Some time ago I wrote a workshop about how to use Bart's PE to create a Windows recovery disk for Windows XP. It is a version of the Preinstallation Environment that computer builders can use to test hardware and install Windows.

Bart's PE is a great way to recover an unhappy computer and it also can be used with the backup software DriveImage XML. Some preparation is required before the computer goes wrong but this is time well spent in my opinion. You will need either a Windows XP disc or a folder called i386 with the Windows files in in order to create the disc.

Someone on our forums brought up the question of what to do with Vista, as Bart's PE does not work here. It's a bit of a shame but thankfully there is a recovery environment included on the Vista DVD.

I wrote a workshop for the Ultimate Guide to Vista Troubleshooting but here are some of the more important steps.

Insert the DVD into one of the optical drives on the computer and restart the computer. Press the space bar when the message ‘Press any key to boot from CD or DVD’ appears. The Windows setup software will load. Set ‘Language to install’ to English and ‘Time and currency format’ to English (United Kingdom). This should also change the ‘Keyboard or input method’ to United Kingdom, otherwise set this as well. Click on Next

Click on Repair your computer.

The Recover Console will then ask you to select which version of Vista to repair. This should be very simple as most computers will only have one installation. Left-click on it and then click on the Next button

The first thing to try is the System Restore option as the wizard works in exactly the same way as in normal windows. As Windows is not running from the hard disk this may succeed where it has failed in Windows.

The Windows Complete PC Restore is only available on Windows Vista Ultimate. If you have Ultimate this is a good alternative to DriveImage XML, although it will not save backups to a networked drive.

If neither System Restore or Complete PC Backup are available or work, there is still hope in the Command Prompt. This is the most basic way of entering commands but is still capable of copying your files off the computer and onto a USB key or hard disk (you will need to connect this before turning on the computer). It is also possible to start some Windows programs that are installed on the computer, type notepad to start this text editor for example. Some antivirus software may work and this may be able to repair damage from viruses.

A full list of the commands available can be found from the Microsoft website at http://blogs.msdn.com/winre but one really clever ability is that USB Keys and hard disks can be recognised by the Recovery environment.

On our computer Vista was on the C drive and the USB drive was detected as F
Type the following commands, pressing enter after each and without the quotation marks: ‘F:’ ‘md vistadocuments’ ‘c:’ ‘cd\users\[username]\Documents’ ‘xcopy c:\users\[username]\Documents\*.* f:\vistadocuments\*.* /e’

This will copy all of the files in the documents folder to the external hard disk. To copy and entire user profile leave out \documents or to backup all users copy from c:\users\