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Restore a previous version of a file with Shadow Copy
Despite best intentions, on occasion files or particular versions of files will be accidentally deleted or corrupted. Fortunately, they can usually be retrieved using the Shadow Copy service running on Windows 2003 (which is what runs on iSchool file servers) and now locally on Windows Vista as well.
If it is a particular version of a file you would like to restore, right-click the file and choose Properties. If you are trying to restore a file that was accidentally deleted, right-click on the folder that contained the file and select Properties. For example, if you needed to restore the file C:\stuff\important.txt, you would right-click on the C:\stuff folder.
After clicking Properties, select the Previous Versions tab. This will bring up all previous copies Windows has located. Select the one you would like restored, and click restore. The file will now be located where it used to be and in the version Windows was able to locate.
NOTE - although this Shadow Copy service works very well most of the time, there is no guarantee that it will work all of the time. If you have mission-critical files, we recommend that you take the additional precaution of backing them up to some media like an external hard drive or CD/DVD.
Last update: 2007-11-16 13:54
Author: Alice Tsoi
Revision: 1.2
