[HarryX]

Recently, my computer was lagging quite a lot and just constantly froze. so i decided to System recovery it, thinking everything will be the same and nothing will have disappeared. (It then reinstalled windows. Was this suppose to happen?) However, i was very wrong and all my files which was under my user, has gone; documents, photos, music, etc. Is there no way of recovering them at all? It is quite peculiar that all my program files under C drive appears to be there but is not. For example, Microsoft office is there but if i open up Word, it says the file cannot be found. What is going on? And it's not if there is nothing there in the files, the file actually has sizes so the programs haven't be uninstalled or deleted when my computer system recovered, it just can't be found. Like on the start programs menu. My installed products are all there but they can't be found, yet they're clearly there in C:\\My computer>Program Files> but then i open the file in there and it can't be found.Finally, whenever i try plugging anything in through the USB ports like my Ipod or the printer, i get this message "the hardware has not passed the Windows test. Installing this hardware could case your computer to be unstable" or something like that... Why is it saying my computer might be unstable?

Can my files ever be recovered? Will my computer programs ever work without having to reinstall every single one?

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It sounds like you did a parallel windows installation instead of a System Recovery.
Try looking in "C:\Documents and Settings\<Your Old Username>\My Documents"
If you chose a different username then you had before the parallel install your documents might still be there.

Regards,
Olrik

[Artellos]

It sounds like you did a parallel windows installation instead of a System Recovery.
Try looking in "C:\Documents and Settings\<Your Old Username>\My Documents"
If you chose a different username then you had before the parallel install your documents might still be there.

Regards,
Olrik

[HarryX]

I have checked everwhere. My other backup username is there but not the one i used as an administrator for this computer.
Could be a parallel installation instead of a system recovery? But then wouldn't the old administrator still be there? There are no traces of it at all!
Regards,
HarryX

[Artellos]

You could run the Windows Search tool and search for the name of one of the documents and see if you can find it again. A parallel install is basically installing a second windows over the current installation.

Let's look at the boot.ini file.

• Right click on My Computer and choose "Properties".
• In the Properties window, click on the "Advanced" tab.
• In the Startup and Recovery section, click on the "Settings" button.
• In the window that opens, click on the "Edit" button...a notepad window will open (boot.ini)
• copy the contents of that window and paste it here for me.

Regards,
Olrik

[HarryX]

[boot loader]
timeout=3
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect
C:\CMDCONS\BOOTSECT.DAT="Microsoft Windows Recovery Console" /cmdcons

Hope this is is what you're looking for.

Regards
HarryX