System Restore Tab Missing 5

[TunaBoy57]

Am running XP Pro on AMD 2200+, Via mobo, nVidia GForce2Pro, 512Mb Ram, lots of apps. Is setup as main server on lan for 4 pc's all different flavours of MSOS.
Having run setup from CD after too many BSOD's, I now find that the tab for System Restore is missing from My Computer Properties page. Machine is not creating any RP's, and there is only one file in the relevant directories on each of the three hard drives, "tracking.log". Is there a registry hack to reenable the page? Am I possibly a victim of a hacker? Am running ZoneAlarm Pro v4, and Trojan Remover 6 detects nothing. Norton Utilities says nothing about it as well. Only recently installed app is Laplink Gold 11.

 

[TunaBoy57]

Hi Guys
In order of posting since my last missive -
bcastner -
I had already tried that, and in effect isn't this the same as running in safe mode under the System Admin account. Just to make sure, I did this exercise whilst in safe mode under the Admin account - no go.
Er sorry, but that link doesn't work from my end.
Yeh tried the registry thing - even a bit of lateral as in enableconfig=1
Linney - Norton System Works configuration hasn't changed since the first install - I don't install the System Doctor component ever, as this has been the main culprit of many of the misadventures you speak of, and is a recognised resource hog, something I detest. But to test your theory, I completely uninstalled it after removing all protections, reboot - same thing, even after reattempting registry settings whilst uninstalled.
greyted - went there, seems irrelevant to me, as these settings are all in place as per the article.
Look guys, I gotta warn ya, this machine is startin to act like a pig now, I've lost my soundcard drivers a few times, which hurts as I'm also a muso and use it for recordings and practise. I just think that I'm gonna have to reinstall, after making sure that I've killed off the current registry.
I mean I can't afford to be patient anymore, my business relies on this computer, and I need to have it running to carry out my work. If other things keep dropping off like they have been over the fast few days, I'll.......

 

[jonlog]

If you have GoBack installed try uninstalling it and see if that fixes your problem.

Reason why I say that a friend of mine was having all kinds of problems with his XP Pro computer. Turned out uninstalling GoBack fixed his problems.

May not work for you but is worth a try.

 

[TunaBoy57]

jonlog,
have never had GoBack on the hard drive at any point.
To bcastner and linney,
Sorry guys, but things went haywire all of a sudden. Things like the soundcard (SBLive Value) giving up and only working with the WinXP drivers, lost the net, involving reinstalling tcp/ip, to get it back up, and numerous irql_not_less_than_or_equal bsod's, usually whilst on the net. So....I took the easy road, fdisk,format & feed. Now, with the same install disk as before, system restore is pumping points.
And now I'm here again to give a possible clue as to why. Not the answer, but something to think about.
Part of my normal setup routine on this machine, not my clients, is to restrict the amount of space for system restore by adjusting all the hard drive sliders on the relevant tab in system restore to 5%. I did this last night without really giving it a thought until this morning, when I remembered the advice about running out of free space on the drives. By making this adjustment am I somehow making the system restore service believe that it doesn't have any room? Therefore it develops the bug? My assumption in this was that system restore only experienced this problem if the actual hard drive in question ran out of space, not merely the portion assigned to system restore. If this is why, surely this bug would have been found before though. Who knows?
Thanks very much 4 the help though.

 

[bcastner]

TunaBoy57,

I am giving you a Star as I think you have done yeoman work about a very interesting problem.

I can assure you that your audience is quite a bit larger than Linney and bcastner.

And if your problem slipped underneath the radar of the users of this site, it is a noteworthy problem.

I can only repeat a point I made earlier, that System Restore is an important feature of XP.

Without intending to do so, your experience is going to help a lot of people. So, a star to you.

And one to add to Linney's well deserved thousands. I fully expect a clean install as you intend will "fix" the problem, but I remain unhappy that nobody, myself included, could find a more direct route to the issue.

I suspect that the file types you are using regularly are an issue; XP is fairly ambitous, perhaps too much so, to discover the attributes of every file. There are known problems with essentially graphics files, and I suspect unknown problems with mixed and audio-only files as well.

This should be sorted. Your user requirements are unusual, but not an unreasonable request for the Windows fielstore system.

I hope it eventually gets sorted for you, and all.

Best.
Bill

 

[TunaBoy57]

Have just read the post from bcastner, am humbly proud that you thought me worthy.
I intend to go back to the registry comparisons, now that the system is "unaffected". Its a good point about the inconsistencies/vagaries of attempting to be everything to everybody. I still believe that XP does it well under the circumstances. Due to my various fields of endeavour and the pcrepair/research business that I run, I am always calling on separate processes, and running the computer under so many different types of programs. For a system to put up with all this is commendable, but I also believe that by pushing some boundaries, greater things will come to the attemptors.
If I find something in my subsequent comparisons of the then and now, I'll be sure to post it back here.

 

[TunaBoy57]

Well, I'm no registry genius, (I'll leave that to the coders amongst you and the guys at MS), but this just may be the right direction.
Comparing the two registries in question, I noted a whole series of entries missing in the problematic one.
They lay under the following key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\EventSystem\{26c409cc-ae86-11d1-b616-00805fc79216}\Subscriptions
In all, there are eight subkeys missing with method names of
1) Backup Complete
2) Freeze
3) Abort
4) Prepare for Snapshot
5) Prepare for Backup
6) Request Writer Info
7) Thaw
8) Post Restore

Whilst there are, somewhat obviously, other differences in the registry due to a now-different software configuration, it is item 8 that catches my attention. Can someone tell me if these entries exist in their registry as they now do in mine?

 

[linney]

Yes they exist in a machine I checked.

I'm not sure if they pertain to System Restore they seem more connected with the Event System.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/d...y/en-us/cossdk/htm/pgservices_events_9i43.asp

 

[TunaBoy57]

ok linney
having read the article in the link, I'm still not sure that it excludes the possibility.
The Class subkey in the post restore key refers to a "VssEvent" which in different keys, refers to both ES.dll and EventClass.dll.
Are these dll's, by not being called upon, because the relevant keys are missing, then not calling the process which would trigger system restore, or its relevant tab? That is of course if they are in anyway linked to the process. I don't know dll's that well.
The whole reason that I am persisting with this line of enquiry is that on every occassion whilst the tab was missing, clicking on properties for My Computer, it would take ages to bring up the relevant page, just like it was waiting for an answer from some sub-process call. It now pops up instantly.
Its just an esoteric thing, but maybe worth pursuing still.

 

[TunaBoy57]

linney
its this bit that worries me (from the article in the link)
"Subscriptions exist independently from event class objects. You can disable a subscription by setting the Enabled property to False. A disabled subscription is not called by COM+ Events.

The three types of subscriptions are as follows:

Persistent
Persistent subscriptions reside in the COM+ catalog and are independent from the subscriber's lifetime. Persistent subscriptions survive a system restart. Generally, a persistent subscription is created when an application is installed on a subscriber's computer and removed when the application is removed. After a persistent subscription is created, COM+ Events activates the subscriber each time an event should be delivered to it.

When a publisher instantiates and makes a call on an event class object, the object looks"

 

[TunaBoy57]

also, this link, from a related page:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/d...y/en-us/cossdk/htm/pgservices_events_20rp.asp

To a non-programmer like me, it seems feasible in light of the explanations on these pages, that by not being called from a required subscription, the COM+Event, namely System Restore, fails to function.

 

[linney]

I have to admit the path you are going down, while interesting, is way above my head. I wonder if you could make use of a tool like Faber Tools to help you along the way. It is very useful in showing what programs are doing what. If you don't already have it, it might be worth looking at, and it is freeware too.

Some of the things it does are - (There are too many to list all).

List of all running processes
List of all modules loaded by a process
For each process are displayed the command line, PID, memory, number of threads, priority, version, description, Parent process.
For each module are displayed the date, size, ActiveX status, version, description.

Read about it here.

http://www.faberbox.com/fabertoys.asp?action=features

 

[TunaBoy57]

Hey linney
It's way over my head too, but like a good little soldier/terrier, I'm willing to chase it for a while. Please hang on to this thread, as your advice thus far has been incisive, to say the least.
Yesterday, I got brave and deleted the keys in question. Lo and behold, no tab. No lost points though, and system restore fired up from the menu item. So something else is the real crux. Just to prove something about this, I then restarted the system, and good ol' WinXP simply recreated the keys (but with different CSID's).
So maybe Faber Toys will point me in the right direction. Am downloading it as I type this.
Will post soon.

 

[linney]

A post in this thread by "831" made me think of your problem. It may or may not be connected.

Greyed-out STAND BY button (No HIBERNATE tab either)
thread779-596881

 

[APUK]

had the same problem on my PC...heres how i fixed it.

clicked 'show hidden files' on system partition (c
located a folder called 'system volume information'
checked all permissions for 'admin' (me) and 'system' users

i can now restart the system restore service and the system restore tab has reappeared...hurrah!

HTH
AP

 

[TunaBoy57]

The simplicity of Apuk's answer fits. This is something I didn't try directly. And can't now.
From what I now understand, (not much), this would probably revert the necessary registry settings to normal, as the security service would have to check the existence of the required permissions or create the necessary values in order to fulfill the change request. Maybe not a good explanation for why it happened in the first place, but I'm happy to put that down to my tinkering with third party system utilities.
The solution is often the simplest, most direct method, I guess. If it works.

 

[sykotik]

Jesus christ, I've seen worse problems get less posts than this. Good luck to you guys. I think I read somewhere back there that you did a repair, right? If not(and just in case you or others don't know how) just boot to the CD, once it loads all the files, hit Enter, on the License screen hit F8, let it search, and if successful you will hit R on the next(and final) screen. It should do little to no damage to any installed programs and drivers and is essentially a reinstall w/out all the reinstalling. Worth a shot I suppose. I work for Dell Inc, done tech support for quite a while, and this is a strange problem, especially since you've received so many useful posts.
Best of luck to ya!

James P. Grant III
A+ Certified Technician