Partition deleted when installing Windows 2000

[thematchstickgroup]

Help!

So I guess I must have deleted a partition or something when I
installed Windows 2000 on my laptop. (previous OS was Windows 98SE).
NONE of my files OR programs were restored after installation.


I've googled and read about these partition recovery programs...should
I even bother? Is there any hope for recovering my stuff?

 

[Dave Patrick]

Sounds like you did a clean install (always recommended) instead of an
upgrade. Have you searched for your stuff? You may have done a parallel
install. Are you presented with a boot loader screen to choose an OS to
start?

--

Regards,

Dave Patrick ....Please no email replies - reply in newsgroup.
Microsoft Certified Professional
Microsoft MVP [Windows]
http://www.microsoft.com/protect

 

[Pegasus \(MVP\)]

Help!

So I guess I must have deleted a partition or something when I
installed Windows 2000 on my laptop. (previous OS was Windows 98SE).
NONE of my files OR programs were restored after installation.


I've googled and read about these partition recovery programs...should
I even bother? Is there any hope for recovering my stuff?

Here are some partition recovery tools:
http://www.restorer2000.com/r2k.htm
http://www.hddrecovery.com.au
http://bootmaster.filerecovery.biz
http://www.runtime.org/ (GetDataBack - has a trial version)
http://www.softwarepatch.com/software/filerecoverysecdownload.html
http://www.snapfiles.com/get/restoration.html
www.acronis.com (RecoveryExpert)

There are two groups of PC users: Those who back up their
important files regularly to an independent medium, and those
who don't. Ultimately everyone ends up in the first group. The
transition can be very painful. Members of the second group
don't seem to realise how effective and cheap a 2.5" hard disk in
an external USB case is when used for backing up important
files.

 

[thematchstickgroup]

the file recovery seems to do alright...i recovered a few of my files.
But, a lot of the files listed by the recovery software is listed under
weird jibberish names. I can't read the filenames, and I can't tell
what extensions are associated with the files. Are those just gone
permanently, or should i recover them and then figure out how to open
them?

 

[Pegasus \(MVP\)]

You can try to recover them. Chances are that you will only get
various fragments. Putting the fragments back together requires
intimate knowledge either of the Windows file system (NTFS)
or of the file structure, or both.