Help!!

[diversion74]

My pc recently died and it has been narrowed down to the mother board.
Was a really cheap version with everything built onto it so I've decided to bite the bullet and get a new pc.

I need to get as much info off of the old hard drive and this is my problem.

I have got hold of a USB to IDE cable and connected it to a laptop.

My problem is that I had two accounts running on my pc.
I don't have a problem getting to my documents in the personal side however when I try to open anything in the work side I get G:/Documents and Settings/work/My Documents is not accessible. Access denied.

Any thoughts on how to get round this?

None of my work files appear in the All Users Shared Documents file and the work account wasn't password protected.

I also would like to be able to get my contacts out of the Outlook express folder if possible.

All help gratefully listened to as I'm beginning to panic!
I know I should have backed everything up and I will from now on but it was the it'll never happen to me syndrome.

Cheers in advance.

Andy

 

[Zippy]

I'm sure there'll be someone more techy along in a mo but....

Have you tried physically installing the old disc in the new PC and booting up with the old disc?

Then you could copy the files off to CD or similar??

Just an idea.

Steve

 

[diversion74]

Thought about doing this but haven't bought a new pc yet.
Using the works laptop and was wanting to transfer all my work stuff to it.

Also when I do get a new pc they usually have a security tag that breaks if you open the case and this usually invalidates your warranty.

Thanks for posting so quick though.

Like you say, hopefully someone will no the answer.

I know that the files are in the folder because if you scan it for viruses you can see it checking all the folders so I am hoping there is a way to get to them.

Cheers again.

Andy

 

[BIGMARKY]

If it is the motherboard at fault you will have a job getting anything to rip,the best thing is to plug the harddrive into your new pc which should have a spare slotcable to fit a second drive. The problem could be the harddrive itself in which case you are bollocked.
The other way is to beg,steal or borrow a dvd/reader/writer which works by usb,....if you can open MY COMPUTER go to all programs and you should find all your files there. your OL express should hold your contacts online so once you reopen your account they should still be there.
Try also....Go to start...click on RUN and type in the exact content of G://documents etc etc and hit enter....it should find the files that you can see in the virus scan.

 

[redcastle]

Ive not used one of those usb to ide connectors but I would imagine all you need to do to get complete access is to change the jumper on the ide drive to slave. Now plug it in the laptop and it will show up as a secondary drive. Find what you want and drag it accross

the contacts file is a WAB file. do a search for it.
It will probably come up with a couple. Pick the biggest to drag over

If that doesnt work there is a plan B

 

[diversion74]

Cheers chaps.

Bit confused about the jumper thing.
Looked on the drive and there is a set of pins with a plastic plug over two of them.
When I look at the drive there are three settings.
1 that says master on/jumper off
2 that says cable select - this is how it looks with the plastic plug
3 that says limit drives capacity to 32 gigabytes.

No cable actually fits into this socket so not sure if the plug is the jumper?

Really interested in plan b!

Andy

 

[redcastle]

dont go for plan B yet
take the jumper off all together and give it whirl a rooney

the jumper is the little tiny wee bit. nothing plugs into it

 

[diversion74]

Took jumper off and laptop doesn't even see it now?

Not sure if this is the problem as I can access one of the sets of my documents just not the work user account?

Know the files are there as when virus check on that folder can see them all being checked.

Starting to despair.

 

[redcastle]

give me the drive model and make
quck I want to go to bed

 

[diversion74]

Drive is a seagate
U series 9
Model ST380012A

Came out of an e-machine (I know I know)

S/N 5JV7FR2J

P/N 9W6002-004

HDA P/N 100275523

CONFIG D4W-01

FIRMWARE 4.04

Thanks for trying.

Andy

 

[redcastle]

Ok,
The jumper needs to be off altogether
Start teh laptop with the drive plugged in, it should start normally, now go to my computer and you should see the seagate drive in there.
It will probalby be drive E or F

come on ................ faster im yawning

 

[diversion74]

Tried that but with the jumper off all together the laptop doesn't see it.

Going to give in tonight before I throw something at the wall.

Will give it another go tomorrow.

Thanks for the advice.

Andy

 

[centaur]

Plug the jumper into the CS (cable sensed) pins and try again

 

[Zippy]

I may have missunderstood in which case please ignore....

When you say two accounts - do you mean dual boot - you select 'work' or 'home' as the pc boots up? or just two different XP accounts?

If its dual boot, it may be that you were OK as you were with the laptop, it just hadn't mounted the second volume....?... but I can't remember how to assign a drive letter....??

But if I'm barking up the wrong tree...please feel free to ignore - I'm off to bed now!

Steve

PS. re security tag / warranty thing - the last new Dell I bought < 2years, you are permitted to open it to install upgrades... (eg. extra disc ) The user manual even showed you how...but things might have moved on since then....

 

[diversion74]

Plugged the jumper back into CS and still same problem where I can only access one account.

Sorry, didn't know you could have a dual boot. Just two XP accounts.

Andy

 

[Fanum]

Mr 74...seems to me you're going a long way around the houses and getting stressed by being advised to do so unnecessarily

Get the new PC.....open it up (hardly any these days come with the warranty labels......don't worry about that ) then find the IDE cable that should be in it, or take the one out of the old machine (plug it onto the new MOBO with the red stripe nearest the pin marked '1') and stick the far end (not the middle position on the cable) onto the old drive.....remove all of the little plastic jumper from the 8 jumper pins to set the thing as a slave drive, plug in the power cable (it'll only fit one way) then screw it into the caddy rack inside the machine, stick the side back on and reboot.....all the info will be on the drive and easily accessible.

If you want to, you could use the 'old' hard drive as a master......in this case, put the IDE cable MIDDLE connector into the old drive, moving the new one to the end position on the cable......then set the jumper on the old drive to 'master' (On the ST380012A drive, that's the two pins vertically that are furthest away from the power cable, marked 8 and 7) then set the pins on the 'new' drive that was in the machine to 'slave' (look at the diagram on the top of it) then reboot.......it should reboot using the old 'c' drive and it'll all work as your old machine did.........don't forget to reformat the 'new' disk though 'cos it'll have another copy of windows on it taking up a lot of space

Hell....that doesn't sound as easy as it really is !!!!

Don't worry though......it's actually a piece of pish

 

[Fanum]

PS a nasty thought....if your new machine has a SATA drive in it, don't do the above.....we'll have to have a piss around in your BIOS to get it to see the 'old' drive as a master....you could still install it as a slave though (the best option, as the sata is likely to be a lot faster and that's best for the boot drive) by following the first part of the above....you will need to add the IDE cable yourself, 'cos a new pc with a SATA drive won't have an ide cable on the mobo....it certainly should have the connector block though

 

[diversion74]

Thanks Fanum.

Brother in law has an old pc in his loft that I am going to connect it to as a master and hopefully be able to access both XP user acounts.

Thought this better as surely the usb to ide cable I'm using is treating the drive as a slave already?

Anyway thanks everyone for your help and advice and I'll let you know the outcome.
Should get the pc on Friday night so preparing for a long drink!

Andy

 

[diversion74]

OK, here goes.
Installed hard drive into brother in laws computer as master but machine wouldn't boot up. Since learnt this was to be expected.
Tried it as a slave drive and got same results as using the ide - usb cable on the laptop.
Tried to copy folder across using DOS but this also copies attributes so no good.
Discovered that for some reason the folder was marked as private at some time?
This would mean that although you didn't need a password to open it on the old computer anyone else couldn't look at it.
Seems strange that I can't look at it from laptop with administrater status though?
Anyway.
Started laptop in safe mode and reassigned folder so that I have permission to access it.
All hunky dory now.
Just need to transfer the contents over to the laptop.
Sounds easy and was easier than I thought but couldn't have done it without some advice from a clever bod I know.
Thanks to everyone here for your help.

Andy