Diagnostic / Recovery Program Recommendations?

[MageTank]

I don't normally make requests like this, but after a recent fiasco with helping a friend recover data, I figured it would be best to consult others for some recommendations on diagnostic/recovery software. Long story short, I am looking some suggestions for software that can help diagnose hardware/software issues as well as assist with recovery should the OS be inoperable. There are no limitations in place, so even if it were to cost money, I am fine with that. Whichever software you consider best, I'll gladly take a look into. I am looking for software for the following:

 

• Data Recovery
• System Imaging / Drive Cloning / Data Backup
• OS Diagnostics (such as bluescreenview, Windows Update Troubleshooter, etc)
• Hardware Diagnostics (software to help diagnose specific pieces of hardware or a system as a whole)
• Safe Registry Cleaning Software (I distrust registry cleaners, but understand their necessity depending on the issues. One that supports creating backups of registry would be nice)
• Driver Update Software (Windows Update is fine for the most part, but can be quite slow for getting updates for other things. This is by far the least important, but figured I would throw it in if someone had a tool they recommend)

 

The goal is to create a drive that I can use to assist friends/family members with their systems and hopefully leave them with tools to prevent any mishaps in the future. Some of the family members I assist are out of state, so it's a chore having to drive 5 hours to fix a simple issue, especially when they are up in the mountains with extremely slow DSL internet making remote connections nearly impossible. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.