[Robbo]

Well, I'm looking for some advice to regain access to "My Documents" (encrypted) that was lost during a hard drive crash that killed my Windows XP installation.

I attempted to reinstall windows on the original drive, but hesitated when it suggested that I could lose the previous "My Documents".

My next attempt was to take an old 10gig drive and use that as my master drive. My old drive (with the data on it) didn't crash too bad yet, so I can see my old administrator account on the old drive. When I try to access the files, I get a message "Access Denied", likely due to the fact that I had the administrator account protected.

What are my options now? Is there a way to get access to the old My Documents? If I reinstalled XP on the old drive, will My Documents be overwritten?

Any help would be appreciated!

Thanks,
Rob

 

[slemaire195]

wait, i think i messed up in my post, gonna think again

 

[slemaire195]

ok, i think i fixed to make sense (i repeated the steps of what you did)

did you try doing the "upgrade option"? it's not recommended for a one time installation (like just to install and keep), but in your situation, you would probably need to use the upgrade if you can.

what version are you running of xp, pro or home. if you are running home, it is possible that you can get pro, and use the upgrade option. from there, you could copy and backup your files, and then do a FULL installation of xp (home or pro, your choice!)

it had happened to me(running w2k), but after a few attempts to power on, the power supply... uhh... just popped. it was from compaq. i have learned so many lessons from my experiences with those people. i still have it, but the only thing i use it for is "the sims". decent, but could use more ram...

but anyway, you shouldn't lose and of your files if you do an upgrade installation (i didn't. didn't even lose any of the problems i had, which is what i wanted )