My Documents and System Recovery

[Mark]

As Microsoft recommend I keep all my work in folders
under My Documents. I had to do a Non-destructive System
Recovery on my HP PC and the files in My Documents have
gone. I am now told that My Documents is a system file
rather than a data file. How can I get my files back? I
know you can get data recovery software but they all
appear to need the PC to have two hardrives.

 

[CS]

As Microsoft recommend I keep all my work in folders
under My Documents. I had to do a Non-destructive System
Recovery on my HP PC and the files in My Documents have
gone. I am now told that My Documents is a system file
rather than a data file. How can I get my files back? I
know you can get data recovery software but they all
appear to need the PC to have two hardrives.

First, there is no such thing as a non destructive system recovery
using the HP method. Always backup data files before doing any type
of recovery. The My Documents folder is a special folder but the
contents of it (containing all your documents, music files, photos,
etc) are not protected.

You probably are not going to be able to recover the contents of that
folder since the HP recovery process has more than likely overwritten
the data. You can try a Google search for data recovery software. I
don't know where you get the idea that data recovery software requires
two hard drives? Good data recovery software can be run from either a
CD or floppy. Recovered data can then be copied to removable media
as well as another hard drive.

 

[Alex Nichol]

As Microsoft recommend I keep all my work in folders
under My Documents. I had to do a Non-destructive System
Recovery on my HP PC and the files in My Documents have
gone. I am now told that My Documents is a system file
rather than a data file. How can I get my files back?

I *think* what has happened is that the non-destructive installation has
set up a new user account that you are now logged on under. You will
need to look for the old accounts 'My Documents' in
C:\Documents and Settings\usernameconcerned\
and 'Take Ownership' - see that topic in Help and support.

But that assumes that HP mean what they say about 'non-destructive'. In
any case My Documents is not a system affair, but each user has his own
version