Data recovery via Knoppix (or other tools)?

[dissent]

MY refurb Dell Latitude E1505 laptop has decided to stop cooperating. I accidentally hit the Media Direct button on the machine - after exiting the crappy Dell Media Direct environment, I now get a "ntoskrnl.exe file missing or corrupted" error when I try to boot back into Windows XP. What a pile of feces. May be the straw that breaks the camel's back with me and Dell.

So, anyway, I want to try to recover some of the newer data off the laptop, if possible. Most was backed to external drive, but not some of the more recent stuff. A couple of weeks ago, I tried to use a more recent version of Knoppix (7.0.4, I believe) to help somebody recover from an issue on their Win7 machine., but I couldn't see where all their Windows data files were once Knoppix loaded. Apparently the drive has to be "mounted" in order to read/write to NTFS drives. Or something. Whatever. Now I want to try to do the same thing for my hosed Windows XP laptop. I'm not too keen on trying to rummage through forum posts to try to figure out the linux commands to make this all work nice, so I am coming to all of you, hat in hand, to ask for help. Can someone point me to the "For Dummies" version of how to boot Knoppix and get it to read Windows folder structure so I can just copy the files over to an external drive? I have a vague recollection of doing this several years ago with an earlier version of Knoppix (maybe v.3). The again, maybe I'm wasting my time with Knoppix and someone can point me to a much spiffier new (free) tool that can do this much better.

I'm all ears. Thanks for reading.

[fliptw]

http://www.ubcd4win.com/

[Krom]

Or alternately, Hirens CD. Both ultimate boot and Hirens CDs should have the option to boot to Windows PE environments.

[dissent]

http://www.ubcd4win.com/

Thanks. I have the 5.1.1 version from this place -
http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/download.html

I'll take a look and try to see if they're different.

[dissent]

Or alternately, Hirens CD. Both ultimate boot and Hirens CDs should have the option to boot to Windows PE environments.

Thanks, I'll check it out. Basically I'll be happy if I can just slide the data over, then wipe the drive and re-install XP. May disable the NIC and just keep it around as a media player until the hardware craps out.

[dissent]

I got the Hirens cd 15.2 from
http://www.hirensbootcd.org/download/

Unfortunately for teh noob (that would be me), both of these disks look to contain just a dizzying array of fixit tools with not too much documentation on which tools to use under which circumstances. I don't see a Windows PE environment listed under either one. Hirens does have a mini XP to boot into. Should I try using one of the file managers from this list?

[Spidey]

I know they cost money, but they’re handy to have around anyway…grab one of those SATA (insert your drive type here) to USB external adapters.

Just a thought if all else fails, and the data is valuable enough.

[dissent]

Interesting. I could stop fumbling around and just pull the drive and dump the data to my desktop machine if I had the right USB plug connector thingy (that would still power the drive; drive enclosure).

It may come to that. I'm running a chkdsk /r on the drive now in Recovery Console; apparently if I do this I'm supposed to be able to see the data drive when I load Knoppix.

It would really be nice if there was a good discussion about how to actually USE Knoppix on the Knoppix web site.

[Krom]

Mini XP is hirens name for the Windows PE mode.

[dissent]

Nevermind !!!!

I can't remember seeing this for sure or not, but it looks like after running the chkdsk /r I am NOW able to see the file directories in the Knoppix File Manager. Am copying them over now to external usb drive. The chkdsk said it did fix "one or more errors". So, unless I'm out of my mind (not to be discounted as a possibility), that was the reason I could not get the drive to read on Knoppix boot up.

So there ya go.

Thanks Krom; was still typing while you posted.