Dumb Question about System Restore

[Chuck57]

I was talking with someone today and they asked a question about System Restore that stumped me. Shouldn't have, since I've used it, but I went blank and am still blank.

This person downloaded some trial software a couple of weeks ago. The trial is over, they don't want it, and have uninstalled it. Now, they want to know, would doing a system restore to the day or week before they downloaded it completely remove whatever junk is in their registry? They used regseeker but there are always some things left behind.

I finally told them I thought that system restore puts your computer back to the day you choose, and software installed after that along with all registry entries is gone. Was I right?

[LowWaterMark]

Yes, that's correct. The one thing System Restore does well is set the registry back to the way it was at a particular point in time. If a person has no imaging or backup software, and isn't using something like Total Uninstall, or "Go Back" and similar products, (which are basically better versions of the "System Restore" concept), then setting the system back by using System Restore could be quite helpful.

But!! If they've made other system changes since then, installed other programs, changed things like IE trusted or restricted sites list, or any other things that are stored in the registry, those will be set back, too.

I've used System Restore as part of a software testing operation many times, but only over short time spans. ie. Set a Restore Point in System Restore. Install software. Play with it a while. When finished a few hours later, uninstall it using it's own uninstaller. Use System Restore to set things back as it was preinstallation. But, setting back to a couple weeks ago? Only if I was sure nothing else had been changed since then.

http://www.wilderssecurity.com/showthread.php?p=108840&#post108840

[Chuck57]

Thanks for the clarification, lowwatermark. I'm getting on the phone right now to advise him of all you said. I don't know the situation with his computer. Hopefully, he hasn't done anything yet.