Have you ever had a computer disaster? The one that makes you feel like the end of the world is here and that you've lost 1,2+ years of work in oblivion. I had some too and I'd like to share some of the worst.
1. I'm installing RedHat 7.x beta, I don't remember what I did but I noticed he's formatting the disk with windows. Ctrl+Alt+Del after format. Ok,let's think a bit. I'm doomed. But wait, it didn't take too long this format, maybe was only a quick-format? So I install windows on a spare disk (I like having a lot of disks), install Windows, install Norton and tried restoring the FAT. Bingo! It really made my day.
2. The second was that one of the most basic Windows XP files was damaged (I don't know what damaged it) and my disk didn't want to boot anymore. Better still, my disk at the time needed extra drivers so Windows Rescue didn't work on it. So what happened was that I installed XP on a second disk, patched the needed file and copied it over the damaged one. As this disk is the one I'm using now, I believe it was some misbehaving program that did it but god knows what was it.
3. This happened recently, I installed Windows XP SP2. I had cancelled one of the Updates and suddenly AutoUpdate stopped working. It was downloading the Updates (that I had installed) and was failing to install them. So I 'wisely' decided to move the files I found in one of the Windows directory that I suspected contained the WU msi files. Biiiiig mistake. XP immediately detected this thing and went crazy. On the next reboot, no choosing between users. Enter username (what was it? Reboot from another disk and look), remember the password... Many graphic elements didn't show the way they should. It seemed I moved some basic dll, perhaps I triggered some of the protections that are in XP now, who knows. At this moment I didn't know what to do, thankfully putting the files in place resolved the issue (never delete things you don't know what they are) and things are ok again.

So,I recommend you do backups are much as you can (and afford) and always have a spare disk near by. Also these days you can get great CD's with some emergency tools 'but that is another story'.

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