'Winresque 98': A knight in shining armor for 'Windows 98'

JAKARTA (JP): You have just installed the new Windows 98 operating system on your PC after years of using Windows 95. And everything is great. But, you still want to use your existing version of applications software designed for Windows 95. You may ask your experienced colleagues about the risk of installing applications software designed for Windows 95 into a Windows 98- powered PC, and they will tell you they have had no problems.

Armed with this knowledge, you decide to give it a go ahead. So you follow instructions of one of your favorite applications software and proceed with the installation program carefully. After the installation is finished, it asks you to reboot your machine. Excited, you eagerly oblige. After several moments, a blue screen appears and displays a message that one or more of your system files have been replaced by an earlier version. Windows can not run properly without them. You have to replace files from a backup and restart Windows. After rebooting your PC for a second time, your system will still refuse to load Windows 98. If the problem lies in corrupted registry files, you can delete your current system .dat and user.dat files and then replace them with the registry backup, provided you have ran Windows Registry Checker earlier or you have copies of both files in another folder. But if Windows still refuses to load, you have a major problem.

At this point, you must be wondering if there is a software that can save you from grief like this. Fortunately, there is. Even though Windows 98 is equipped with File Checker and Windows Registry Checker for data protection and recovery, third party software usually offers more power and flexibility for configuring your backup and restore preference. Norton Utilities 4, WinRescue 98, Nuts & Bolts 98, Emergency Recovery System 98 and Cleansweep 4 are among them. I like WinRescue 98 from Super Win Software (http:superwin.comfrescue.htm) for its economical value, simplicity and ease of use. This software is more than consummate for both novice and recreational users.

One of the things that I like about WinRescue is its ease of use. The main menu is divided into five functions which are backup, restore, regpack, config and boot disk. To access the backup function you simply select the backup tab from the main menu and click a single button with the backup icon on it. Then you can give a name for your backup file. WinRescue automatically saves your registry files, initiation files and system files as its default settings. But you can add configuration settings and other files of your own choosing for your backup files.

For those of you who want more control over your backup files, you can click on the change backup preference button from the same menu and then assign your backup files to your chosen folder. You also have the option of selecting the media type to which your backup files will be copied to (hard drive or diskette). Another neat feature is the option of compressing your backup file. With this, you can select whether you want your backup files to be compressed from low to highest compression ratio. The highest compression ratio slows the time considerably for the restore operation to complete. In addition to those features, WinRescue also allows you to make daily backup files as temporary backup on the background, which is helpful in case you have heavily configured your system for five consecutive days and forgot to update your permanent ones.

But then we can not forget about the restore function. This offers to restore from permanent backup, temporary backup, spare registry, diskette and original registry. There is a wealth of choices to restore your Windows files and settings. And it even gives you an added security by allowing you to make a bootable disk in case your Windows refuses to load. All you have to do is just insert the diskette and restart your computer. After that WinRescue will load its main menu automatically and offer five ways to restore your backup.

But unlike other utilities software, WinRescue can not make or save an image of your hard drive boot record, partition table, root directory structure and CMOS information. Norton Utilities 4 offered those features with its Norton Rescue Disk and Image utilities.

Moreover, the regpack function from WinRescue uses Microsoft proprietary Registry Checker to fix a corrupted registry and to reduce the size of your registry files. Even though it is meant to make your registry files load faster, in one isolated incident my system locked up after I used it. So I resolve only to use it when I feel it is necessary.

And now for the final verdict. As a buying guide, this advises you to buy software only if you really need it. If you're just a regular user of MS Office products and you seldom install new software on your hard drive, save your money. But if you're one of those bravados who like to install a beta version of any new software or the latest games from the Internet, then this might just be what you have been looking for.