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System Restore Group Policy restrictions

Published: March 19, 2005
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Symptoms

System Restore tab may be missing in My Computer Properties. Also, when you start System Restore (rstrui.exe), you receive this message:

"System Restore has been turned off by group policy. To turn on System Restore, contact your domain Administrator."

-or-

System Restore Properties page says disabled by Group Policy

Note: For a Windows Vista version of this article, see Restore point creation disabled by Group Policy.

Resolution

1. Click Start, Run and type regedit.exe and press Enter

2. Navigate to the following key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \ Software \ Policies \ Microsoft \ Windows NT \ SystemRestore

In the right-pane:

3. Exit the Registry Editor.

In Windows XP Professional, you can accomplish the above using Group Policy Editor as well.

1. Click Start, Run and type GPEDIT.MSC

2. Navigate to this path:

-> Computer Configuration
--> Administrative Templates
---> System
----> System Restore

3. Set Turn off System Restore to Not Configured

4. Set Turn off Configuration to Not Configured

More Information

Turn off System Restore corresponds to DisableSR registry value. With this Policy is turned ON, the System Restore tab may be missing in My Computer Properties. Also, when you run System Restore (rstrui.exe), you receive this message:

System Restore has been turned off by group policy. To turn on System Restore, contact your domain Administrator.

Turn off Configuration corresponds to DisableConfig registry value. With this Policy turned ON, the System Restore tab will remain displayed but the user cannot configure the SR options. It reads disabled by Group Policy.