System Restore disabled by Group Policy

In case you find that  System Restore has been disabled by Group Policy do this.
Please note that you may have a virus or at least you had a virus in the past which disabled your system restore. In fact the virus does just to disable your interface with the system restore keeping it active for virus files storage.
In the most cases I found this problem on windows XP.

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:

* Delete the value DisableConfig
* Delete the value DisableSR

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.

Or perhaps you can review this
Control of System Restore function has been disabled by "Group Policy".
How do regain control?Go to Start>Run, key in gpedit.msc and hit ENTER. Under Computer
Configuration, expand Administrative Templates, expand System, then click on
the System Restore folder. In the right-hand pane, double-click on Turn off
Configuration and, under the Setting tab, click in the radio button beside
Not Configured. Click on Apply then OK.

Please visit the following Microsoft Knowledge Base website
and review the topic titled: "Method 1: Use Group Policy".

Note: You must be an administrator or owner, or have administrative
privileges to perform this task.

Undo the changes using Group Policy Editor (Gpedit.msc)

-or-

Open Registry Editor and navigate to:

HKEY LOCAL MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Wind… NT\SystemRestore

In the right-pane, delete the value "DisableConfig".
Close Registry Editor
Close and re-open the System Restore properties page.