Hi Gerald, Yes, you, are missing something. The tutorials on creating a system restore disk, or disks, and using them to restore your system explain clearly how to do it, without sighted help. The fact that a particular program doesn't fit the desires of every individual, doesn't make it impossible to use, or useless. There are a few terms being used here that are not inter-changeable. Backup, typically refers to your personal files such as data, music and videos for example. These backups are recommended by many computer professionals to be done before any significant changes are made to your system. System Restore, is nothing more than a way of returning your system to a previous state, such as the Windows System Restore. Creating a system restore disk, or disks, canbe easily done with Jaws, as the tutorialls on Image for Windows demonstrates. The advantage of using disks for this restore is that it doesn't consume space on your hard drive the way that Windows System Restore does. System Recovery, is typically used when the hard drive has crashed, and the physical drive has to be replaced. In this case, there would need to be a boot disk,and there are programs that will allow a blind-user to create one and they are also Jaws-friendly. Yes, some of these processes are quite technical, and not for the average user. The majority of computer users just want to know how to use the machine, not look under the hood. If a user is interested in looking under the hood, then they need to do what it takes to acquire that knowledge and skill. I backup my files every day, and sometimes more than once, easy and Jaws friendly. I have created a set of restore disks to return my system to a previous state at will, also Jaws friendly. I have read the documentation on creating an unattended install of Windows which can serve as a system recovery, but have not yet successfully created such a disk, but again, Jaws friendly. Whether it is a restore, or recovery, I would suggest to anyone, keep it small, and not bloated with unnecessary software. In most cases, a restore disk would be sufficient, since the mechanical failure of a hard disk is not as frequent these days as it was in earlier years. Just because there isn't a way at the present time for all of us to do these things the way we want to, doesn't mean that it cannot be done by a blind user at all. Anyone that has worked with computers for any great length of time, and in depth knows the familiar phrase: work-around. We have all had to earn our stripes, so-to-speak, we didn't get it over night. I hope this was helpful, if not, contact me off-list. Richard Q. Justice-website owner www.blind-computing.com ----- Original Message ----- From: "Gerald Levy" <bwaylimi...@verizon.net> To: <jaws-users-list@jaws-users.com> Sent: Monday, May 25, 2009 3:32 PM Subject: Re: [JAWS-Users] DATA BACKUP AND RESTORE
Brian, The problem I have with Drive Image XML (and apparently all other such disk imaging utilities), is that the restore procedure is hopelessly complicated. If you use this program to back up your system to an external hard drive, like I wish to do, you have to create a boot CD in order to restore it, which seems to be a difficult procedure for a non-techie. I am not aware of any tutorials that provide step-by -step instructions on how to create and use a boot CD with JAWS. In fact, there seem to be no tutorials at all on performing a system recovery using JAWS. From what I have researched, performing a complete system recovery in the event of a catastrophic crash requires a good deal of tech-savvy sighted help. How can a blind person use a boot CD without crucial visual feedback? I have listened to the tutorials for Disk Image for Windows, but they do not demonstrate the creation and use of a boot CD, nor explain how to back up to an external hard drive and perform a system recovery. The lack of such a tutorial suggests to me that even the exalted geeks on this list may be clueless on how to do this. So, to be perfectly blunt, it appears that there is really no simple way for an average blind computer user to back up his entire system. Everyone likes to talk about how important it is to back up your system, but nobody likes to talk about how difficult it is to restore it. Am I missing something here? Gerald ----- Original Message ----- From: "Brian Lee" <brianl...@charter.net> To: "JAWSUsers" <jaws-users-list@jaws-users.com> Sent: Monday, May 25, 2009 2:12 PM Subject: [JAWS-Users] DATA BACKUP AND RESTORE > Hello, > > A couple of weeks ago I wrote a post about the features of a free data > backup program called "Drive Image XML." It is available from > www.runtime.org. I need to make a correction to my post. One of the > things I said was that Drive Image XML would not backup to a network > share. The program will backup to a network place or drive. When in the > step for picking a backup location there is a graphic that is not spoken > by JAWS. Even if you read a current line JAWS does not indicate there is > a graphic but simply reads the default path for the backup. However, if > you route JAWS to PC, move one line under the edit control for the path, > press home key and then move a word to the left, you will find the > graphic. A simulated left mouse button click on the graphic will bring up > the dialog box for browsing and you can browse through the tree structure > to a network shared location. > > Another point is that when you first open the program, it seems to not be > accessible. However, the menu bar is accessible at this point and all > choices can be made from the menus. You can also use CTRL+B to start the > backup wizard, CTRL+R to start the restore wizard, and choices for > browsing and other functions are available in the menus. > > I also found another program that is JAWS friendly but it is not a free > one. The name of the program is "Active@ Disk Image" and it is available > from www.ntfs.com. It costs $40 but the license allows for installation > on three different computers. The purchased program has a boot disk > creator that is not available in the trial version. I used the trial > version yesterday and backed up just over 100 GB in a little less than two > hours. > > I wanted to make the correction about backing up to a network using Drive > Image XML in case some one on the list avoided trying it out based on that > reason. > > Take care. > > Brian Lee > brianl...@charter.net > For answers to frequently asked questions about this list visit: > http://www.jaws-users.com/help/ > For answers to frequently asked questions about this list visit: http://www.jaws-users.com/help/ For answers to frequently asked questions about this list visit: http://www.jaws-users.com/help/
