What Is The Difference Between A System State Recovery And A Bare Metal Recovery?

You may have heard of bare metal recovery and system state recovery services. They often try to sell you on recovery after a crash, and on backup services to lessen the consequences of a crash. This article explains what bare metal recovery and system state recovery are.

How to do a Bare Metal Recovery

The Bedroom After a Hurricane

There is a big hurricane that smashes up your bedroom. You look at the mess before a smiling insurance man walks up and gives you two options.

Option number one is that they can piece together all your stuff, fix it, polish it up, and put it all back the way it was. They will even find and clean the wallpaper so that it all looks and acts the way it did before the hurricane.

Option number two is that they can give you a different bedroom. The furniture will be new or second hand, and it may function a little better or worse than your old bedroom. However, it will be mostly the same with the same wallpaper, same furniture styles, same arrangement, and so forth.

This dilemma is similar to what you face when you have to choose between bare metal recovery and system state recovery.

Bare Metal Recovery

Like option number one, somebody will fix up your computer to how it was before the crash or the incident. The stuff you had on your computer will come back, the way your computer works will stay the same, and even the way your computer was set up (settings and such) will go back to how it was before the crash or the problem. The same hardware and software is utilized, so things are almost exactly the same as what they were before the crash/problem.

System State Recovery

Like with option two from the bedroom example, you can use your old hardware and software if you wish, or you can buy secondhand hardware and install it, or install new hardware if you wish. The hardware and software can change depending on your preferences. However, the way your computer is set up (the settings) and mostly all the software on your computer will return to how it was before the crash or problem.

Are There Problems to Look Out For?

In order to keep things simple, the examples and explanations above are overly simplified. For example, if you are attempting a bare metal recovery on a burned computer with no backups, then your success will be limited at best. In the case of a system state recovery, unless you have full backups, then some of the software you wish to install may be unavailable. In fact, some of the components of your old software may be missing or redundant, such as if your old software relied on “.NET Framework 3.5”, which is something that doesn’t come pre-installed with Windows anymore.

There are many other problems that may occur, especially if you do not already have backups in place. Doing forensic recovery where an engineer or piece of software tries to recover damaged/corrupted/lost data from a hard drive is very hit and miss. In short, if you want the option of bare metal or system state recovery, then you need to consider your backup options beforehand. If you need help with recovery and your backup options, then contact IT Gurus today.

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