Musical

I wont be going to my brothers for 2 days so it'll have to wait until then. Im trying to find out whats possible if anyone can shed any more light ...... some utilities can recover even files that have been overwritten????

Hi, My brother has a laptop and Im reasonably sure its a 60Gig drive (approx). 256 RAM. No partitioning. The long and the short of it is he doesnt save much stuff at all except some AVI's and JPEGS. The drive is, going from memory, at least 75% Free. Now, he deleted some JPEGS about a year ago or a tad more and Ive been meaning to help him to try and get these back, as hes not that tech savvy. You know how it goes, sometimes things just slip by you and its not until now that this scenario has come up again. SO after googling about recovery options I've only just seen that you guys also have software to hopefully deal with this. Ive been using CCCleaner for years. Ive told him not to save anything on the computer and use it as minimally as possible until we at least give it a go. I know its probably too long now, and Im thinking about 2 questions .... wouldve temp files from surfing the net overwritten these JPEGS by now? and wouldve the swap file done the same??? Ive also DL'd a utility "Restoration" and tested it on my system to see if it could recover some random different file types. I was able to successfully get Word Docs and PDFs and txt files way past a year old, from both my C partition which is constantly 75 to 80% full and my D drive as well. JPEG seem to be the hardest to recover. I was able to go back on my system which I use heavily and recover at least some. This was sporadic though and in windoze explorer some things had 0 kbs but showed a thumbnail. Others had certain Kbs showing but showed no thumbnail . Go figure. : / Any help greatly appreciated Musical

Mmmm I cant see a thumbnails on my User at that level in but I'm on Pro, not that I think that makes any difference. Also have you tried viewing it in safe mode, and what do the attributes say in the properties . I cant find any folders on my user thats called thumbnails in fact. And thats with all sytem and hidden folders and files showing... I can open a few odd .png files I found in my TIF which are basically wee graphic files of buttons and so forth on webpages by the look of it.... although Windoze gave me a warning that "running a system command might be unsafe... do U wish to cntinue" which of course I ignored HTHs a bit at least Musical

Thats OK JD, worse things happen at sea eh ... Cheers, Musical.

JDPower Im not sure what you mean but maybe I should say that TheFiresInTheSky PM'd me, and instead of clicking on the link in the PM I clicked on the one in his post here Its all good now thanks. rridgely, I know at the Tor site they say its not 100% bullet proof, but from what I can gather and understand so far, (which is not a lot) it gives the most degree of anonymous surfing there is. Also I thought it would be good to hear "outsiders opinions" so I could gain possibly a more unbiased view. Thanks for your input so far guys Musical

Jago, Not thinking along the the lines of illegal downloads or anything P2P really... was more meaning general surfing and that being in regards to privacy. Privacy which in principle has been and is being eroded away right before our eyes. People who think its only those who have something to hide who want privacy are dead WRONG. Privacy is a matter of principle. Thats the type of privacy I'm talking about. Thanx for your comments. TheFiresInTheSky, Yes I've been to the Tor website and done some 'mileage' there getting my head around onion routing and such like. Oh and I clicked on those links you gave, and one thing I dont like doing is joining a forum ... site unseen. Both links took me to a registration page ...whats with that?? I'd like it better if I can view some threads and what not, 1st. Thanks. Musical

Hey all, Thinking of mainly things like TOR or other methodologies that you might recommend, or not recommend or even be suspicious of... Musical

Hazelnut, Wow, interesting link alright!!!! NONE of this surprises me at all, and I NEVER EVER EVER have done, am, or going to, trust M$ .... There is soooooOOOOooooo much underhandedness going on that invades everybodies privacy EVERYDAY that you feel like you have to go to university to learn how to deal with it.. ...... leverything seems to be logged here and there and everywhere leaving your tracks a mile a wide for all to see. Its not that people necessarily have something to hide either, but the principle of the matter, that we were never designed to know everybody elses business. VERY scary stuff, when you see people encouraged to "air their dirty linen in public" as if it is now a natural thing, but I'm getting a bit OT. Musical

Thanx again for all your responses, at least I know all this is not just me .... my Mums still on IE6 and I've used CCleaner on her computer, so next time I see her I will check out what her Local Settings Folder contains. Oh and when I get a spare moment I'll do that Hijack this post. Musical

Dennis, ... no there must be something wrong there... I can get both FF and IE to remember my login.... You haven't got CCleaner set to clean everything on boot up or something similar, (like another proggy like Spybot S&D doing that) have you? I can definitely get my login to "stick" but I was just griping about the fact that I had to try each additional cookie (what I thought might belong to MSN ) and flush out everything then add it and try again. Now that I've "discovered" what the cookies are, the login is fine.... and you have to make sure the cookies are set to be remembered .... let us know how you get on... farbuncle, ... thanks for that, which confirms what I thought. Not that MSN ins't still a HAAAAWG Its just annoying when a cookies name doesn't give you much clue and u have to guess.... Cheers, Musical

Not worrying as such, but just VERY VERY curious.... as I say my system is running very adequately speedwise with a few things a bit glitchy like windows Help and Support takes a minute to load up on my Acct but like about 3 seconds on the others.... Not sure how to read the hijack this logs but I am suspect about one lot of sites that showed up on my TIFs a couple of days ago that I never went to ... would this be a re-direct or something? .... Anywayz me thinks I might just build me a new user account ... but ooooo you don't realize how much you customzie things to your liking till you have to run an untweaked setup Any further comments most welcome... Musical

Well whoever did, they a did a fine job... and dont ya just get sick of the IN YOUR FACE look with colour schreams ooops I mean colour schemes screaming at your eyeballs... Anyway, Full marks.... Musical

Hey all, Just thought I'd drop by and say .... since I've only just started visting this site again I've notied everything has a new look. I'm on dialup and yet I find the site is speedy to load pages, and I love the uncluttered and fresh clean look too. This is not to say that it wants for features either. Like, I also like the way all the options are layed out and just little things here and there that are easy to find and are accessable. These DO make a difference. Other websites that are huge can have you chasing your tail looking for this and that... for example the Reply button at the bottom of threads is either obscure or not there at all and youre left with individual reply buttons. Just my 2 cents Musical

David_L, thanks for your response .... Yes I know about 3rd party cookies, and thanks for the link which gives the heads up about in Mozilla 2.0, and it being harder than 1.5 to block 3rd Party cookies. I've not long installed it and why do they change a good thing??? Anywayz, maybe I didn't make myself clear enough, or maybe its only in relation to one or a very few particular sites. For example when I go to log into my web based email, I have founfd I have to add 4 cookies to keep, in CCleaner, to do with MSN and if I dont have them all, the login details wont "stick".... So I guess the question to ask... is it typical that you would only get 1 cookie per website or is MSN just being a HAAAAAAWG ? Cheers, Musical.

Thanks for your responses. Sorry my answer has been a bit long in coming but its been a quite time consuming preparing this post. I?ve followed up on your suggestions?? I spent a couple of hours in another account yesterday and did a bit of surfing plus clicked on all the users and their Local Settings which I will summarize in a mo?. Then it got late and had to go to bed?. I have about 5 different users I've created over time for various things to try. Anyway I logged on as one of them (full admin ) I tried various things mainly starting off with checking and unchecking that Hide System Files option. I had the 2 pane view open in W Expl. The more I just generally clicked around opening different Folders and subfolders the more inconsistent and wierrrrdo things became. I think I could safely state one thing though.... Im sure certain folders are "built" as you use your computer for that various task.... like in the Mac world we trash various preferences which can become corrupt and the OS will build/rebuild more fresh ones when the program is reloaded or pooter rebooted. Anyway there sure is something horribly screwy with my user Accts. Heres some of the weirdness I encountered.... Yesterday, after Booting into "Other Acct" ? ? on going to my usual user account in Windoze Exp with Folder options showing both hidden and System files when I booted, the 4 folders initially showed. Then when I disabled show System files the History and TIF folders didn't show. But when they did initially show the more clicking I did on the History icon the more wierd it became like having NO + or - sign next to it. Then eventually the History and TIF Folders didn?t show at all. After doing a bit of surfing there were no TIFs or History files !!! BUT when I looked in another User acct it was there !!!!!! These 2 accounts seem to be screwed with each other!!! I found by clicking on Another Users TIF The CONTENT.IE5 originally had + beside each folder below..then as I clicked on one of those folders it lost the + sign, then the rest did after I exited then re-enterd (closed and then opened Content IE5) that is? they all lost their + signs. On my Acct I double Clicked the Content IE5s in the right pane and then they showed in the left pane !!!!! Now today, booting in to My User Account ?. Initially Folders and subfolders would show on my Account, with Hide Sys Files UNCHECKED but TIFs Subby had NO + beside it meaning no subfolders. After going to other users Local Settings and then returning to My User Acct then the History and TIF Folders didn?t show at all. When I did get them to show after rebooting, I performed that search in the addy bar. Now how weirdo is this?????? See Attachments Again I could ?populate? the left panes TIF\Content.IE5?s 4 folders by D Clking in the right panes ones In Content.IE5?s properties on my User Acct I had both Hidden & Read only Checked. Hidden was greyed out. If I disabled Read only, whether I applied it or OK?d it the setting would?nt ?stick?. MikeW Thanks ?it is of some use actually ? just to know its not only me?.. I strongly suspect IE7 too. fireryone ?Weird how the check box seems to have been reversed (on is off/off is on) though?. On second glance at the + and ? signs I now have to say I cant see where they are opposite?. Sorry I must be temporarily blind now or hallucinated before ?. Coz they look OK now?can you explain exactly which ones are opposite coz all mine show like this ?. Like?When you click on the little + it opens that folder to a ?new level one layer in? which is evident by a ? mark I take it? ?The directory may be super hidden on like in the old Win98 days. Even with "Show Hidden files" checked and "Hid Protected Operating System Files" unchecked .? As you can see I can actually get them to show but with a fair bit of inconsistent weirdness, and I can?t seem to use the unhide option in the Content.IE5 properties as it is greyed out. So any ideas on how can I ?super unhide? these super hidden Folders would be most welcome? As I said, Ive done your search and so please see these attachments in relation to bringing up the Content.IE5 Folder as well as other general discrepancies ALL screenshots are of my usual Account in Local Settings 1/ Initial view with Hide Syst Files unchecked 2/ Another ?initial view? with Hide Syst files unchecked 3/ 2 Folders now show after exiting and re-opening Local settings a few times. The exact amount of clicking unreproducable. 4/ The view after I did an address bar search 5/ ?Repopulating? the Folders on the left by DClking the folders on the right (and ignoring the warning about opening sys files) 6/ Content.IE5 properties whilst accessing from My Account

fireryone !!! Full marks for noticing that!!! which I didn't see until U pointed it out. As I say wiieeerdoo. I know about a month ago when I was clicking on this and that, I was sometimes getting things to show under various settings and sometimes not, but could'nt reproduce the wierdness at will...... Anywayz yeah, thanx for the suggestion, I will go into another account and see what happens...

Andavari, thanks for your reply, Care to tell me how you actually manaully recreated it? ...like a step by step procedure... I tried and failed, but that was the actual History and TIF folders, which I found are actually there but they arn't showing unless I have the Hide protected OS files unchecked. wiiieeeerd man wiierrd. Its the IE5 folder and the 4 inside that that are still missing in my User Account, but as you can see by the picks the files are on the next layer in. I havn't even started figuring out the index dat situ with this yet.... 1st th8ings 1st Musical

I thought the Attachments would show the file name, which it hasn't so I need to just add that the pickie on the left is My usual User Account and the one on the right is Another User Account. Musical

Please help with this exxxxtreeeeemly puzzling problem.... which has bugged me no end for a while now... 1st I'll say this. In a thread "history folder, to view history folder " that Login 123 posted at the very end of last year about probs with the Local Settings and subfolders, it described what seemed to be the closest I've seen that has at least some sort of resemblance to my problem . Just as an aside, my system actually does have a few unrelated glitches but overall the performance is fine. XP Pro - IE7 - Latest CCleaner. I've always wondered whether CCleaner may have screwed up/erased some of my Subfolders somehow, but wasn't sure. Also, this is one of those things that just happened unawares as sometimes things do B4 you actually take enough notice to pin down dates and such. I cant remember when this exactly started happening, but probably around late last year or early this year and I can't remember whether my installing IE7 was at the same time and has screwed this up and not CCleaner at all. Sooo heres a description of what the problem is as best as I can describe it. With these settings below, some of my Subfolders are not showing on my account in the Local Settings. On other accounts they are showing on some accounts OK with Subfolders and still others dont have the complete subfolders. With Windoze Explorer > Tools > Folder Options > Show Hidden Folders and files > enabled .... heres what I see by Clicking on Docos and Settings > My User Name > Local settings ..... 2 Subfolders : Application data and Temp. If I Disenable "Hide protected OS files" (in the same Folder Options area), then the History and Temporary Internet Files folders show up.... but NOT with the 4 Subfolders. Please have a look at my Pikkies to make my point hopefully clearer. Questions: 1/ Who else has got this problem and have you resolved it and if so how? 2/ I've tried copying in the subfolders from other accounts and Noooo Goooo ... is there a way I can copy them back ???? (but ooooo noooo please no OS reinstalls ) 3/ Does Windoze somehow only "build" a History Folder OR TIF Folder on a new account once theres files to put in there....? ( hope I'm making sense ) 4/ I thought the Local Settings Folder was supposed to be "dulled out"? my one is "full colour" ... why is that or is this a new IE7 thing ??? Any input ]MUCH [[/b]/size]appreciated TIA Musical

Hi, Im finding dealing with which cookies to keep fopr site that u log into, quite confusing. Ive seen a thread just down a bit relating to this where you have to log in to sites but I thought I would post my own thread. Now some sites you go to only give you one cookie as I understand it. But others will drop like 4 or so cookies on you. Sometimes you dont know which ones are relative to who, until you have to go back and log in again So you set up a site by site thing checking one by one which cookies are relative to who, then going into options, deleteing all the files and start again for each indiviual site you go to. Please help! Surely there is a better way than this Comments most welcome. Musical.

As has been already said, definitely get an UPS. I have an APC Smartups1000I I purchased about 1 1/2 years ago, and it has 8 inputs which I hook my Mac, My PC, soundcard, and some synths on to and she cooks with gas. Heaps of headroom.(About 20 minutes uptime) Heres some more points you might want to consider. - if you are in a rural area, and/or live in an area prone to electrical storms, I would make this a matter of urgency. - Make sure you "size" your components that you want to protect. I found websites that had a feature where they would help you to size your gear according to things like, How much grunt your CPU has, Number of HDDS etc. - Do your homework on these things, and learn what they do and how they operate. Learn how to best avoid deep draining the battery which can cost an arm and a leg and a years wages!!!! (well not really but theyre NOT cheap).... "But if you aren't there during the power outtage, what if the UPS runs out of power? what will it do then? Will it safely shut of your computer and prevent any damage? Because I want to make sure the whole point of a UPS is to prevent any power surge damage EVER...." Some UPS' have shutdown software that come with them. You might wanna look carefully at this to ensure compatibility with your system too. To me its not that big of a deal as Im never far from my computer when its on. As such, I havent bothered installing the SW. Your needs look to be different from what you say. An UPS is not gonna do any good at all if, say, youve got 7-10 minutes of uptime, but youre not there to manually shut it down, and with no software to "gracefully" shutdown your computer for you. Thats the main purpose of an UPS, to gracefully shut down your system. Its either done manually OR by software. - I know as technology gets better and better, things may have considerably improved since I got my UPS. They didnt all have features that may be counted as standard nowadays, so just in case, I would highly recommend one that gives off an audible alarm. -As was mentioned earlier, a decent UPS can clean up your power from "line noise" and harmonics and such, and these are VERY destructive to the delicate componentry inside our 'puters and the like. Ironically computers themselves are said to exacerbate the problem of the above, so, its worth while getting a decent UPS, but OTH dont oversize either. These things can range greatly in price too. By and large though, you'll get what you pay for. Just as a matter of interest, as I understand it, its not the actual " hard cycling off" that hurts the computer, its when the power comes back on, that does the damage, as you are more likely to have things like power surges, and these are BAD especially when the power alternates quickly between being on and off, as can sometimes happen. HTHs and all the best in your decision. Musical.