Recovery cards and their utilization in student’s laboratory Radoslaw Jedynak, PhD Poland, Technical University of Radom Faculty of Teacher Training Department of Mathematics jedynakr@pr.radom.pl

Basic Information The recovery card is a computer device which uses a small quantity of place on the hard disc to protect the computer against unwanted or uncontrolled changes. The recovery card is a powerful instant recovery system technology for: - school computer laboratories, - cyber cafes, - libraries, - companies, - etc.

Utilization of recovery cards It can protect our computers from: • file corruption; • unwanted modification; • accidental or intentional damage to the hard drives; • viruses; • hacking; • unwanted software installation; • formatting and deleting the hard disks

Examples of recovery cards Goliath 2 HD Protector http://www.goliath.pl/ Recovery Card Maintenance http://arkomp.eu/ BulwarkPRO Recovery Products http://www.divaco.com.my/

http://www.goliath.pl/

Principle of card working When the user changes a file or saves a file, the recovery card keeps the original file unchanged and saves the changes in a copy of this file. When the user accessed the file, the recovery card presents the modified copy. The file appears to be modified, but the original one is hidden and remains untouched. The recovery card only creates a copy of the modified part of the data, for example a few percents. For this copy the empty space of the hard disk is used. These saved changes are compressed and recorded in a special dynamic buffer of the hard disk.

Card installation First the driver of the recovery card must be installed. We could choose different type of install. There are Default, Office and Home, Cyber cafe and School, Diskless System, ezCopy Source PC and Ghost Source PC and Custom installation style. The driver must be installed with the item “ezControl Client” picked up into the student computer. The computers with installed “ezControl Client” will be controlled remotely by ezControl console. This special program must be installed into the teacher computer.

Driver installation

Configuration of card parameters After installation the recovery card shows a menu on the next slide when the computer is started. This menu appears before the operating system is started. The choices provided are to continue in: -"Protected Mode" is the working mode, which protects data on a specified area of the hard disk. -"Open Mode" is the working mode, which does not protect any data, which is useful for system installation and administration. -“Configuration" is to set some working parameters of the recovery card “Save Changes" makes all the changes made to files on the hard disk in protected mode permanent.

Hotkeys Menu screen

Configuration of card parameters If we select “Set Parameters” we can see the screen shown on next slide. There are many configuration items of card to set. We can set “Recovery Interval” from every 1-99 boot, every 1/2 day, every 1-99 days and every week or manual recovery. If we mark in the field of “protect CMOS”, it means the data of CMOS is protected. If we mark in the field of “protect BIOS”, the BIOS will be protected, otherwise, not protected. If we mark in the field of “boot from HD only”, it means the computer has to boot from hard disk. If we choose “Booting Display” as none, there will not show up Hot Keys Menu during booting up and the system will enter directly into operating system. If we choose Booting Display as hotkeys menu, the Hotkeys menu will appear when booting our computer with the countdown timer from 15 seconds to 1 second.

Set Parameters Menu screen

Program for management of recovery cards – ezControl EzControl is a LAN based administration tool for the management of recovery cards and the client computers on which they are installed.

The program offers two main categories of management functions: I. Remote management functions: Power Management; Change Computer Name and TCP/IP Properties; Distribute Files; Remote Commands; II. PC-recovery card settings: View Recovery Card Status; Set Parameters; Enter Protected Mode; Enter Open Mode; Save; Recover; Uninstall;

EzControl basic operation screen EzControl allows the administrators to view the current boot up mode of all computers and other system information, including: Computer Name, O/S version, IP address, MAC address and etc.

Some functions for remote management the chosen computer

Chosen options of ezControl program One of the most interesting functions offered by the program is power management. This item offers 3 functions: • Wakeup On LAN (remote power on); • Reboot; • Power Off. If we choose one of these commands we can wakeup all selected PCs at the same time, reboot or power off. In first case we must properly setup the client's CMOS.

Function “Change Computer Name and TCP/IP Properties” for chosen computer If we choose function “Change Computer Name and TCP/IP Properties” we can change the computer name and TCP/IP properties

Function “Distribute Files” for chosen computer With function “Distribute Files” we can copy files from one computer to another. The source folder must be shared, or just exist in every selected destination PC. All destination PCs must have permission to access the source folder. The destination folder must be in local PC.

Function “Remote Commands” for chosen computer Remote Command is a very interesting function . For demonstration purposes, it is possible to send simple commands to execute all executable files in the Windows system root of the remote PCs, i.e. cmd, regedit, notepad, etc.

Function “Set Parameters” for chosen computer With PC-recover card settings options we can change mode remotely from protected to open and reverse. For example if we enter protected mode all selected Pc’s will enter protected mode at the next boot.

Conclusion The recovery cards make it impossible to introduce the permanent changes by users in the computer systems without the agreement of the computer administrator. One of more popular cards of this type, in Poland, is Goliath 2 HD Protector (the product of computer firm “Moria” from Cracow). Cards from this family are used in the computer laboratory by the author of this lecture. One of the unique possibilities they possess is the function of their management through the net. They can control all computers equipped with these cards and connected to the LAN

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