Is there a way to write protect folders on a hard drive?

Is there a program available that notifies you of EVERY file that gets written to your hard drive BEFORE the write takes place?

Is there a way to prevent hard drive files being changed without the user's permision?

Is there a CD bootable version of WindowsXP?

I ask all of these questions because this morning I was reminded of how fragile PCs are now. My desktop icons disappeared. It's a "minor" thing and one relatively easily fixed, but it should not happen in the first place.

Yes, I have virus scanning software with current definitions (TrendMicro came on my new PC which is less than 6-months old).

In the "old" days when people used floppy disks, there was a write protect tab which could be used to prevent changing the files on that floppy. Is there such a thing for hard drives which contain our precious operating system files and settings?

What about tools like Ghost? Once my PC is running properly, can I use Ghost (or something like it) to burn to CD my system setup so when the system corrupts itself, I can re-set everything back to the way it was?

thanks.....................matt

1. Right click on the folder, click properties, click read only. It will ask you if you want just that folder only, or that folder, subfolders, and all files in that folder and subfolders. That would be your choice. If you do set it to read only, that means you can't modify it. If a program uses files in the read only folders, and it needs to modify them, it won't work and cause some errors to happen, so be careful which things you set that to. Operating system files are by default set to read only, but that doesn't stop people from finding ways to hack protected files.

2. Can't say I know of a program, but if you are worried about malicious software, Trend Micro should be scanning files when they are modified. You may want to look more into that. It may be a setting you need to turn on within the software. Contact Trend Micro if you need to know specifically how it works.

3. If you set folders and files to read only, they can't be modified. Except of course if someone deselects read only or if you get a virus that can work around that. Or if you are boot to some sort of pre-install environment like Bart's PE that ignores permissions and file attributes.

4. I'm sure someone has created a live version of XP. However, it is probably not legal.

As far as cloning programs. I prefer Acronis True Image. It is as easy as cloning gets and it is in a nice, user friendly GUI interface.

Thanks. I'll take a look at Acronis.