Computer help forum: total reboot - Dell Xps One 2007

If I read your post well, you wanted to know about backup. The usual way, nowadays, is to copy the data you want to backup to an external hard disk and from that to a second computer. But if it says that your usb-connected whatever doesn't have enough space (even if it has, you forgot to tell about that small detail) that seems impossible.

Then your two options are:
1. Install a second internal hard disk and copy to that. Be sure to disconnect it during the system recovery.
2. Boot from a Linux live disk and try if that lets you copy your data to an external hard disk. Should work, even if it doesn't in Windows (unless there is a serious hardware issue).

Kees

sorry guys...when I do (or try) a system restore the computer says insert disc....I put in a cd (dvd) and it makes some noise for a bit and then it ejects the cd (dvd) and says that there is not enough space on it and to insert another...I have never done one before...so it's like - I click on restore and I think it says create a backup...this backup thing I guess is where I have trouble so I have never gotten to the end of a restore...what I am looking for I guess would be a suggestion for anything that would have adequate space to become a backup (which I assume means it will hold of of my present data making it possible for me to reinsert what I need after doing the total restore - of which I have never been able to do)
the last time I was in Best Buy the guys behind the Geek Squad table gave me the CDs(dvds) I now have and said that one of them should hold everything but they dont...do you think I am just not doing it correctly? I had both HP and Compact prior to this Dell and both of them were simple to restore...I thought this would play out the same way but for some reason it is making me nuts...I do not want to do a total restore without backup
I did not mean my ports are inadequate - just the little flash things you plug into the ports...there has to be something large enough to hold all the info after all this is an older computer
and when I try to just restore to an earlier date it only gives me a handful of dates...I choose one and go thru the process finishing with a restart only to have it say could not restore to this date even though it was one offered which is why I think it would be best to go back to day one - when my computer and I were friends

What you are doing is to try and do a backup of your complete system now, after all these years of using it. Sure, that is going to take quite a few DVDs since the regular single sided DVD holds about 5GB and your computer might easy be holding 20 to 50 times that much.

But what it sounds like what you think you want to do is a restore of your old computer, like the day it was new. If you do that then you will LOSE ALL of your current files. So a complete backup first is not out of the question. But you don't have to use the backup procedure built into Windows. You could just as easily (perhaps even more easily) just copy all your wanted files (pictures, songs, movies and documents) onto some USB massive external drive and then just do the complete restore to the original machine.

When you do the restore you then should install all the up-to-date security fixes, get a reasonable security software package, install all of your wanted programs, then re-install all of your files again.

Sure it is a lot of work. Next time don't wait so long to do backups.

As for doing the restore there could be one of three ways to get to that procedure.
One) if the computer came with Restore disks, good, use them. Or,
Two) if the computer required you to create your own Restore disks, then use them or create them and then use them. Or.
Three) Some Dells have a special hidden portion of the hard drive that you use a special key sequence when you are just booting up. Pressing those keys will get you to the procedure and prompting to re-image all the initial files back to the regular area of the drive.

Note: any one of those three procedures usually (not always, it depends upon how they make it happen) will wipe out all the files you have placed on your computer since it was new. So again, back up somehow all the files you believe you need before doing any restore.