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Windows System Re-set This service restores your computer to its original factory settings. Computer Healthcheck This service includes an antivirus scan and malware check.
In addition to checking the operating system regularly and fixing logical errors and other problems , Windows 10 users are recommended to run diagnostics for hard disk drives HDD or solid-state drives SSD from time to time for monitoring purposes, so that they can always know if the storage devices are healthy and can avoid unexpected hardware failures that may result in a sudden loss of data.
However, we can still use such preinstalled tools as Command Prompt , Windows PowerShell and Performance Monitor to access the information based on the self-monitoring, analysis and reporting technology SMART that is available in most storage devices, and always know if the hard disk is healthy or not, ready for work or suffering from hardware problems. An important note. With the command prompt console, you have at least two ways to check the SMART data and see if there are any hardware issues with your hard disks.
Open the Command Prompt with administrator rights in any way you know. For example, click on the Start button in the lower left corner of your desktop, on the Taskbar and open the main Windows menu. Use the scroll bar or the mouse wheel to navigate the list of all applications installed on this computer, find and open the section Windows System. Under this title, find and right-click on the line Command Prompt. In the context menu that appears, click on More ; a new context menu appears, and the option Run as administrator is what you need.
In the Command Prompt window, type the following command for the operating system to check if the hard disk is having any issues, and press Enter on the keyboard to run the command remember there must be no quotation marks :.
Windows 10 will analyze the disk data and display the result in the Status column; in my case, all the storage devices are healthy. A bit of explanation. Here are the steps to take if you want to know the chances for possible failure of your storage device or to learn how healthy the disk is from the viewpoint of the operating system.
Just as before, you need to open the Command Prompt with administrator rights. Click the Search button fashioned like a magnifying glass on the Taskbar you can find it in the lower left corner of the screen to open the search panel. Type Command Prompt in the corresponding field. The system will run the search and the Best match section will show you the result you were looking for. Right-click on it and select Run as administrator from the context menu. Otherwise, click on the corresponding button in the right-side menu of the search panel, and the application will be launched.
Type the following command to read the SMART status data for the hard disks, and press the Enter key to run it make sure there are no quotation marks :. When the command is processed, you can see the result in the PredictFailure column. The Reason column may show a digit other than zero.
Step by step, here is what you should do to test your hard disk for possible issues. There are several ways to open the Windows PowerShell app.
The quickest one is to open the Power user menu. In the new window that opens, type or paste the following command to see if the hard disk is prone to failure, and press the Enter key remember there should be no quotation marks :. View the report, and pay special attention to the line PredictFailure. If it says FALSE , your hard disk is fine and there is no reason to worry about possible failures yet.
Similarly to the case with the Command Prompt, if the field Reason contains a value other than zero, you should ask the manufacturer for explanation, as the meaning of this code may differ depending on the actual manufacturer of the hard disk you are using.
If you see that the hard disk has a problem or a failure should be expected anytime, the best solution would be to start looking for a new storage device to replace the faulty one. Besides the two methods based on using the Command Prompt and Windows PowerShell apps that we have just described, there is one more tool to help you check the SMART data and detect hardware disk errors — Performance Monitor.
There is a number of threat-provoking actions that may potentially open the door to your operating system for a tricky virus:. Actually, there are just too many ways for a virus to get inside your computer, and the harsh reality of life is that they are getting more numerous and sophisticated every day. That is why an important limiting factor to help prevent virus infestation is to always use trustworthy antivirus software especially when you have just bought a new computer or completed a scheduled reinstallation of your operating system.
In theory, viruses share a similar algorithm of action. Being attached to a kind of carrier — be it a drive or just a piece of data circulating throughout a network — the virus makes its way into a computer device and infects it.
After successful infiltration, the virus may lie dormant until certain circumstances trigger its execution. This way, a virus remains invisible for a user and the computer shows no signs of virus infestation. When certain conditions are present, the virus begins its harmful activity by attacking system and user files, especially in computers within a certain network. As a result, its harmful activities damage the file system and operating system, change file names and even erase data which can be a terrible loss.
Summing up, it is evident that a computer virus can provoke major issues for proper operation of the computer and system services and result in loss of important data which may eventually lead to unwanted expenses.
That is why recovering files deleted by a virus attack becomes a significant task that requires special attention. This operating system features several built-in tools based on the backup approach which save user files in accordance with the user-defined settings. The Windows operating system cannot directly scan the computer for deleted or erased files and recover them.
However, the functionality of its integrated tools makes it possible to back up a selective list of files and folders and restore them at your command if the original data is lost. The operating system offers several methods to try that give users good chances to detect and recover copies that can be used successfully instead of the lost files. An obligatory requirement for using these backup tools is to have them configured and enabled in the Windows operating system.
If the Windows backup settings have been enabled previously, then you can restore date from such backup with the integrated system tools. There are different ways to access the tool for data recovery from backup.
For example, click on the Start button in the lower left corner of your desktop on the Taskbar, and open the main Windows menu. In the list of all installed applications, drag the slider down and find the section Windows System. Open the nested menu and select Control Panel from the list of available apps.
In the next window, scroll down to the Restore section and click on Restore my files. It will start a system-integrated file recovery tool working with a backup copy. In the new window, click on Search, Browse for files or Browse for folders and add the files you are going to recover from the corresponding archive. Choose a directory where to recover the selected files a new location or the original one and click Restore to accomplish the process.
This method of file recovery is quite simple and can be used to restore a single file or folder as well as an entire logical disk. To start it, use Windows File Explorer. Open it in any way you prefer, for example, by clicking on the folder-shaped icon in the Taskbar. In the File Explorer window, select the necessary section, folder or file, and right-click on it. In the context menu, select Restore previous versions from the list of available actions. In the Properties window, find the tab Previous Versions to see all previously saved files that the system created automatically based on the backup settings you have configured.
Choose the necessary files and restore the data you were looking for. Bear in mind, though, that this method restores the previous version of your data and uses it to replace the current data.
As this replacement operation cannot be canceled in any way, such recovery method should be used with caution. File History is a function to save previous versions of documents and other user files in the Windows operating system, and it enables recovering earlier versions of files after they have been modified accidentally, damaged, removed or affected by ransomware activities.
By default, File History in Windows regularly saves backups for all files from the folders selected by the user, and for the files from OneDrive cloud storage which are available locally on this computer, and keeps their older copies for an unlimited period of time. Users can restore various versions of files that can be viewed and recovered with the help of navigation buttons on the timeline. You can open the File History tool in a number of ways: from the search panel, from the Settings or from the Control Panel.
However, the easiest way to access File History of a certain folder or partition is from the Windows File Explorer. Open the File Explorer and go to the necessary folder.
In the Home tab, find the Open column and click on the History button fashioned like a clock on the background of a folder.
The File History window for this folder will open to show you numerous temporary copies of its files saved at different times and dates. Select the necessary copy of a file or choose all files and restore them by clicking on the round green button with a white arrow inside it — you can find this button between the other two buttons for switching between file versions.
A particular kind of Internet swindling that has become widespread recently is directly connected to encrypting user files by various malware and then demanding to pay a ransom for removing restrictions imposed on the use of the infected files and the operating system in general. This type of virus threats comes from malicious software classified as Ransomware.
Restrictions imposed on the operating system of a computer may vary by duration, have all kinds of additional requirements and is implemented in a number of ways. Based on the system restrictions that can be visually perceived we may recognize two types of malicious influence:.
There are many types of ransomware and unfortunately, there is no single methodology for recovering user data that would work each and every time. The general algorithm to eliminate a virus infection for all cases can be formulated as a series of steps:.
Some modern viruses may possess a combination of features that enable them to lock the computer and encrypt user data at the same time. That is why it is necessary to bypass the screen lock before you try restoring the encrypted files , and you can do it by starting the operating system in safe mode before you begin the recovery process. This way, you can prevent the virus from launching protective mechanisms which are intended to remove user data after a certain period of time. Immediately after recovery, you should save the files to an external storage device and clean the operating system with an antivirus.
In addition, it would be a good idea to format the disk that contained the virus. In some cases, you may have to reinstall the operating system as the viruses can damage certain system files or registry keys which prevents the OS from working properly. The best protection against ransomware is to backup important user data regularly and quite often, and to prevent virus invasions of your devices by keeping your antivirus software and virus databases always up to date.
If the operating system is already infected, user data can be decrypted after malware effects with a special tool which tries to identify the virus family; if identification was successful, the tool provides the user with a special file that can decrypt the infected data. On the Internet, you can use a free-of-charge web service where you can upload an infected and encrypted file or the file containing the demand to pay ransom and let the service identify the ransomware family; in some cases, this service can also help you decrypt the files if the virus family was identified.
One of such services currently containing information on over ransomware products and updated regularly is ID Ransomware. When you upload an encrypted file or a file demanding to pay ransom, the service will compare certain patterns in the uploaded data against the ransomware database.
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