FlyerTalk Forums - View Single Post - I got a virus. How do I 'restore' my computer to the day before
Old Jul 9, 2007, 11:23 am
  #11  
mbreuer
 
Join Date: Jul 2004
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Originally Posted by sllevin
Not sure to help in this situation, but I did want to mention backups again.

I'm a bit more geek than most, so this may not work for everyone -- but I dump an image of my HD to an external drive once a month -- and the drive can hold three images. Restoring an image will lose any new data you've saved -- but it will bring your machine back clean.

I had a laptop stolen last year on a Saturday; on Sunday I got another identical laptop we had at work -- Monday morning I walked into work with a fully operating machine. Since I don't store email on the laptop but on servers...I lost virtually nothing.

And as a mention for backups -- keep them separate from your computers for just those kinds of reasons. If the external drive had been inside my house, I am sure it would have gotten taken as well.

Steve
Yes - backups are hugely important. But... if you're trying to recover from a virus, especially a new one, it's possible that the backups are infected. This typically happens when a signature update & subsequent scan (usually weekly) find the virus. The infection could be as old as the oldest useful backup. So, use the backup, but scan it from a clean machine before applying it.
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