I inadvertently restore system to its original state

[Guest fl]

Hi,

I want to add a new video card to my HP Pavillion a820n computer. From

some advice on the newsgroup, I uninstall the original video on-board

driver first. Then, I wanted to delete other left driver under display

and video adapter driver after the safe mode bootup (This is the

suggestion for the upgrade video driver). But, my computer go to

system restore, instead of safe mode bootup. It had quite a long time

to restore and to the partition action later. Now, my computer

directly goes to the single administer account (previously it has four

accounts). Even though I can see the shared directories and files, the

other three account files, I lost my documents under My Documents

directory. Could you help me to recover my documents? Thanks a lot. My

computer has an XP family version.

[Guest fl]

Re: I inadvertently restore system to its original state

 

On 12 juil, 20:35, fl <rxjw...@gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi,

> I want to add a new video card to my HP Pavillion a820n computer. From

> some advice on the newsgroup, I uninstall the original video on-board

> driver first. Then, I wanted to delete other left driver under display

> and video adapter driver after the safe mode bootup (This is the

> suggestion for the upgrade video driver). But, my computer go to

> system restore, instead of safe mode bootup. It had quite a long time

> to restore and to the partition action later. Now, my computer

> directly goes to the single administer account (previously it has four

> accounts). Even though I can see the shared directories and files, the

> other three account files, I lost my documents under My Documents

> directory. Could you help me to recover my documents? Thanks a lot. My

> computer has an XP family version.

 

From the start up of the computer, it seems that it is at the original

state because it asked to setup internet etc. I cannot see any

previous date from the System Restore application. Thanks.

[Guest Daave]

Re: I inadvertently restore system to its original state

 

"fl" <rxjwg98@gmail.com> wrote in message

news:d440587b-7db0-45c8-83c8-7d38dbab4ab6@z66g2000hsc.googlegroups.com...

> Hi,

> I want to add a new video card to my HP Pavillion a820n computer. From

> some advice on the newsgroup, I uninstall the original video on-board

> driver first. Then, I wanted to delete other left driver under display

> and video adapter driver after the safe mode bootup (This is the

> suggestion for the upgrade video driver). But, my computer go to

> system restore, instead of safe mode bootup. It had quite a long time

> to restore and to the partition action later. Now, my computer

> directly goes to the single administer account (previously it has four

> accounts). Even though I can see the shared directories and files, the

> other three account files, I lost my documents under My Documents

> directory. Could you help me to recover my documents? Thanks a lot. My

> computer has an XP family version.

 

I believe you are confusing System Restore (a function of the Windows XP

operating system) and HP's System Recovery function. Information on the

latter may be found at:

 

http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?lc=en&cc=us&docname=bph07145&dlc=en

 

System Restore is only concerned with returning the system's settings

(e.g., the registry and some other settings) to a previous point in

time, usually a few days ago). Information for future reference:

 

"Use System Restore to Undo Changes if Problems Occur"

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/helpandsupport/learnmore/systemrestore.mspx

 

"Windows XP System Restore Is Easy to Use"

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/helpandsupport/getstarted/ballew_03may19.mspx

 

Unfourtunately, you learned the hard way that backing up your data is

best done before you lose it. It sounds like you performed a destructive

recovery. If you are lucky, you may be able to retrieve some of the lost

data. This will involve removing the hard drive and either attaching it

as a slave in another PC or placing it in an external USB enclosure.

Then you would need to run a data recovery program on the other PC to

attempt to salvage what is possible. The sooner this is done, the

better, because any further use of your hard drive will result in even

more loss of data. There are many data recovery programs available, some

free. Perhaps you need to take the PC to a professional (but not a chain

store!). If the data is extremely valuable, you could always take it to

a data recovery specialist, but that can wind up costing you thousands

of dollars.

 

What exactly is "XP family version"? Do you mean XP Home?