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Windows 10 (registry directory) restore: current best practice?

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Okay, so I borked my Windows install by unintentionally importing another machine's registry into my registry. (Didn't know THAT could happen without my even trying to do it.) I have my Acronis cloud and local backups available, but I imagine this will take an alternative boot method. 

Last time I needed to do a complete restore, I found out after the fact that I should have used a different backup/restore methodology that was considered much more reliable. (Nice documentation there!) So, this time, I thought I'd first check in with the big brains from the forums as to the best way to go about it. 

Probably MVP PEBuilder Tool, right? (With indicated mods)

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Dave, you need to treat this recovery as if you were doing a bare metal restore and boot the PC from the Acronis rescue media in the required correct BIOS boot mode then restore back your chosen / most recent full backup.

If there is any significant changed data that has occurred since the chosen backup was created, then make an offline backup of that data using a Files & Folders backup from the rescue media.

The only other possible option that you could try (from the rescue environment) would be to restore just the registry hive files to replace the corrupted files but the risk in doing this is that other strange issues may arise as those hives come from an earlier point in time and won't include any changes that have happened since the backup was created!

I figure that as long as I have my full backups, I can try just restoring the registry. If it works, great. if not, bare metal restore it is. Or, perhaps, the "install Windows while saving data and apps" option.

So, if I'm going to try restoring the registry (registry hive files, as you say), I'm still going to have to use Acronis rescue media. In helping you choose between the Linux version and the WinPE version, it suggests using "Acronis bootable media." They're being weird here, but I assume this means the Linux version. 

Do you agree that the Acronis bootable media / Linux version is the best option, unless it doesn't work and you need to use the WinPE version for drivers and such?

Dave, I very rarely use the Linux version of rescue media except when dealing with very old non-PAE hardware.  I would recommend keeping to either the WinPE or MVP version of the same.

If you are going to try doing the install of Windows while keeping apps and settings, then this needs to be done as an in-place upgrade from within Windows starting from the desktop but may carry over any registry corruption!

Thanks for the WinPE advice, Steve.

Sounds like the Windows replacement may not do the trick. I can try the registry hive replacement, the in-place upgrade, and finally the bare metal restore, with the Files & Folders backup if necessary.

Much obliged.

 

Interesting. When I choose the "Simple" option that will choose the best method for my PC, it uses a third method: WinRE. Maybe that's the  "Acronis bootable media" they were referring to. OK, switching to the WinPE option.

Nope. I'm misunderstanding things. The WinPE option ends up with:

Bootable media type: WinRE-based media, 64-bit

WinRE is simply WinPE but using files taken from the RE - Windows Recovery Environment, instead of needing to install the Windows ADK and PE Kits at 6+ GB install size!

Ah, it all comes back to me now. Thanks for setting me straight.