How to Make Recovery Discs for a Computer

Recovery disks can salvage your data in the event of a computer crash.

A recovery disk contains all of the important files and folders contained on your system, along with the operating system. Creating a recovery disk can help to ensure your computer won't lose data from viruses, hardware failure or other unfortunate incidents. Making a recovery disk is a largely personal affair, as only you will know which folders and files are important enough to keep, but there are some general instructions that should be followed in any event.

Things You'll Need

• Blank CD
• CD-burning program such as Roxio or Nero
• Boot Image Extractor such as Bart's Boot Image Extractor or ISObuster
• Windows installation CD

Instructions

1. Insert the Windows installation CD into your computer.

2. Double click on "My Computer," open the "Tools" menu, click on "Folder Options," select the "View" tab, tick off the box stating "Show Hidden Files" and uncheck the box stating "Hide Protected Files."

3. Right click on your desktop and create a "New" "Folder" titled "Recovery Disk."

4. Double-click on your CD drive letter and copy all files from the Windows installation CD to the "Recovery Disk" folder.

5. Go through your hard drive and copy any important files and folders to the "Recovery Disk" folder as well.

6. Open your Boot Image Extractor program and select the drive letter of your CD drive. Copy the boot image file (the "ISO" file) to your "Recovery Disk" folder.

7. Open your CD burning program and select the option to create a "Boot CD." Set the boot image as the "ISO" file extracted during Step 6, drag and drop all the contents of the "Recovery Disk" folder to the queue, and burn the information to disk.

References

• Elder Geek: Bootable Windows XP CD