G
Glenn Graessle
I have an older Dell computer (vintage early 2000's) that was purchased with
XP Home . Not sure if there was an SP at that point, but I don't think so,
and I'm not sitting in front of it now. A couple of years ago I purchased
and installed XP Professional on it. Recently, I purchased a new computer
with XP Home. I decided to upgrade that computer to the XP Pro license I had
purchased for the 1st computer and re-install XP Home on the first computer
from the Original Dell Installation Media. (I only have XP Pro on one
computer.) I have a Linksys router to provide both computers access to the
internet.
First mistake, After this downgrade from XP Pro to XP Home, I set the files
for my account to be private so my kids did not mess up any of my files.
More on that later.
Everything was quiet in Mudville until one day last week when my first
computer (the one with XP Home re-installed on it) locked up on me while
browsing the internet. I let it sit for an hour to no avail.
Second mistake: I decided to power-down the computer and hope it would come
back up again. When it booted, it crashed with a message before the re-boot
was complete (not sure when in the boot sequence it happened), and it got
into an infinite re-boot loop. A message was being displayed before re-boot,
but I could not see it as the computer re-booted too fast. I changed the
boot settings to have it hold the error message, and I saw that some OS file
was locked or corrupted (don't remember which). I tried to re-boot in safe
mode, but the same thing happedned. I tried to repair the installation with
my Dell Install media, but when it asked for the Admin password, it did not
take the password I had given when installing XP Home.
I sat and thought for a while.
Third mistake: I decided to re-install XP Home in the hopes that I would be
able to see my files in My Documents. This went off without a hitch, but
when I went into Documents and Settings to see the old My Documents files,
they were not accessible. This is presumably because I set the files to be
private on the previous install. (BTW, there are multiple My Documents
folders now: the inaccessible ones from the previous install and the empty
ones from my new install.)
My question is: Is there a way to get to the inaccessible files from the
previous install? I just realized that I did not try login in as
Administrator and see them. I logged in as my personal account with Admin
rights. Does XP Home have an Administrator account that will allow access?
Thanks in advance for any help!
XP Home . Not sure if there was an SP at that point, but I don't think so,
and I'm not sitting in front of it now. A couple of years ago I purchased
and installed XP Professional on it. Recently, I purchased a new computer
with XP Home. I decided to upgrade that computer to the XP Pro license I had
purchased for the 1st computer and re-install XP Home on the first computer
from the Original Dell Installation Media. (I only have XP Pro on one
computer.) I have a Linksys router to provide both computers access to the
internet.
First mistake, After this downgrade from XP Pro to XP Home, I set the files
for my account to be private so my kids did not mess up any of my files.
More on that later.
Everything was quiet in Mudville until one day last week when my first
computer (the one with XP Home re-installed on it) locked up on me while
browsing the internet. I let it sit for an hour to no avail.
Second mistake: I decided to power-down the computer and hope it would come
back up again. When it booted, it crashed with a message before the re-boot
was complete (not sure when in the boot sequence it happened), and it got
into an infinite re-boot loop. A message was being displayed before re-boot,
but I could not see it as the computer re-booted too fast. I changed the
boot settings to have it hold the error message, and I saw that some OS file
was locked or corrupted (don't remember which). I tried to re-boot in safe
mode, but the same thing happedned. I tried to repair the installation with
my Dell Install media, but when it asked for the Admin password, it did not
take the password I had given when installing XP Home.
I sat and thought for a while.
Third mistake: I decided to re-install XP Home in the hopes that I would be
able to see my files in My Documents. This went off without a hitch, but
when I went into Documents and Settings to see the old My Documents files,
they were not accessible. This is presumably because I set the files to be
private on the previous install. (BTW, there are multiple My Documents
folders now: the inaccessible ones from the previous install and the empty
ones from my new install.)
My question is: Is there a way to get to the inaccessible files from the
previous install? I just realized that I did not try login in as
Administrator and see them. I logged in as my personal account with Admin
rights. Does XP Home have an Administrator account that will allow access?
Thanks in advance for any help!