REQ: My XP Crashed! - Can't Restore/May lose Data - Help!

[young@and.restless]

A friend of mine asked me to downloaded three pics from a web site to
JPGs on my hard drive, because he said he couldn't, which I then
attached to an emailto send back to him.

As soon as I clicked on send the system hung and I had to power off.

When I reboot now,XP only goes to the abnormal termination window to
give me the opportunity to either start in safe or normal mode. Safe
mode doesn't work at all, Normal mode merely restarts the boot
process.

I thought, well I might be able to reinstall XP in its so-called
restore mode, but when I try that it fails to do anything. If I were
to reinstall XP as a full install, I will lose the entire contents of
my hard drive of course.

Therein lies the rub. Mostly because anothrer friend recommended it,
I formatted the original XP install using NTFS format. Turns out that
makes the drive UNREADABLE unless you have XP, which I no longer have.
What a catch 22!

This might not be so bad except I stand to lose about a week and
half's work on my genealogy, because I can't copy the files off (I
can't read the drive). This would not have been true had I formatted
XP as FAT32 and not NTFS.

I am not sure what I should try to do.
Can anyone help me?



Thanks

[Rick \Nutcase\ Rogers]

Hi,

Follow these steps to do a repair install which should preserve your data,
settings, and programs:

1. Insert the Windows XP CD into your computer's CD-ROM drive or DVD-ROM
drive.
2. Restart your computer. If you have to, change the BIOS settings to start
from
the CD-ROM drive or DVD-ROM drive, and then restart your computer again.
3. At the "Welcome to Setup" page, press ENTER.
4. Press F8 to accept the Licensing Agreement.
5. Use the arrow keys to select the installation of Windows XP that you want
to
repair, and then press R to start the automatic repair process.
6. When Setup is completed, activate Windows XP.

Note that you will need your Product Key for this procedure, so have it
handy before you begin.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers aka "Nutcase" MS-MVP - Win9x
http://mvp.support.microsoft.com/
Associate Expert - WinXP - Expert Zone
www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/expertzone
Win98 Help - www.rickrogers.org

> wrote in message
...
> A friend of mine asked me to downloaded three pics from a web site to
> JPGs on my hard drive, because he said he couldn't, which I then
> attached to an emailto send back to him.
>
> As soon as I clicked on send the system hung and I had to power off.
>
> When I reboot now,XP only goes to the abnormal termination window to
> give me the opportunity to either start in safe or normal mode. Safe
> mode doesn't work at all, Normal mode merely restarts the boot
> process.
>
> I thought, well I might be able to reinstall XP in its so-called
> restore mode, but when I try that it fails to do anything. If I were
> to reinstall XP as a full install, I will lose the entire contents of
> my hard drive of course.
>
> Therein lies the rub. Mostly because anothrer friend recommended it,
> I formatted the original XP install using NTFS format. Turns out that
> makes the drive UNREADABLE unless you have XP, which I no longer have.
> What a catch 22!
>
> This might not be so bad except I stand to lose about a week and
> half's work on my genealogy, because I can't copy the files off (I
> can't read the drive). This would not have been true had I formatted
> XP as FAT32 and not NTFS.
>
> I am not sure what I should try to do.
> Can anyone help me?
>
>
>
> Thanks

[young@and.restless]

On Wed, 6 Aug 2003 19:55:26 -0400, "Rick \"Nutcase\" Rogers"
> wrote:

>Hi,
>
>Follow these steps to do a repair install which should preserve your data,
>settings, and programs:
>
>1. Insert the Windows XP CD into your computer's CD-ROM drive or DVD-ROM
>drive.
>2. Restart your computer. If you have to, change the BIOS settings to start
>from
>the CD-ROM drive or DVD-ROM drive, and then restart your computer again.
>3. At the "Welcome to Setup" page, press ENTER.
>4. Press F8 to accept the Licensing Agreement.
>5. Use the arrow keys to select the installation of Windows XP that you want
>to
>repair, and then press R to start the automatic repair process.
>6. When Setup is completed, activate Windows XP.
>
>Note that you will need your Product Key for this procedure, so have it
>handy before you begin.

Already tried the 'r' thing. It did nothing.

Thanks

[Rick \Nutcase\ Rogers]

Hi,

Install WinXP to a new folder, then take possession of the files you want to
recover. These articles can assist in this. The first contains a section
about installing to a new folder about 2/3's of the way down:

HOW TO: Install Windows XP [Q316941]
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=316941

HOW TO: Take Ownership of a File or Folder in Windows XP [Q308421]
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=308421

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers aka "Nutcase" MS-MVP - Win9x
http://mvp.support.microsoft.com/
Associate Expert - WinXP - Expert Zone
www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/expertzone
Win98 Help - www.rickrogers.org

> wrote in message
...
> On Wed, 6 Aug 2003 19:55:26 -0400, "Rick \"Nutcase\" Rogers"
> > wrote:
>
> >Hi,
> >
> >Follow these steps to do a repair install which should preserve your
data,
> >settings, and programs:
> >
> >1. Insert the Windows XP CD into your computer's CD-ROM drive or DVD-ROM
> >drive.
> >2. Restart your computer. If you have to, change the BIOS settings to
start
> >from
> >the CD-ROM drive or DVD-ROM drive, and then restart your computer again.
> >3. At the "Welcome to Setup" page, press ENTER.
> >4. Press F8 to accept the Licensing Agreement.
> >5. Use the arrow keys to select the installation of Windows XP that you
want
> >to
> >repair, and then press R to start the automatic repair process.
> >6. When Setup is completed, activate Windows XP.
> >
> >Note that you will need your Product Key for this procedure, so have it
> >handy before you begin.
>
> Already tried the 'r' thing. It did nothing.
>
> Thanks
>
>

[Graham Cutting]

Hi,
Can't you boot from the XP CD and copy the files off to floppy that way?

> wrote in message
...
> A friend of mine asked me to downloaded three pics from a web site to
> JPGs on my hard drive, because he said he couldn't, which I then
> attached to an emailto send back to him.
>
> As soon as I clicked on send the system hung and I had to power off.
>
> When I reboot now,XP only goes to the abnormal termination window to
> give me the opportunity to either start in safe or normal mode. Safe
> mode doesn't work at all, Normal mode merely restarts the boot
> process.
>
> I thought, well I might be able to reinstall XP in its so-called
> restore mode, but when I try that it fails to do anything. If I were
> to reinstall XP as a full install, I will lose the entire contents of
> my hard drive of course.
>
> Therein lies the rub. Mostly because anothrer friend recommended it,
> I formatted the original XP install using NTFS format. Turns out that
> makes the drive UNREADABLE unless you have XP, which I no longer have.
> What a catch 22!
>
> This might not be so bad except I stand to lose about a week and
> half's work on my genealogy, because I can't copy the files off (I
> can't read the drive). This would not have been true had I formatted
> XP as FAT32 and not NTFS.
>
> I am not sure what I should try to do.
> Can anyone help me?
>
>
>
> Thanks

[young@and.restless]

On Wed, 6 Aug 2003 21:20:51 -0400, "Rick \"Nutcase\" Rogers"
> wrote:

>Hi,
>
>Install WinXP to a new folder, then take possession of the files you want to
>recover. These articles can assist in this. The first contains a section
>about installing to a new folder about 2/3's of the way down:
>
>HOW TO: Install Windows XP [Q316941]
>http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=316941
>
>HOW TO: Take Ownership of a File or Folder in Windows XP [Q308421]
>http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=308421


Hi

Sounds like a good approach, but since my c drive is unbootable I have
to boot from the XP Pro CD disk, which seems only to want me to
install XP either as a full install or a restore (the latter does
nothing). If I choose the full install, of course it starts by wanting
me to do a FORMAT which is the LAST thing I want to do.

Somebody told me about READNTFS, which may turn out to be the only
thing I can try.

Thanks.

Young

[young@and.restless]

On Thu, 7 Aug 2003 02:32:56 +0100, "Graham Cutting"
> wrote:

>Hi,
> Can't you boot from the XP CD and copy the files off to floppy that way?
>
I don't see how - all the CD will allow me to do is install. I saw no
way to get control to do any copying or whatever.

Thanks

[Kent W. England [MVP]]

If you press F8 after your BIOS screen you should see an option to boot
the Last Known Good configuration. Try that.

--
Kent W. England, Microsoft MVP for Windows



> wrote in message
...
> On Wed, 6 Aug 2003 21:20:51 -0400, "Rick \"Nutcase\" Rogers"
> > wrote:
>
> >Hi,
> >
> >Install WinXP to a new folder, then take possession of the files you
want to
> >recover. These articles can assist in this. The first contains a
section
> >about installing to a new folder about 2/3's of the way down:
> >
> >HOW TO: Install Windows XP [Q316941]
> >http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=316941
> >
> >HOW TO: Take Ownership of a File or Folder in Windows XP [Q308421]
> >http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=308421
>
>
> Hi
>
> Sounds like a good approach, but since my c drive is unbootable I have
> to boot from the XP Pro CD disk, which seems only to want me to
> install XP either as a full install or a restore (the latter does
> nothing). If I choose the full install, of course it starts by wanting
> me to do a FORMAT which is the LAST thing I want to do.
>
> Somebody told me about READNTFS, which may turn out to be the only
> thing I can try.
>
> Thanks.
>
> Young