How to Restore Vista Backup Files with an External Hard Drive

I have Vista Home Premium Edition installed in my system. Recently, due
to a problem with corrupted protected system files, I was forced to
conduct a clean re-install of the operating system.Before re-installing
Vista, I backed up my all data including softwares into an external hard
drive. After reinstallation I have attempted to restore the backup
files, unfortunately Vista does not recognize the backup source. When
turning on the external drive my system recognizes it, however when
navigating to Control Panel/Backup and Restore Center/Restore files from
backup/and then to Restore Files I receive a yellow yield icon with an
exclamation indicating that "There are no backups available on this
computer". Very odd. I cannot seem to restore my files from the
previous installation? I checked the external HDD to insure that the
files are stored, and they are there. Can anyone help me with this
problem please? Thank you in advance!

Forced"? Maybe, but it's hardly ever necessary, and is usually the
worst course of action.

Two points:

1. How did you do the backup? Was the backup made with the built-in
Vista backup program? How did you "check the external HDD to insure
that the files are stored"?

2. Note that backup of your software is useless. Except for a very
occasional very small program, all programs have entries and
references within the registry and elsewhere in \windows.
They can't be run under Windows unless they were *installed* in that
copy of Windows. Except for backups which are images or clones of the
entire drive, only backups of data files are usable.

I made the backup with the built-in Vista backup program and I have
checked the external HDD and it shows two GB with lots of folders and
files. I don’t worry about programs but I need to restore some important
files. Is there any possible way I can retrieve those files. I look
forward your help.

I have the same problem but, I'm afraid your reply wasn't helpful.

Because you are using the web interface and didn't 1) stay in the original
thread; 2) quote any of the original thread - no one knows what you're
talking about and thus no one (except possibly Blake if he sees this) can
help you. Most of the rest of us are using real newsreaders and we don't
see what you do. Please take a look at the information below and if you
would like help with whatever your "same problem" is, go to some of the
"How to Post" links and then come back with all pertinent details. We
really do want to help you but you need to give us something with which to
work.

Basically, this is what happened: my laptop was getting slower and it would
freeze once in a while. I then decided to format the HDD but before that, I
made sure I backed up all my data on an external HDD.

After reinstallation of the same OS I was using before (Vista Home Premium),
I couldn't restore my files from the HDD using the vista backup and restore
application that comes with the OS (that I had used to back up my data). The
application can't read the backup source.

I don't know whether I'm the Blake he mentioned, but I have no idea
what his problem is.

Assuming that both of you are using the backup and restore center under the
maintenance folder in the start menu. Click on restore, advanced restore,
restore using a backup from another computer. Try that and see if you can
navigate to the correct external drive to locate your backups.

I have the same problem as descibed by the guys. Basically I need to send the Laptop back to DELL to get a few things replaced under warranty. They asked me to back up the hard drive before sending it to them.

I backed up onto an external hard drive but I could not restore afterwards because the back up files could not be located. I moved the backup files to a folder on the hard drive but it still could not locate the files when using the restore function from the control panel.

Thats about as helpful as tits on a bull... i'm more interested in getting some help with my own issue.