Hi,
I have a friend, really not me, that did an HP repair. He doesn't remember
if her chose to protect files or not. He did the repair from when the PC
starts and hit F10 in error. It did a reinstall of Windows XP it appears. I
have used a software program form iolo and only found some old internet jpegs
etc. I am pretty comfortable doing repairs etc but need some guidance in the
area of what software program do you suggest if any to look deeper for his
pictures music and data after a repair. I am not sure if it did a full or
soft format of the drive.
Thanks,
John
ps it really isn't my computer...

traumajohn wrote:

> Hi,
> I have a friend, really not me, that did an HP repair. He doesn't remember
> if her chose to protect files or not. He did the repair from when the PC
> starts and hit F10 in error. It did a reinstall of Windows XP it appears.
> I have used a software program form iolo and only found some old internet
> jpegs etc. I am pretty comfortable doing repairs etc but need some
> guidance in the area of what software program do you suggest if any to
> look deeper for his pictures music and data after a repair. I am not sure
> if it did a full or soft format of the drive.

You cannot accidentally do the restore-to-factory condition by pressing F10.
You are given numerous warnings. If your friend did a full destructive
recovery (and he would have needed to press the Advanced button to choose
this and then OK'd the additional warning), then it is very unlikely you
will be able to recover his data. If he did the partial recovery, then his
data and original programs would still be there.

That said, you forgot to tell us what data recovery software you used. I'll
give you some links but if the data is crucial and expense is not a factor,
your friend should contact a professional data recovery company. I use
Drive Savers (www.drivesavers.com) but there are others.

Do not install anything on the target computer. Install programs on a
different machine and either slave your friend's hard drive to it or make a
bootable CD and boot the target computer with the data recovery CD.

http://www3.telus.net/mikebike/RESTORATION.html
PCInspector File Recovery -
http://www.pcinspector.de/file_recovery/welcome.htm
Executive Software ?Undelete? -
http://www.undelete.com/undelete/undelete.asp
R-Studio - http://www.r-tt.com/
File Scavenger - http://www.quetek.com/prod02.htm
Ontrack's EasyRecovery - http://www.ontrack.com/software/
(EasyRecovery doesn't work on Vista)

Malke
--
MS-MVP
Elephant Boy Computers - Don't Panic!
http://www.elephantboycomputers.com/#FAQ

"traumajohn" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:B4F4819E-9028-45A1-9D4D-(E-Mail Removed)...
> Hi,
> I have a friend, really not me, that did an HP repair. He doesn't
> remember
> if her chose to protect files or not. He did the repair from when the
> PC
> starts and hit F10 in error. It did a reinstall of Windows XP it
> appears. I
> have used a software program form iolo and only found some old
> internet jpegs
> etc. I am pretty comfortable doing repairs etc but need some guidance
> in the
> area of what software program do you suggest if any to look deeper for
> his
> pictures music and data after a repair. I am not sure if it did a full
> or
> soft format of the drive.
> Thanks,
>
>http://www.pcinspector.de/Sites/file...htm?language=1

The program is freeware, but should be installed on a 2nd drive,
where you are going to save the recovered files to.

The less writing you do his harddrive, the less damage you`ll do !.

"traumajohn" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:B4F4819E-9028-45A1-9D4D-(E-Mail Removed)...
> Hi,
> I have a friend, really not me, that did an HP repair. He doesn't remember
> if her chose to protect files or not. He did the repair from when the PC
> starts and hit F10 in error. It did a reinstall of Windows XP it appears.
> I
> have used a software program form iolo and only found some old internet
> jpegs
> etc. I am pretty comfortable doing repairs etc but need some guidance in
> the
> area of what software program do you suggest if any to look deeper for his
> pictures music and data after a repair. I am not sure if it did a full or
> soft format of the drive.

No such thing as a "soft" format.

> Thanks,
> John
> ps it really isn't my computer...

Up front, the prognosis is not good.

Stop using the machine, though it's likely too late now. Remove the drive
so that it cannot be booted. Attach it to another system with, say, the
demo of R-Studio and see whwat it finds. Turn System REstore OFF for that
drive. the process will likely take hours.

If that doesn't produce reh results you want, the next step is a recovery
bureau. Expect the bill to start around $1000, and while most will give
estimates of cost and results, the estimates are not always free.

In any case, if you want anything back from that system, take the drive out
of it now. Unfortunately, that will leave the owner in possession of a
dead PC since he bought a system without system disks, and only a recovery
partition. Contact HP to get replacement install CDs - don't expect them
to be free, but they shouldn't be expensive either.

HHT
-pk

HTH
-pk

traumajohn said this on 4/16/2009 10:41 AM:
> Hi,
> I have a friend, really not me, that did an HP repair. He doesn't remember
> if her chose to protect files or not. He did the repair from when the PC
> starts and hit F10 in error. It did a reinstall of Windows XP it appears. I
> have used a software program form iolo and only found some old internet jpegs
> etc. I am pretty comfortable doing repairs etc but need some guidance in the
> area of what software program do you suggest if any to look deeper for his
> pictures music and data after a repair. I am not sure if it did a full or
> soft format of the drive.
> Thanks,
> John
> ps it really isn't my computer...

http://www.runtime.org/data-recovery-software.htm
I've never used it, but a friend had a blown fat or root directory and
lost all his data and used this getdataback program and had pretty good
success. It's been a while and I never heard the details but he was
content that his family photos were retrieved.

I know you knew this was comming, but this does point out the need for a
good backup utility.