How in the Tech

Bring back previous versions of files in Windows 7

By Adam Myers ⋅ April 26, 2010 ⋅ Tags: Backup, File Management

At one time or another you’ve probably deleted a file on accident, or in the case of a document, deleted a paragraph or three – saving changes and then realizing at a later date you need that selection back. If you maintain your backups diligently it’s likely possible to recover the paragraph from an earlier iteration. However this isn’t a full proof solution; the reality is if you do maintain backups you aren’t taking snapshots nightly which would probably be the requirement to recover in the situation above.

Windows includes a mechanism that may be of use in this scenario, it’s called volume shadow copy. Volume shadow copy is actually a subset of the system restore feature in Windows – the feature that allows you to rollback system changes to a previous state. The idea is extended into the file system and while it was introduced in Vista, it wasn’t available across all versions. The situation changed when Windows 7 was released however and all shipping versions includes this feature – titled Previous Versions.

In it’s default configuration, system restore and previous versions take daily snapshots of the system. Accessing previous versions of files and folders is greatly simplified from previous Windows releases.

From Windows Explorer, right-click on any folder or file you wish to rollback and choose Restore previous versions.

You will see all versions of the folder/file in question, as snapshotted by system restore. Select the relevant date of recovery – if you are unsure you have the ability to open the files directly from this dialog.

In addition to opening, you may also copy or restore to a separate location – generally my preferred method.

It should be obvious by now that this is a major life-saver but many users aren’t aware it’s even available to them. Another drawback perhaps, system restore uses just 5% of the hard drive in question. This doesn’t allow for much recovery as you would expect – with hard drives so large, and free space likely going to waste, it may make sense to increase the percentage allotted to System Restore.

To change the System Restore settings search for restore point in Windows 7 search.

Select the drive in question and click Configure on the launched dialog.

Here you can choose what is included when a daily system snapshot is created; either just system settings or system settings and previous versions. Ensure you have the second setting selected. Lastly, there exists a slider that controls the amount of disk space allocated to system restore. If you’ve got the spare space why not bump this slider up? It may just save your bacon in the future.