Re: [microsound] Re: Laptop Questions

[BJM <bent@xxxxxxxxx>]

Sorry to hear about this... I live in constant fear of a sudden failure 
of my 80 gig work drive. However, I hope you didn't loose it all 
needlessly. Did your operating system get screwed up and you couldn't 
boot up? Or did the drive die? Unless the drive died -- meaning you 
would have to physically replace it -- I hate to say it, but you 
probably could have fixed the system without wiping out all your work.

I use windows 2000, but I think XP is fairly similar. The installation 
disc should have a repair option. And, even if that doesn't work, when 
you re-install the OS you should have the option of not re-formatting 
the drive and installing new system files into the existing file 
structure. There's also the linux-on-a-CD that I was raving about the 
other day... you can boot up with that and access your Windows file 
system and copy stuff (although I'm not sure where you would copy it to 
and that linux CD hasn't gotten to the point of supporting every single 
combination of hardware yet). If you want to check it out, they're at 
dynebolic.org.

You did say "format", so maybe the drive got really screwed up. But, 
just in case, I felt it important to point out that OS troubles do not 
necessarily mean lost data.

b

(Apologies if anyone thinks this is OT... though I do think it's 
important for computer music people to know how to avoid losing all 
their hard work..)

wesley m wrote:

>
> ps: i have an urge to warn everyone to backup their stuff at the 
> moment. i had to format my laptop the other day and lost 4 years worth 
> of samples/feild recordings, tons of downloaded stuff which was 
> probably weeks of d/ling on a 56k and all my newest pieces. not very fun
>
>
>

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