Windows XP crash, can't get data off drive

[mike_n_herrin]

Hey folks, I got a problem.

Windows crashed on me last night after i kept getting errors that my TV tuner card software was having issues (it had the same problem alot). I reinstalled the software (like i usually do), but just at the end it gave me a DLL error (ATI's multimedia center). Any little change in the my system seems to cause the ATI software to mess up. So i have to uninstall and reinstall it alot. But i've never had an error at install before, but it finished anyway and said to restart. So i did. It started to boot back up, but just after the splash screen i get a black screen and nothing more. Not in safe mode, command prompt, or safe mode with network support. I never get into windows the whole system just stops.

Ok so my first thought was a "repair" with the XP CD. XP setup doesn't give me the repair option. so i tried a bootcfg /repair option and that didn't work either. The XP setup program says there is an operating system on the drive, but doesn't give me the option of repairing it. in fact it doesn't even seem to say it's windows. it just says an OS.

Then i thought knoppix. i tried both version 4 and 5. And while i can burn data from the drive to a DVD, i can't copy data from my windows drive (drive c) to my other hard drives. T-rex talked me through some stuff last night, about mounting and unmounting and making read/write access available. But knoppix it wont do it.

Ok so i thought I'll dig out an old hard drive that i used prior to my current drive. Windows is up and running (since that drive still had it installed and it was from this computer). No problem. I can see all the data on the damaged XP drive (the drive isn't damage keep in mind, just the OS), but any files in My documents, etc etc wont copy. They are read only. I have a password set at windows login for that drive. So...how can i get the data off the drive to another drive? some folders are way 24 GB and burning piece by piece even to a 8 GB dvd would take a while. the data is in the windows folder so i'm pretty sure reinstalling windows will erase it.

i'm going to try setting the same username and password on this install of XP and see if that gets me past the read only...

if anyone has any other suggestions, let me know.
thanks folks.

 

[provenlogic]

i don't understand, you could or could not boot in safe mode?

 

[mike_n_herrin]

I can not get into windows via any method I know of.

I've now since tried the Bart PE disk that didn't work either. I went out and got (very lucky..sorta) a 320 GB Maxtor drive for 89 bucks. My intention was to format the drive with Fat32 so i could use knoppix to copy data from my damanged windows drive to any of my other drives. However the MaxBlast4 software that came with the drive says there is no Maxtor drive connexted and wont do anything. Although it clearly identifies all 3 of my hard drives (the new maxtor, and the two wester digitals). I then tried to format with just the maxtor drive and dvd drive pluged in and the same thing. it shows the maxtor drive, and the serial number and firmware, but when i go to partition it, it says there is no maxtor drive connected. I hate maxtor with a passion and have for years, but i figured this was too good of a deal to pass up.

...the saga continues

 

[provenlogic]

ok, that's a whole lot of confusing...

So when you hit F8 on POST and try to enter safe mode, what happens? At what point do you determine it won't start?

Have you plugged the Hard Drive (that your data is on) into another computer to see if you can access the data? Can you?

If you can't, then the problem is with your HDD, it may be toasted. If you can get to the data, then you either have a hardware configuration problem, or a corruption of windows. Try pulling out your tv card and see if you can load windows.

If all else fails, you can always put your new HDD in and load a fresh install of XP to it, plug in your old HDD after you've installed, and copy off all that data you need.

 

[mike_n_herrin]

I'm sorry guys. I tried to be short, but clear and it sounds like i've just cofused everyone.

I can't get into windows in regular mode, or safe mode with network support, or regular safe mode (that is by pressing F8 ). In any of those modes, it boots so far then hangs after a bit. There is nothing wrong with the drive. Windows got messed up during my last attempt to solve my TV tuner card issue.

i hooked up a drive i had in a box (which still had windows xp and tons of programs installed, lets call it Win2 drive) i could read the data on the "damaged windows drive" just fine (lets call it Win1 drive). i was able to copy the data at that point if it was outside of the documents and settings folder to my storage drives (lets call them Storage1 and storage 2 ), but not any file inside that folder. I believe this is because i had a login and password with the Win1 drive and the data is protected.

I can also read and open and use the data on the Win1 drive in knoppix just fine. however, because all my drives are NTFS partitions, i can't copy the data from one drive to another (I can copy, but i can't paste (write) it to another NTFS partition. If i understand the limitations of linux (aka knoppix), i could have copy and pasted data if one of the drives i was trying to copy to was a FAT or FAT32 drive.

i just not managed to get the new drive (lets call it Max1) formated and I've installed windows xp fresh. I then used partition magic to partition the drive and make the extra partition a FAT32 drive (lets call it Max2). Now i'm going to restart with knoppix and see if i can copy the data from the Win1 drive to the new Max2 drive.

sorry i'm typing in such a confusing maner. this has had me stumped all freaking day. it's now 2am here....

wish me luck!

 

[Franion]

Mikey, can't help you get into windows, but can give you one of these:

I know how you're feeling. When things go wrong for me I panic/freak out, my head spins and I can't think straight.

However . . . anyone who doesn't back up MyDocs to an external drive (and burn the really important stuff to DVD) regularly, definitely deserves a

But that's for later - have another for now.

 

[mike_n_herrin]

/\ thanks buddy!

the funny thing is, in an effort to make my computer more secure, i only recently added a password to login. i'd say 75% of the content of my documents folder was backed up (on four 8 GB DVDs!). i'm in knoppix now and am finally able to copy the data out of the my documents folder from the Win1 drive to the new FAT32 Max2 drive. 17 GB done only 4 GB left. then i'll have to wipe the drive and do a clean install of windows again. I don't want winodws on the same drives i use for storage. gosh and it's only 2:51 am....

 

[trawler69]

Hi Mike
Glad you got it sorted, how did you get past the read only / password problem? Was the fat32 format problem because xp won't format more than a small fat32 disk and you needed another formating prog?

 

[mike_n_herrin]

I had to format part of the new drive as FAT32 so that knoppix could save data from the Win1 drive to the FAT32 drive. Knoppix was able to get past the read only/password problem with no problem. But without a FAT or FAT32 partition to save the data too, I couldn't do anything with it. For example, knoppix would save the data to a DVD, but i had about 70 GB worth of files in the my documents folder. So even with 8 GB dvd's it would have taken a long time to save that data, plus a lot of expensive dvds. So once i got the partition formated to FAT32 knoppix copied the data right to the new drive. ....i guess i could have used windows instead of partition magic to format a FAT32 partition...but i didn't think about it. Live and learn.

 

[trawler69]

Thanks for that Mike. You were right not to use windows as it only formats small disks to fat32, I think because they want to lock everyone into NTFS. I found a program fat32format.exe which formatted a 250gig drive in about 10 seconds. I'll have to try knoppix on my password protected "my documents" folder.

 

[mike_n_herrin]

The information i found on the web said that XP would overwrite the My documetns, as well as documents and settings and remove any installed applications if when you tried to use the XP cd to restore your copy and it didn't give you an option to repair. Which mine didn't. i found this info here: http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/XPrepairinstall.htm and under warrning number 2 is where it tells you if "repair" isn't an option then windows will overwrite your files.

I tried to repair the boot ladder because i suspected that was what was wrong. i tried the "boot cfg /repair" command in windows setup and it appeared to work or at least i didn't get an error, but it didn't do anything otherwise.

I'm not sure what you mean by saying a password at login doesn't encrypted your data in the my documents folder...everything i read online said it does and that it's very hard to retieve that data if something goes wrong. what i was annoyed with is that since i knew the password why windows (the fresh install) at some point didn't ask for a password to change the attributes of the folder. I mean if you know the password you should be allowed access to the data. oh well. i did lose all my saved emails in outlook express and my bookmarks in firefox (although i have those saved on a USB drive somewhere). i have not yet erased or reinstalled windows on the "damaged" win1 drive so would anyone know how to manual retrieve those files? mainly the outlook express folders. outlook express starts on the new install, but i do't know if i can manually point it somewhere to get files that were not "exported."

thanks

 

[mike_n_herrin]

/\ lol well i didn't use the NTFS or built in encryption to my knowledge. But i can see the files are all marked "read only" and if i try to change that in windows it says access is denied.

...i'll check on that outlook thing. brb

 

[mike_n_herrin]

well the outlook thing worked as did the firefox thing. very nice. thanks noelie!

and t-rex, wow what a response. lol.

in each of the two new installations of XP pro that i've done today the "Documents and settings" folders are all marked as read only, apparently by default. when i have both drives (each has a new copy of win xp on it) together and i log into one, i can't copy the files from the "documents and settings" of the other windows installation. I checked just to see. I have a password on the first one but not on the second installation i did. so i don't know why the folder is marked as read only nor do i understand why i can't change that. trawler above might be having a similar issue with the password/read only access to his "documents and settings" folder. maybe he'll explain how he came to have the problem. i for one, will no long be saving anything in the "my documents" folder. live and learn.

And t-rex you'll be happy to know that i did leave about 10 GB on the new drive partitioned for linux. oh...i didn't think to look in knoppix to see if there was a disk formating utility that would format a drive, but like duh!

thanks again for everyone's ear and hugs and hopes.

 

[bigpimpboy14]

Hey guys, I'm in a similar jam, maybe you can help me out.

I had a Dell laptop that is no more. The hard drive is intact though. When I connected it to my desktop with the intention of retrieving everything I had on it, I get an error message when I go to my folder in "Documents and Settings". Yes, I had a logon password, and the folders and stuff set to "private", however, I know there's always a way around everything, my problem is just finding out how. How would I be able to go about retrieving my stuff off the hard drive?

 

[mike_n_herrin]

/\ well what i did was booted the computer with knoppix. you can get knoppix on CD or DVD so if your laptop will boot from a CD i would try and get knoppix version 4 or 5. t-rex said up above that he thought version 5 should have been able to read and write to another spot on an NTFS partitioned drive. knoppix is a free linux operating system, but you'll likely have to buy a book or linux magazine to get it. a good book that comes with a CD with version 4 is called "hacking knoppix" by scott granneman. knoppix both version 4 and 5 let me read the data and burn that data to a CD, but not to another spot on the drive since it was NTFS partitioned.

now i don't know how it would work since it's a laptop and I assume you only have one cd/dvd drive. i don't know that you'll be able to save stuff to a CD since you'll be running off a cd. but maybe you can copy and save your data to a USB drive if you have one. t-rex also mentions above that once in knoppix you can use "QTParted" in knoppix to repartition part of your drive to make it FAT32 so that knoppix can write to that. i've never used QTparted, so you'll have to ask t-rex how to use it.

if you have highspeed internet access and you know how to burn ISO image files, you can download an ISO file of knoppix 4 or 5 to a working hard drive, then burn that to a CD or DVD.

you can find knoppix here: http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=knoppix

just go down till you see the "free download" row and it has ISO in purple for whatever version you want to try.

So basically:
1. if your files are small i would suggest trying a USB drive so plug in your USB drive (if you have one)
2. boot with knoppix
3. your hard drive will show up on the desktop and so will the USB drive.
4. single click the hard drive and you should see the folders that are there and find the folder with the files you want. then right click the files you want and select "copy"
5. back on the desktop open your USB drive and past them in there.
or you could try starting up the CD burning software in knoppix called K3b, it's very similar to any windows based CD/DVD burning program so if you know how to use one of those you can use K3b pretty easily.

good luck!

 

[bigpimpboy14]

thanks mike_n_herrin. i'll give it a try and post back. =]

 

[mike_n_herrin]

I've had good luck booting knoppix on Dell optiplexes at work. at home with knoppix 4 and 5 my USB flash drives (both of them) show up with an icon that looks like a flash dive so it's easy to see it.