Windows crash due to virus

You know I am going to disagree with the advice about back ups in most cases.

1) For 99% of the population there is no reason do any back ups as most people have nothing on their PC worth backing up so it is in my opinion a better option in a situation like this to just reformat and reinstall Windows from scratch as it tidies things up, you get better performance and you get to reinstall and repatch your software and up to date software and drivers is a good thing.

2) For those that do have things they wish to secure, you should never save it directly to your computers hard drive just put it straight onto an external hard drive or back it up to dvd/cdrom if you get into this habit you will not clutter your hard drive and need to spend days trying to kill any bugs you get.

3) One of the problems with copying things to a back up drive after you are infected is that you may well be copying the virus source as well only to copy it back when you restore.

So my advice just bite the bullet and reinstall Windows it is quicker in the long run.

You are correct Monty
And this is why I keep only the things I can't find anymore and still want on disk, and just redownload everything else.
I had a complete system backup once, I mean everything, all I did was put a new hard drive in and connect this thing to the computer, and it put everything back exactly like it was before, viruses and all LOL
Ever since them I have been doing it the way I do now .
 
1) For 99% of the population there is no reason do any back ups as most people have nothing on their PC worth backing up
Pictures!! ;)
ALWAYS backup your digital pictures to DVD or an external harddrive..

Almost everyone are using digital cameras now and many never make any backups of their digital pictures so a lot of the family history will get lost when (not if) the harddrive crashes if they haven't made any backups..
Been quite a few stories in the media here about many families who have lost 5+ years of "family history" due to HDD crashes...

I always backup my pictures to DVDs that I keep at work (in case of fire etc. at home), and to an external HDD so I'll always have at least 3 backups of the pics.. :smil:

Here's a few good and free adware and spyware removers by the way:
http://www.safer-networking.org/en/download/index.html
http://www.lavasoft.com/single/trialpay.php

Run them both in normal and safemode just to be sure...
 
Pictures!! ;)
ALWAYS backup your digital pictures to DVD or an external harddrive..

Almost everyone are using digital cameras now and many never make any backups of their digital pictures so a lot of the family history will get lost when (not if) the harddrive crashes if they haven't made any backups..
Been quite a few stories in the media here about many families who have lost 5+ years of "family history" due to HDD crashes...

I always backup my pictures to DVDs that I keep at work (in case of fire etc. at home), and to an external HDD so I'll always have at least 3 backups of the pics.. :smil:

Here's a few good and free adware and spyware removers by the way:
http://www.safer-networking.org/en/download/index.html
http://www.lavasoft.com/single/trialpay.php

Run them both in normal and safemode just to be sure...

I agree to a point, generally I automatically save all documents and photo's etc. to an external HDD when I then burn to a DVD but I rarely do more than one back up of anything except a few photo's and important documents, for the most part 90% of the photos taken are not worth backing up at all so between sites like photobucket and a DVD that is more than enough to keep me happy.
 
In my house there is one standing rule about documents and pictures
documents go to the printer and files in the fireproof box.

Pictures go from the camera to either a disk or the printer IMMEDIATELY, then into the fireproof box.

Videos fall under the picture category.

Everythingh else can be redownloaded or reinstalled from the original install disks.
 
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