Microsoft Rolls Out Windows 11 Restore Tool for 8.5 Million-PC Crash Fallout
Updated
Updated · ZDNet · Jul 9
Microsoft Rolls Out Windows 11 Restore Tool for 8.5 Million-PC Crash Fallout
2 articles · Updated · ZDNet · Jul 9
Summary
Point-in-time Restore is now available across Windows editions, letting users roll a PC back to a previous working state from the recovery environment after serious failures.
Microsoft built the feature under its Windows Resiliency Initiative after the July 2024 CrowdStrike outage sent 8.5 million Windows machines into crash loops and often required hands-on fixes.
The tool creates one full-system snapshot a day, keeps the three most recent copies, and uses 2% of the system drive by default; PCs with drives of 200 GB or more get it turned on automatically.
Restoring can take 30 to 45 minutes and may require a 48-digit BitLocker key, while files saved locally after the snapshot are lost unless they were backed up to the cloud.
The release follows Quick Machine Recovery as Microsoft adds layered safeguards meant to reduce the impact of future large-scale Windows failures.