Removed Vista, back to XP Pro - Can't read windows.old data
meganm1524
Madison
Hi,
This is my first time on this forum and I'm truly hoping to get some help on my recovery. I'm on day 3 of my recovery attempts since my computer basically crashed. (when i would turn it on, I got nothing but a black screen) This is my work computer, with my whole life on it, including all my emails, client lists, website files for hundreds of websites, (which I know, luckily I can retrieve those from the server), tons of spreadsheets, - You get the idea.
I'll try to explain to you what I have done to get to where I am now, which is that I used the program GetDataBack to retrieve most of my files, but many of them are not viewable. So basically, I started with the basics, using the Windows Repair Console to try and fix missing or corrupt files preventing my computer from working. I tried so many different things that I got to the point where I knew that I was going to have succumb to doing a clean install of Windows XP, against my better judgment. But before I did that, I tried to use Windows Vista to do a repair, which reformatted my HD, and I was left with nothing. Vista then saved all my files to 'windows.old'. I hated the Vista environment b/c I couldn't get any of my programs to work, and I have over 300 of them.
So I decided to switch back to XP, and did so using BART's PE (a version I created, The Ultimate Boot CD for Windows). I was able to get back most of my personal files this way, but no programs or settings. However, I still have the 'windows.old' folder, and I can see everything that I want is in that folder, through the recovery tree I made, but none of them are readable. The file and folder names are all the same as they used to be, but when opened they are in some sort of scrambled code.
I have Office reinstalled, and my internet is working as well. I also reinstalled SP2.
I was able to import my emails back into outlook using the .pst, but none of my settings carried over, and I had hundreds of rules and alerts. I've accepted that I most likely lost all my programs, and that's fine, I can replace those. But the files cannot be replaced and the fact that I can see them and not get to them is beyond frustrating.
I guess my main question I'm looking for help with is since I switched back to XP from Vista, how to view the files in the 'windows.old' folder the way they are intended to be viewed.
Also, if I used one recovery program, can I still try another one without damaging what I've already accomplished? I have access to 2 other PC's and 2 laptops to help me through this, and have been storing my changes to an external HD.
If you need clarification, please let me know, and ANY help or advice would more than greatly appreciated. I've literally been doing this for 3 days, and I feel like I'm almost there. This 'windows.old' folder is just causing too much trouble and I don't know what to do with it. Please, if you have any advice, I really need it.
Thanks so much in advance!
Desperately, Megan
This is my first time on this forum and I'm truly hoping to get some help on my recovery. I'm on day 3 of my recovery attempts since my computer basically crashed. (when i would turn it on, I got nothing but a black screen) This is my work computer, with my whole life on it, including all my emails, client lists, website files for hundreds of websites, (which I know, luckily I can retrieve those from the server), tons of spreadsheets, - You get the idea.
I'll try to explain to you what I have done to get to where I am now, which is that I used the program GetDataBack to retrieve most of my files, but many of them are not viewable. So basically, I started with the basics, using the Windows Repair Console to try and fix missing or corrupt files preventing my computer from working. I tried so many different things that I got to the point where I knew that I was going to have succumb to doing a clean install of Windows XP, against my better judgment. But before I did that, I tried to use Windows Vista to do a repair, which reformatted my HD, and I was left with nothing. Vista then saved all my files to 'windows.old'. I hated the Vista environment b/c I couldn't get any of my programs to work, and I have over 300 of them.
So I decided to switch back to XP, and did so using BART's PE (a version I created, The Ultimate Boot CD for Windows). I was able to get back most of my personal files this way, but no programs or settings. However, I still have the 'windows.old' folder, and I can see everything that I want is in that folder, through the recovery tree I made, but none of them are readable. The file and folder names are all the same as they used to be, but when opened they are in some sort of scrambled code.
I have Office reinstalled, and my internet is working as well. I also reinstalled SP2.
I was able to import my emails back into outlook using the .pst, but none of my settings carried over, and I had hundreds of rules and alerts. I've accepted that I most likely lost all my programs, and that's fine, I can replace those. But the files cannot be replaced and the fact that I can see them and not get to them is beyond frustrating.
I guess my main question I'm looking for help with is since I switched back to XP from Vista, how to view the files in the 'windows.old' folder the way they are intended to be viewed.
Also, if I used one recovery program, can I still try another one without damaging what I've already accomplished? I have access to 2 other PC's and 2 laptops to help me through this, and have been storing my changes to an external HD.
If you need clarification, please let me know, and ANY help or advice would more than greatly appreciated. I've literally been doing this for 3 days, and I feel like I'm almost there. This 'windows.old' folder is just causing too much trouble and I don't know what to do with it. Please, if you have any advice, I really need it.
Thanks so much in advance!
Desperately, Megan
0
Comments
Make sure that once you get this problem sorted out you purchase an external hard drive and start routinely backing up everything that is important to you The piece of mind alone is well worth it.
I realize the above doesn't address your problem. I'm just keeping the background music going until your appointment starts.
In my opinion, an external drive used for backup should be ONLY that, a backup. Perform complete system backups with intervals of incremental backups. Use the external only for backups. Turn off and unplug the external drive when it is not in use. Ideally, store the backup media - external drive, tapes, or hard drive removed from the enclosure, at a different location, such as the office. If you need an external drive for other than backups, I would recommend having a second external drive or one of the external cradles that you hot-swap drives. You literally can change drives in seconds. This type of plan might have been prohibitively expensive a few years ago, but storage has become dirt cheap. A terabyte drive can now be had for even less than $100.
It's actually my fiancee's computer. He tried to do some repairs, but we kept getting corrupt or missing file errors for the system and software registry. We had XP on it originally, and couldn't do a repair with the XP Installation disk. So, he tried to do a repair by putting Vista on that same drive, updating. When he did that, he was using The Ultimate Boot CD for Windows that he created, and Vista created the windows.old folder. That folder it created is the one that is holding most of his documents and files that he is trying to recover, and he cannot read them or copy them to my external hard drive. We haven't written anything else back to the corrupt drive, because I know that will cause total deletion of all files. He tried to get rid of Vista then and go back to XP.
Using the Boot CD he created, he was able to recover and view many of his files, and we copied them to my external. We were also using the program GetDataBack for NTSF. The Recovery Tree did show many of the correct file names that he was looking for, but most of them were listed under windows.old and those can't be opened or copied. We know that the programs are pretty much a lost cause which is fine b/c they can be replaced.
From reading the instructions for the GetDataBack program, (http://www.runtime.org/howto_datarecovery.pdf) I concluded that the best way would be to copy as many of the files that we could recover onto my external hard drive, then do a clean reinstall of XP on the corrupted drive. (Let me know if you think this is correct). However, he didn't totally do that. When he was going back from Vista to XP, he did the reinstall then, assuming that this would take care of that step. I thought that all the files should be copied, moved off the drive, THEN perform a clean reinstall and move the copied files back to the drive after that was done.
Doing it his way, he was able to get his email back, it was readable, but all his rules and settings were gone. Those rules and settings are very important, so we need to find a way to get those back as well. Most of his other files would open just fine, but in the Recovery Tree, there were many files that were listed as only numbers in place of the names. These obviously weren't recovered correctly, and it does mention how to fix this on the website I mentioned above.
Because of all the steps and different things we've tried, we weren't sure what to do next, so he restarted the computer and everything that he did manage to get back onto the computer was completely gone again. (which we thought might happen since it said NEVER WRITE ANYTHING BACK TO THE CORRUPTED DRIVE!:eek3:
So....Did we permanently get rid of everything we were trying to recover? Is a recover still possible doing it the way I thought we should? (copying all recovered files somewhere else, then doing a clean reinstall and then moving them back?
I also don't see how we can completely disregard this windows.old file since it seems to contain the majority of the files we are trying to recover. Basically we're back to square one: a corrupt drive with nothing on it, a recovery program that contains some of the recovered documents, and not sure on what the next move should be. Please let me know what you think because I'm at a complete loss right now.
I hope this clarified somewhat and I appreciate any help.
Megan
As for your rules and settings. They are unrecoverable if you are using outlook. When you back up your outlook rules are never backed up and they aren't transferable either.
If you really - really need to get stuff back. I would suggest setting a side any disks you currently have that have data on them and going out and buying a new harddrive. Then do a clean install of XP or Vista on that drive. Then connect the drives with the data on them to your machine and try and recover the data off of them.
The more times you try and do something to a drive that has damaged/deleted files on it that you are trying to get back there becomes an incrementally less chance of them being recovered. From what I've read so far it may already be past the point of no return.
so did this not happen then?
If you put in the vista disk to do a repair and it reformatted your HD and Vista saved all your files to windows.old - then you for all intents and purposes installed Vista.
From what I've read you need vista to open a windows.old file created in vista because it's format is different then the one xp uses.