Howdy Jim,
I am _pretty_ sure that a seletive restore is possible from all types of backup, desktop/flex/etc .
Although the methods for each are different.
Backup to desktop only backs up very little information, as to make it as little as possible so there wouldn't be that much to restore so a selective restore isn't really an issue as it would probably take long to do than a full restore from desktop backup. Thats the beauty of flexbackup, if you need to restore any single file you can, you just have to follow the howto, there was mention of a selective restore howto just the other day, I'm sure you'll find it if you search for it.
Cyrus Bharda