Getting files from a wiped hard drive

[Guest]

I have a friend that let someone try to pull her files from an old hard drive
that she had her quicken files on. They reloaded windows on it. How do I go
back and retrieve her very important files for her. Or is there a way to do
this?

 

[Guest]

Christy,

Depends on a variety of things but i will hope to answer them for you
although i may need some additional information to your original post.

You say "They RELOADED Windows onto it". Now this is where it gets patchy
because this can be done in a variety of ways and dependant on which way she
done the reinstall depends on wether or not her files are retrievable.

There are numerous ways to reload Windows onto a PC.
I would need to establish which one she did. Did she.....

1 - Do it with a boot/startup disk (Floppy disk) and then run a new Windows
Installaion/setup from the Windows CD Rom. (If done this way, provided she
did not format the disk then files are still retrievable)

2 - Did she insert the Windows CD Rom and do a new installation? (Unless she
formatted the PC, files would be retrievable).

3 - Did she do an upgrade (Again files would be retrievable)

4 - Did she boot the PC from the Windows CD Rom or Operating System restore
CD Rom which MAY have come with her PC (Again unless she formatted the PC
files would be retrievable).

5 - She could also have done a WindowsXP restore which comes with the
Windows XP OPerating system. (Again files Could be retrievable)

If she has formatted the harddisk (C:/) or overwritten the original
partition then she is pretty much up the creek without a paddle! BUT......


If she has not formatted the harddisk (C:/) or overwritten the original
partition then she has the following options available to her. Again, there
are a few options avaiable to her depending on which way she reloaded Windows.

If she has her PC up and running she can check to see if she has two
versions of the Windows folder or WINNT folder on her C Drive (C:/).
(If she has Windows 95/98 she will see the Windows folder
If she has Windows 2k/XP she will see the WINNT folder)

If she can see two versions of the Windows folder or WINNT folder then that
means she has not deleted her original installation of Windows (The one which
she is trying to retrieve). //This would be good as she could retrieve the
data

This would mean that she still has all the data on the harddisk and her
files are retrievable but her programs may not be working because they are
still pointing to the original installation of Windows which she has
since/later restored.

If you reply back telling me which install she did i will try to solve for
you.

Basically,

1 - If she deleted the C/: to install a new version of Windows she is pretty
much up the creek.

2 - If she still has the data on the disk but the disk won't boot she can
run the disk as a slave and retrieve the data that way.

3 - If she has the data on the disk and the PC does boot into Windows then
she should look in the start > find folders > and try looking for quicken
files.

HTH