Ever wish you could grab just one file from a PC backup rather then having to restore the entire backup? Now with Vista CompletePC backup you can!

Using Vista CompletePC Backup you can now create full backups of your entire hardrive to external media. (For instance a USB hard drive) for details on how to create backups take a look at this previous TLA article on CompletePC Backup After following the above mentioned article you will have an image on your external media: Browsing to the folder you specified you will need to drill down to the folder that contains the VHD file: Here is what that might look like:

Now that you know where the VHD is located, we need to get it open. Using either Virtual PC 2007, or Virtual Server 2005 you can add the VHD to the list of hard drives installed on a Virtual Machine you have already created. (a VM install of XP or Vista works best)

Now Turn on your VM as usual. Once the VM is running you should see the backed up data listed as a new drive in your VM's hard drive list. You can pick and choose the files you need to recover. Note: You need to make sure the account you are using to run Virtual PC or Virtual Server has read/write permission on the VHD file. If the account does not you may not see the drive, and you will not be able to mount it in Windows. Here is my CompletePC Backup mounted on Windows Vista, and WindowsXP: