From: Bob Villa on
On Jul 17, 2:07 am, undisclosed wrote:
> Hi, can someone please help me with a huge issue for my notebook. There
> was some sort of a problem with my HP laptop where I was unable to
> access the internet but the internet icon was showing full conectivity.
> In order to fix that little problem, we tried everything from system
> restore many times to the last option: system recovery and hence got
> into a biggg problem on October 30, 2009. Unfortunately we proceeded
> with that last option without proper backup and now the laptop was as if
> "brand new" since it repeated the first steps that were initiated when I
> bought it. Since then, almost 9 months, I have not used it in hope of
> recovering my files and pics but dont know how. Please let me know if I
> have any hope of recovering my lost items and if so, then how. I am
> really veryy worried, any help is much appreciated. Thank you so much!
>
> --
> nousheen

This is after the fact...but if you don't do back-up and your OS goes
South with valuable files you need to remove and replace the HDD.
Install the OS on the new drive and put the old drive in a USB
enclosure. And, more than likely, you will be able to access and
transfer your files.
(You could also add the old drive as a slave and transfer the files
you need)