"Undelete in the Home"

Complete Transcript of
Michael Materie – Diskeeper Interview
on Let’s Talk Computers
Host Alan Ashendorf
August 16 2008

Alan:  Consumers, in most cases are way too trusting, especially when it comes to their computer information. To discuss why this is a bad idea, our guest today is Michael Materie, Spokesperson for Diskeeper Corporation. Welcome back to Let’s Talk Computers, Michael.

Michael:  Hi, Alan, how are you?

Alan:  Consumers by and large have this tendency that we assume that since our computer is working, it's always going to be working. When it comes to losing their data, that’s a bad assumption, isn’t it?

Michael:  Absolutely. One of the most devastating things that a user can go through is loss of data.

Alan:  We buy our computer system and we think that the operating system, because it’s so sophisticated, is going to protect us. "It’s got System Restore – and so you don’t worry about losing your data because it has the Recycle Bin." That can get us in a lot of trouble, cant’ it?

Michael:  Yes, the operating system sounds like it has a lot of great features that will save you or the user and your data in every circumstance, but there’s a few gaps in there – especially when you’re talking about what happens in between say, a restore point or there’s other technology in there like the Recycle Bin that’s going to capture all the files.

Alan:  Well, let’s just talk about the "Restore," because a System Restore really doesn’t do anything for data, does it?

Michael:  The primary focus really is to make sure that if you get a bad driver or a bad software product that it makes it impossible to boot or makes it difficult to boot cleanly, that it will allow you to get back to a previous state where your operating system was functioning.

Alan:  I hear this all the time at the PC User Group, "My system crashed, but that’s okay, I can get it back by using System Restore and I just need to go back a couple of days and everything is going to be just the way it way." That’s not right, is it?

Michael:  No, it is really for the point at which something with the operating system, itself stopped working and that will get you back to a point where the operating system was working properly, probably prior to some type of software install.

Keep in mind as you go backwards in time, you are losing all the data, as well, that was on that computer system if that was on the same volume as your system that you do that kind of system-point restore.

Alan:  You have a Recycle Bin that comes with all the Windows Operating Systems and that is supposed to protect us, because when we manually delete something we always get this pop-up window that says, "Do you really want to put in the Recycle Bin?" What happens to the files that go into the Recycle Bin?

Michael:  The Recycle Bin does capture a good amount of files and if you delete something from your desktop it’s going into the Recycle Bin in most cases, unless it’s too large of a file. But obviously that’s a very common situation these days where people might accidentally delete a really nice video file and it just bypasses the Recycle Bin.

Alan:  But, when we install a brand new program, we don’t see that pop-up. It just installs all these new drivers and all these new DLLs and we never see that Recycle Bin pop-up.

Michael:  There are certainly some files that it’s not going to capture. Some of the key things you want to keep in mind are the way that deletions work in Windows is that when you open a new say, Microsoft Office file, say Microsoft Word for example, you’re actually opening up a second copy of the file. The original copy is not being modified; you’re opening a special temporary one.

All the changes you made are made to the temporary file and when you save that temporary file Microsoft does some fancy stuff in the background - taking your copy you’re working with and saving it to the disk and overwriting the name of the file of the original file.

Alan:  Because when we write something on top of a same named file as far as we’re concerned that file is gone. We can’t get it back under normal circumstances, can we?

Michael:  That’s one of the glaring shortcomings of the Recycle Bin. You open up a file called, "lettertoauntjane.doc" and you make a few changes to it and you save it again. Your earlier version of that file is gone; that may have some important things that as you are working with the document you deleted. Now it’s been saved over and the Recycle Bin is not going to get that earlier version of the file back for you.

Alan:  What makes it even worse because if you have the "autosave" set on say, Microsoft Word every couple of minutes it’s going to save a copy of that file and then when you look at the screen and realize that, "Oh, I’ve made some major mistakes and I really wish I could get something back that was earlier, I can’t do it because all it’s doing is saving the same file over and over again and you can’t get it back at that point."

Michael:  It’s another place where you see data loss. You can have data loss from a file being deleted off a system and not being recoverable, but certainly, just as you’re working with data, that’s where you see a great amount of data loss, is just the different iterations of versions of the data you’re working with.

Alan:  We also see all the time at the user group, where someone comes in and says, "My computer doesn’t work anymore; it’s kind of flaky." Well, what were you doing? "Well, I just installed this program that I got off the Internet and it should have nothing to do with my word processor or my spreadsheet, but it doesn’t work, anymore." Why would downloading one program have a major effect on another program?

Michael:  When you have a software install it may certainly overwrite dlls and delete those files. Some of us may run into and be aware of the term, "DLL Hell." There are conflicts between dlls, but certainly losing a dll is going to basically break the software program. Being able to recover those dlls can definitely save that new application from breaking.

Alan:  This is where your new Undelete really shines, because it captures everything that we want to save. As a matter of fact, if we install a brand new program we can actually save all the old system files and all the old drivers that were installed during the process of the program’s being installed. So, if we have a problem we can pretty well salvage some of this, can’t we?

Michael:  When we say that, "We can capture everything," that is a customizable technology. Obviously there are some files that are going to get deleted regularly from the computer that you really don’t need or want and probably would never need to recover – maybe cookies from Internet Explorer. So, there is definitely a way for Undelete to be custom-tailored to really fit the user’s needs.

Alan:  Unfortunately, when you buy a new computer, it only comes with a C: drive. It’s easier on what they call OEM’s or the “Original Equipment Manufacturers,” to just stamp a C: drive with everything you need. You really need to set it up for instance, a C: drive for your programs, a D: drive for your data, and then set up an E: drive for like extra throwaway files. There’s no reason in the world to either back up or try to recover temporary Internet files or temp files. These are throwaway files, aren’t they?

Michael:  I think you really hit the nail on the head, there. When we were talking earlier about System Restore is that you’ve got a laptop that came from a brick and mortar retail store around the corner, you are going to have a C: drive. If something goes wrong with the computer and you do system restore and go back two days in time, you’re going to lose a lot of data that you may need that was put on the computer during that period of time.

Alan:  Well, you are going to lose everything, because System Restore from the OEM standpoint or the System Restore CD or the F11 key that comes on some of the HP’s and so on – that actually says, "We’re going to put your computer back in pristine condition."

Well, what people don’t realize is that that means without any data that you have ever done. That’s just going to put the operating systems and the original programs, the trial ware and so on that you had when you walked out the door with your computer system. That’s not what you want, is it?

Michael:  No, not at all. That’s where you have definitely seen the growing popularity in the consumer space with a USB attached hard drive. That’s an excellent source for where Undelete can really protect your data. Keeping your data on that D: drive, as you suggest and running Undelete, specifically on those systems and keeping your data managed on those particular volumes.

Alan:  We really don’t want to save all the files that we have on our computer. There are temporary Internet files and there are temp files. Can we set Undelete so it can bypass those files by name or by location?

Michael:  Absolutely and both, to answer that question. There are actually some default settings in there so when you get this [Undelete 2009] product out of the box it’s not going to store cookies, temp files, Windows Operating System Log Files, and things of that nature. It’s very customizable and if there are things you want to keep there or if you want to them, you can add it by, "I don’t want to keep any files that are .tmp extensions," or, "I don’t want to keep any files from Windows System32 folders," - it’s very definable.

Alan:  But, I want to keep my log files, because I’ve been having some trouble with my computer system and the log files are very necessary to use in troubleshooting to find out what went wrong. Can I mark those so that they are saved?

Michael:  You can go into the Exclusion List feature and basically remover those particular folders or file extension types that you do want to keep.

Alan:  When you’re talking about the files that get put into the Recycle Bin, they only stay there for a specific point in time. Windows basically re-uses as much space as it possibly can. There’s really no rhyme or reason on how it does it; it just finds the first place that it can write on and the files are gone. If it was put in the Recycle Bin, those are gone, too.

Michael:  Those are going to stay in the Recycle Bin based the percentage of space on your disk. It’s pretty common for most users – you know, when we talked about using a USB attached hard drive. A lot of people need that, especially if you’re running a laptop at home. You’re going to run out of space very quickly. You’re going to need that extra drive or that extra space.

The Recycle Bin isn’t going to really function very well with respect to how it manages your deleted data. Undelete is going to give you the opportunity to move to volumes where there is free space; it’s going to be able to keep files based on a life expectancy. If you want to keep a file for 14 days or 21 days, you have a lot of flexibility in what you want to do with that.

You can also use a new feature in Undelete 2009, which allows you to basically set a percentage of the available free space on a drive and use that percentage of space to store your deleted data. You can adjust that and throttle it, so you could say, "Use 1% of free space," or you could say, "Use 80% of the free space to keep the data." You have a lot more functionality with respect to how long or how short you want to keep those deleted files.

Alan:  Michael, let’s just get a little technical for a minute. When we delete a file, we are really not wiping the file, are we?

Michael:  It’s basically saying that, "Hey, this is free space and if you want you can write a file here." That’s really what you’re getting when you delete a file.

So, when you delete a file, as long as it’s still considered a file, whether it’s in the Recycle Bin or if it’s in the Undelete Recovery Bin, which is a more advanced version that we put onto your computer with the Undelete 2009 Product, those files are still kept.

Once they get purged out of there and become deleted or for example the Recycle Bin didn’t capture the file, which is obviously the case quite often, that file and the space that it occupied is just going to be marked as "Free space," for the Windows Operating System to write a file in that space the very next file write operation that it needs to do.

Alan:  I see times where you try to undelete a file that you have accidentally deleted, but in the process of maybe shutting your computer down and booting it back up again, that file has become partially available and "partially available" is not good enough, is it?

Michael:  No, not at all. If it’s a JPEG or a video clip, you’re going to lose data and it’s not going to be usable as a file.

Alan:  What are we looking at for the price of Undelete?

Michael:  There are two products. If you do attach your computer to a network and want to recover files off a server, the Undelete Professional Product would be a good fit for you. It’s $59.95. I think what we would say for most home users, the best product is if they are just looking at protecting the data on their local PC or laptop is the Undelete Home Edition and that runs for $29.95.

Alan:  Where can we find more information about Undelete 2009?

Michael:  You can go to www.undelete.com

Alan:  Michael, we’ve run out of time. We didn’t even get a chance to talk about how the new Undelete 2009 makes it even easier than ever to restore all these files that have been safely captured. We'll have to pick up there, next time.

Michael:  Absolutely. Thanks, again, Alan.