reinstalling XP

[Mark]

Will windows XP leave all my data & program files intact
if I do a reinstall. I've tried to repair but it says I do
not have a copy of XP on my computer. Iv'e tried recovery
console but it cand find it either.

Please help.

[Thorsten Matzner]

"Mark" > wrote:

>Will windows XP leave all my data & program files intact
>if I do a reinstall.

Usually yes (for original Windows-CDs), but since you can never be
absolutely sure about this, you should backup your personal data files
at last.
Note that some OEM versions of Windows will reformat the HDD during
the reinstallation.

--
(tm)

[Harry Ohrn]

Is your hard drive being recognized by the BIOS? If not then see if you have
a loose connection.

Assuming that it is recognized by the BIOS and you can't get at it with the
Recovery Console then you have a problem to be sure. If the data is
important and you have a CD Burner or a second hard drive you might want to
run Knoppix and use it to save your data to either CD-R or the second drive.
Knoppix is a complete Linux operating system that runs from a single CD
without installing anything to your hard drive. You can boot with the
Knoppix disk and read the data on your drives. It has a nice GUI. The
Desktop is familiar enough that most users can navigate it without much
trouble. The Desktop should display icons for your Hard Drive(s), Floppy, CD
devices etc. Hard Drives can not be written to unless you make them
Writeable. A single right click on a Hard Drive icon and you can select the
option to Make Writeable. A single right click on your CD burner icon and
you can select the option to write to CD. This opens burner software similar
to Easy CD Creator or Nero and you can burn data from the Hard Drive to CDs
or you can make your second Hard Drive writeable and copy files over from
problem drive.

Knoppix is a huge 700MB ISO you can download from
ftp://mirror.csit.fsu.edu/knoppix/KNOPPIX_V3.3-2003-11-03-EN.iso
Documentation is available here http://www.knoppix.net/docs/

Once you've recovered your data you can work on the drive without fear of
loosing your important stuff!
--

Harry Ohrn - MS MVP [Shell/User]
www.webtree.ca/windowsxp


"Mark" > wrote in message
...
> Will windows XP leave all my data & program files intact
> if I do a reinstall. I've tried to repair but it says I do
> not have a copy of XP on my computer. Iv'e tried recovery
> console but it cand find it either.
>
> Please help.