... and I'm a PC

haro!haro!
Posted:
in Genius Bar edited January 2014
So the lone PC I have at home is on its last legs. It doesn't fully start up (for reasons I still do not know). I'm not even trying to figure that out and I'm just going to let it die. However I might have some data I want to save from its HDD that I hadn't backed up. Is there anyway to retrieve that data without having to get windows to fully start up?

To better illustrate: I am running Windows XP SP 2 on the PC in question. When I start up it gets past the "Windows XP" screen and the blue "welcome" screen and then the desktop starts to load up. The "Start" and the bar at the bottom appear. The icons on the desktop appear, and it seems to connect to the network (the monitor icon at the bottom right corner flashes a few times). And that's as far as it goes. It just freezes.

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 5
    kareliakarelia Posts: 525member
    Data that resides in universal file formats, like music and photos, can be extracted by hooking the drive up as an external. Things like bookmarks and contacts will need to be exported first, and that requires a running PC.
  • Reply 2 of 5
    haro!haro! Posts: 32member
    (Newbie-ishness is going to show). As the only PC I own, does the fact that the hard drive is NTFS does that matter at all since I would be accessing as an external from a Mac?
  • Reply 3 of 5
    audiopollutionaudiopollution Posts: 3,226member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Haro! View Post


    (Newbie-ishness is going to show). As the only PC I own, does the fact that the hard drive is NTFS does that matter at all since I would be accessing as an external from a Mac?



    You'll be able to *read* the disk just fine. *Writing* to it, nope.



    In your situation, you'll be fine.
  • Reply 4 of 5
    haro!haro! Posts: 32member
    Awesome thanks.

    Although a friend turned me on to just booting Ubuntu and moving files to an external that way. Either way sounds fun though. Decisions decisions.
  • Reply 5 of 5
    fixmdudefixmdude Posts: 93member
    On starting up, press F8 repeatedly to hit it at the right time, you want it after the computer finishes the hardware checking but before it starts to load windows. If you get a stuck-key error then you pressed too early during the hardware check, if you see the WindowsXP splash screen then you waited too long or missed it. Pressing F8 before Windows starts to load will give you a startup menu. Select Boot in Safe Mode. It will ask you if you want to boot into your normal user profile or as Administrator. Select administrator, go into the control panel < users < create a new user and give it administrator rights < reboot < it will ask you which user to boot into, your old one or the new one < select the new user < find your files on the C: drive. They might be in C: \\documents and settings\\'olduser'\\my documents\\
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