Shadow Explorer

[drmsucks]

This program is a front end to the Shadow Copy feature that is enabled in all Vista versions but only 'accessible' in the Business, Enterprise and Ultimate versions.

Shadow Explorer will allow access to the files that are backed up with each System Restore point to Home and Basic users.

Pretty new but seems to work well already. Painless backup for Vista users!

As far as I know, only works with Vista.

http://www.shadowexplorer.com/

[Carbon Dioxide]

So Vista keeps your files if you delete them? Intriguing.

[drmsucks]

So Vista keeps your files if you delete them? Intriguing.

Yep. Files only for Home and Basic - no programs.

It's my understanding that Vista, all versions, make incremental file backups, Shadow Copies, from time to time. I think that Home and Basic versions just do the 'Shadow Copy' when it sets a Restore Point, which is at least daily - the other versions may do it more often.

Shadow Explorer, the referenced program, provides a front end to obtain the data that's already there but M$ didn't provide access to on Basic and Home - I guess that the safety of my data isn't important to M$!

This is not a replacement for a proper backup strategy, mainly because the data is on the system drive, but will certainly help when you accidentally overwrite a file.