How do you solve a problem like a crashed computer...

So, my faithful Acer 2480, Windows XP Media Center Edition, kicked it on me. On Monday, I pushed the power button, and unfortunately, I got the lovely Acer splash screen, however, after that, nothing but the black screen of death. I am probably too self-reliant. I like to fix things myself. Computers included. If I don't know how, I will go and figure it out.

So, I embarked on a mission. This mission included, but was not limited to, buying Avanquest Fix-it Utilities, external hard drives, trying to repair with XP recovery console, loading Linux and trying to rescue my files, all sorts of stuff. I got everything safely off of the D, but the C (which for a long line of reasons is not backed-up) had screwy file allocation, which I think--now that I've sorted through a lot of online info, and played with the computer-- is probably what caused the inability to boot up anyways. There are many, many things that I must rescue from said C drive, so after a successful rescue mission on the D drive, and all that info now living safely on an external hard drive, I decided that I would load windows onto my D drive and then hopefully be able to fix the file allocation of the C with my D up and running.

I still don't know if this will work, because when I loaded XP, I learned that my product key wasn't working. Who knows why! So, after about 45 minutes on hold and getting transferred from one Microsoft call center to another, I was informed by a foreign call center (by the sound of it), that my product key was a valid product key, however, if it wasn't working, it wasn't Microsoft's problem. I would have to contact the company from which I purchased the software. I didn't purchase this software, my dad did, back when Caleb was building his own computer and bought a couple of extra licenses for reloads and what have you. So, now, I'm trying to figure out where Dad bought this thing, and why it's not loading. Once I do, I probably won't be able to fix the file allocation anyways (that's just a bit too advanced for me), and unless I want to wipe my C and reload XP there (which I DON'T because everything I've ever written in my creative writing life--everything since from the ages of 11 to the present--is stuck on there. Hundreds of thousands of words of the only creative thing I know how to do) I'll probably end up getting the Geek Squad. Oh, how great this has been. Many, many, many hours, only to surrender to the guys with pocket protectors.

I will back-up from now on. It's not that I didn't believe in backing up files, I just never did it for a long strand of reasons which I will not share, because I get passionate about all the terrible things that happened to me. Really, if I get all the files out of there, that's great. But really, all I will not surrender to wiping is all my creative writing, and my journal. That's it.

My mother says I'm having a slump in my life. That's why I shouldn't climb stairs at the moment. I'll probably break something.

Comments

p said…
If you've got a bad FAT probably the best you can hope for is to read out the drive in the shape it's in then patch files back together manually.

But it's probably more than just a bad FAT. That disk is old and is dying. It will have lots of bad sectors and quite likely parts of your files are lost.

Norton Disk Doctor may recover a chunk of it. You might also try freezing the disk for an hour then quickly booting and recovering files. This requires you to take apart the computer and you'll probably want some longer patch cords to connect with it in the freezer ideally. This sometimes helps.

See more at
http://www.maximumpc.com/article/how_to_detect_a_faulty_hard_drive_and_recover_data
June 5, 2010 at 9:08 AM
p said…
Oh. don't expect that disk to have any useful life once you recover data. Dump it NOW and replace it immediately.
June 5, 2010 at 9:10 AM
Hannah said…
Yeah, I eventually surrendered to the Geek Squad, and the Geek said it was probably just breaking down and corrupting files. So, the files weren't recoverable with what they had there, and they're running diagnostics to see where I need to fix it.
June 5, 2010 at 6:08 PM
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