Returnil and Vista

Searching for something similar to ShadowUser for Vista has now led me to try Returnil after having mixed feelings about DeepFreeze.

I ought to mention that the problems I encountered with DeepFreeze were related to the fact that my computer wouldn't hibernate in 'THAWED STATE' (normal state).

With Returnil things looked promising insofar as it allowed the computer to hibernate in normal state although recovery was chaotic (I should have suspected then, something could go very wrong).

Disaster struck 2 nights ago when oblivious I was in 'frozen state' with Returnil, my computer entered the hibernate state alright, but never woke from it.

I mean trying to restart it was giving me an endless loop of black screens asking to try the last working configuration, the various safe mode booting possibilities that I could invoke in emergency situations. Needless to say nothing would unblock this kind of sudden death.

Well then, let's try ShadowProtect and its recovery CD: The CD started loading it's info, and I thought great in 10 minutes I'm back in business... The moment the restore wizard was about to start, a nice blue screen of death (how appropriate in this case) appeared, and I surrendered.

Pretty humiliating if you ask me to go back to the shop to get advice, after spending more than two years at Wilders to learn how to cope with this kind of emergencies. What happened I was told, the partition table got corrupted and even the Windows Vista reinstall CD would blue screen when trying to reinstall.

The bottom line: I personally will never ever touch the 'hibernate' function having a sandbox application installed whether it is in frozen or thawed state.

I also think that I will most likely buy DeepFreeze even though Returnil can't be judged on this alone, it was not pleasant at all what I experienced.

 

Have you tried GParted or a Linux-based LiveCD?

 

I'm pretty sure that having the time and the inclination one can get all the tools that can save you from a software mess-up. Most bad virus infections can be wiped clean with a reinstall of the Windows CD. When my Vista CD gave me a blue screen, I thought this is caused by a software that is supposed to protect my computer.

I can't be sure about it, but I suspect that ever since Vista came out there was a rush from a lot of companies to update their programs to make them compatible. A lot of these programs haven't been tested long enough because of time limitations. The hibernate function gives problems with DeepFreeze (the computer doesn't crash though) and Returnil (devastating with my computer).

DeepFreeze has acknowledged there is a problem, but they don't inform you in their delivery e-mail. Returnil created the biggest problem I ever had, I like to think it is only doing it with my machine and few others. I'd like to add that there aren't any other software that could conflict with the above mentioned names: No HIPS, antivirus, antispyware.

 

you might want to try http://www.localcooling.com/

I tried this with Deepfreeze, Returnil and Shadow Defender (?) albeit with XP

 

Thanks, an interesting possibility, but the reason I was trying 'hibernate' was only to test the functionality of my new computer. I use very often the 'sleep' function which is automatically enabled after 20 minutes of inactivity by default.