's/DVD's  OS & System Restore CD's/Partitions  Recovery CD's  Knoppix 3.7  Tomsrtbt 2.0.103  Damn Small Linux 0.9.1  INSERT 1.2.16  UBCD 3.1  UBCD4Win 2.3  Combo UBCD, WUBCD, INSERT  Bart PE 3032, Bart PE 3.12  911 Recovery CD's Linux Boot Discs

 Full Size Recovery CD's  Knoppix 3.7  Helix 1.5  Credit Card Size Recovery CD's  INSERT 1.2.16  Damn Small Linux 0.9.1  Tomsrtbt 2.0.103  0.96  System Rescue CD SCD_X86_0.2.15 Knoppix

911 Rescue CD

 Helix 1.5

 Recommended Procedures

 Have OS CD or Recovery CD's available.  Make sure you have CD's or DVD's to rein- stall all your applications.  Have a list of all your application installation codes or serial numbers handy.  Make CD copies of all your Documents, E- Mail, Pictures, Music and any other impor- tant data you can't easily replace such as financial or tax data.  You will need all of these in the event that there is a problem with your backup. Recommended Procedures 2

 Large hard drives have become very inex- pensive.  GB < $1. Bare drives = GB < $0.50.  Backup to an external USB 2.0 or Firewire HD or file server.  Do a virus scan and spyware scan.  Delete any unneeded or temporary files.  Empty recycle bin.  Full Backup at least Monthly.  Incremental backup at least weekly.  You should be able to completely restore your system with a couple hours work. Recommended Procedures 3

 Windows has some built in tools which may help you in the event of problems.  System Tools  Event Viewer – View Error Logs. May point to where to look for solutions to problems.  System Information – Displays your System Con- figuration Information.  Device Manager - Provides you with a graphical view of the hardware that is installed on your computer, and allows you to change your hard- ware configuration.  System Restore Points Recovery Procedures

 Last Known Good Configuration: Gener- ally this should be your first stop on your PC's path to wellness. Can be accessed as a start-up option by pressing and holding F8 in most cases. This is a really easy method to restore your PC back to its last known working state. Recovery Procedures 2

 Device Driver Roll Back: If you are pretty sure that this is a driver-related issue, then this might be the next logical move. When dealing with a problematic driver upgrade, this allows you to "roll back" the driver to a state in which the device was working properly. Recovery Procedures 3

 System Restore: A feature that's rarely used since experience has shown that many times it's just not enough, it is de- signed to allow the user to "travel back in time" to a point where their PC was running right. It is sort of like rolling back your PC settings to a previous point.  Norton Go-Back performs a similar func- tion and is probably more reliable. Recovery Procedures 4

 Recovery Console: Accessible from the XP CD, (sorry to those that have those cheesy "recovery" CDs) allows you to utilize a series of command line tools that can be used to help you recover from things like a messed MBR among other problems. Windows Networking has a great tutorial [ http://www.wown.com/j_helmig/wxprcons.htm ] on how to use this tool. Note: This often is a waste of time. Recovery Procedures 5

 Automated System Recovery: One of the tools of last resort, this procedure is great as long as you remembered to create a backup with the NT backup utility that comes installed on XP Pro and 2000 Pro machines. XP Home users can grab a copy here http://www.onecomputerguy.com/software/ntbackup.msi if they need to download it. For those that are not familiar with using this tool to create this type of system backup, you can use these directions http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/winxppro/maintain/asr.mspx thoughtfully provided by Microsoft. Recovery Procedures 6

 Reformat and reinstall from your backup.  If your hard disc has truly crashed, you can replace it and restore to the new HD with your backup.  As an absolute last resort, you can reparti- tion and/or reformat your hard disc and re- install your from the sys- tem or recovery CD. Of course, if you have to resort to this, you will have lost every- thing that's not backed up using one of the above mentioned procedures. Recovery Procedures 7

 Once you have become familiar with Knoppix, you can boot from a Knoppix CD and resolve many Linux and Windows prob- lems.  The recommended resource for this is the O'Reilly book “Knoppix Hacks”, by Kyle Rankin.  Other Linux “Live” CD's can be used to solve specialized problems. Some things you can do with Knoppix

 Windows Rescue  Fix Windows Boot Sector  Back Up Files and Settings  Write to NTFS  Resize Windows Partitions  Reset Lost NT Passwords  Edit the Windows Registry  Restore Corrupted System Files  Scan for Viruses  Download Windows Patches Securely More Knoppix Uses

 Browse Windows Shares  Create an Emergency Router  Create an Emergency File Server  Create an Emergency Web Server  Collect Forensic Data  Clone Hard Drives  Wipe a Hard Drive  Test Hardware Compatibility Knoppix Hacks

Knowing Knoppix

http://www.pjls16812.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/knowing-knoppix/ Recovery Procedures 8

 Many problems with hard discs and file sys- tems can be solved with the many tools provided on the UBCD, UBCD4Win and Combo UBCD CD's. It's worth taking the time to learn what these tools can do for you before you actually need to use them.  These CD's are constantly being improved and updated by their providers and can eas- ily be customized with your own favorite choice of tools. UBCD

 UBCD 4 Win

 Combo UBCD

 Links

 911 Rescue CD http://www.911cd.net/  Bart's Boot Disks http://www.nu2.nu/bootdisk/  DSL http://www.damnsmalllinux.org/  Helix http://www.e-fense.com/helix/  Insert http://www.inside-security.de/INSERT_en.html  Knoppix http://www.knoppix.net/  Puppy http://www.goosee.com/puppy/  System Rescue CD http://www.sysresccd.org/  Tomsrtbt http://www.toms.net/rb/  Ultimate Boot CD http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/  Windows Ultimate Boot CD http://ubcd4win.com/ Backup & Recovery

 Presented by: ● Josh Cockey [email protected] ● FPCUG Technology SIG ● January 4, 2005