HELP with Hard Drive Recovery

[mshockley]

Okay, maybe you read my rant and I'm hoping some of you smart tech guys will see this!

I need help trying to restore my hard drive
I have the recovery cd's
I have no idea how to run them, it will not simply load the disc when I insert it
I'm in a cast and could sure use some help trying to see if i can fix it without having to try and leave the house today

Thanks

[dakwegmo]

Originally Posted by mshockley

Okay, maybe you read my rant and I'm hoping some of you smart tech guys will see this!

I need help trying to restore my hard drive
I have the recovery cd's
I have no idea how to run them, it will not simply load the disc when I insert it
I'm in a cast and could sure use some help trying to see if i can fix it without having to try and leave the house today

Thanks

Usually, with recovery CDs, you insert the CD and reboot the computer. However, before you do that, you should probably tell us what happened when the computer crashed. Is it just that it won't start, or did it stop working while you were using. If the latter, did it give you some sort of error message?

[CheaperKings]

Originally Posted by dakwegmo

Usually, with recovery CDs, you insert the CD and reboot the computer. However, before you do that, you should probably tell us what happened when the computer crashed. Is it just that it won't start, or did it stop working while you were using. If the latter, did it give you some sort of error message?

This. Also, know that you'll lose everything on that HDD when you run that disk.

[Murtasma]

If you're just talking about the recovery disks that came with your computer this will do nothing to restore any pictures / videos you may have lost. It will just put the computer into the state that you bought it.

What OS? What does the machine do when you boot it up? What do you want to restore?

[tsmcb87]

I made a thread about this for external hard drives but this works for internal ones too.
What you will need:
A spare usb thumb drive
An external hard drive

1. Download a copy of puppy linux and google how to make a live usb thumb drive with Puppy Linux
2. Boot your computer from the usb drive, not the internal hard drive.
3. You will be in a linux environment when the booting is complete.
4. You will see the internal hard drive and thumb drive icons on the bottom of the screen.
5. Hook up the external hard drive to the computer
6. mount the internal and external hard by double clicking on the icons.
7. Move all of the files you want from the internal to the external hard drive

This will work with any small linux distribution, but Puppy is the smallest. This will only work if the OS is corrupted and that is what is causing the issue. It will boot, if there are no hardware issues, on any machine(pc or mac). You will be able to see all the files unless they are encrypted, which they probably aren't. Hope this helps.

[dakwegmo]

Originally Posted by tsmcb87

Download a copy of puppy linux and google how to make a live usb thumb drive with Puppy Linux.

Perphaps not the most useful advice for someone who's unsure how to run recovery disks.

[tsmcb87]

Originally Posted by dakwegmo

Perphaps not the most useful advice for someone who's unsure how to run recovery disks.

There is actually a program that does it for you once you have the ISO, called UNetbootin. You just have to show the program where the linux download is and hit create. So it really isn't hard at all if you know how to navigate folders in windows.

[tsmcb87]

Or "Live USB Creator"

[dlambert]

I'll jump on the bandwagon with everyone else here. The most important thing for you to do right now is to assess the damage and get a game plan. At this point, the last thing you need is to make anything worse.

Do you have a backup of the document files on your laptop? This would include photos and documents at least. If so, how old is it?

[CheaperKings]

Why do I get the feeling that, since she's not responding, she's sitting on the floor with a now-smoldering laptop in front of her?