Fix, Recover, Restore and Repair Windows XP - Using the Xcopy and Robocopy Commands from the Command Prompt in Windows XP and Windows Vista to Copy and Backup Files

Copying files and making backups: Using the Xcopy and Robocopy commands from the Command Prompt in Windows XP and Windows Vista

You should always make copies of important files and backups so that you can restore them if Windows XP or Windows Vista have to be reinstalled after an unrecoverable system crash.

Windows XP and Windows Vista provide backup software and file-copying software that can be run from a graphical user interface (GUI) or from the Command Prompt. Click here! to go to the information on backups and backup strategies on this site. The command-line xcopy and robocopy commands are dealt with here.

Many users of Windows Vista have made complains about slow file-copying, particularly across a network, but also to external hard drives. Windows Vista Service Pack 1 (SP1) has improved matters. However, note that in both Windows XP and Windows Vista, copying files using the xcopy command from the Command Prompt will always be much faster than copying files using Windows Explorer.

To open a Command Prompt in Windows XP enter cmd in the Start => Run box. Then just enter xcopy /? beside the flashing underscore to find out what the full range of switches are that can be used with that command. You can then enter xcopy followed by the switch of your choice to run that command. In Windows Vista enter that cmd command in the Start => Start Search box. To find out how to use the xcopy command in Windows XP, enter xcopy + xp, as is, in the Google search box at the top of this page (with its Web radio button enabled). Note that Windows Vista has replaced xcopy with the superior robocopy, which has powerful backup options in addition to its copy options. To find out how to use the robocopy command in Windows Vista, enter robocopy + vista, as is, in the Google search box at the top of this page (with its Web radio button enabled).

Note also that you can add robocopy to Windows XP. It is part of the Windows Server 2003 Resource Kit Tools that are free to download from:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?...

When you have it installed in Windows XP (it is part of Windows Vista), you can copy the long help file to a text file by entering the command robocopy /? > robocopy.txt. I take it that the file is saved to the root directory C:\. You can use the Start => Search in Windows XP and the Start => Start Search box in Windows Vista to locate it.

You can also run it with a graphical user interface (GUI) instead of from the command line.

Utility Spotlight: Robocopy GUI - http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/magazine/cc160891.aspx

CONTENTS OF RECOVERING AND REPAIRING WINDOWS XP

Click the relevant link to go to that information

Introduction: Recovering and repairing Windows XP

Methods of recovering Windows XP

System Restore

How to create a boot (startup) CD/DVD for Windows XP

How to find out the cause of a Blue Screen of Death (BSOD) error message - Shutdown and reboot in Windows 2000, XP and Vista

How to perform a repair installation/install of Windows XP

Recovery by reinstalling Windows XP over itself and the consequences of so doing

Using the Recovery Console and the CHKDSK Hard-disk-drive Diagnostic Tool/Utility