Windows Help Center

First thing to keep in mind: If your computer hasn't crashed yet, it will in the future! So instead of waiting for fate to strike, take some precautions now:

1) BACK-UP! Buy some decent DVD-R discs and put everything useful in them. When you have more useful stuff, backup again. Do this often.

2) Keep your computer healthy. Use an antivirus, an anti-spy, and a firewall. Keep them updated. Check regularly for Windows critical fixes.

3) Don't install software that would do dangerous things to your hard drive. A boot manager would fall in this category.

4) Use a registry cleaner before and after you install or uninstall any software. Many of the problems that will keep Windows from booting are caused by sloppy software that mess up your registry. A good registry cleaner is Tune-up Utilities.

Code:

http://www.tune-up.com/

5) Run chkdsk now and then. Go to Start> Run. Type chkdsk /F. Press enter.

In case your PC has already crashed, read the following:

Most important: Don't panic! Panic is like a little demon that whispers in your ear to format your hard drive and reinstall everything. Don't do it! You will lose all your data and the little demon will laugh at you.

To be exact you can still recover your data if you format your drive (by using special software), but only if you don't write anything on the disc afterwards. In other words format + windows install = bad idea. If you reinstall windows without formating your drive, you will only lose the files on your desktop and "My Documents" folder.

In all occasions you should make sure to safeguard your files before attempting any kind of repair!

So let's go about how to do that:

The fast way: Go to this site:

Code:

http://www.knoppix.org

. Knoppix is a Linux distribution than runs from a CD. Download the Knoppix ISO and burn it. Put it in your CD drive. On startup access BIOS and change the boot sequence so that your computer boots from the CD drive. Save settings and exit. Upon reboot, Knoppix will load.

Knoppix is much like windows and it comes with its own CD burner. Locate it, launch it and backup everything you want on CD. Now you don't have to worry anymore!

The less fast way: This requires that you have access to a second PC. Open the case of your computer and remove the hard disk.

Install it as a slave on the second PC.

Depending on respective configurations, you may have to change some jumper settings on the drive. Read the manual for help with installing hard drives and setting jumpers.

After this is done, boot the second PC. If everything went out ok, you should be able to access your drive without problems. (Edit: Note that Win98 cannot recognize a local NTFS (Win2K/XP) disk.)

Copy everything you need from your own hard drive to the other one. Now you don't have to worry anymore!

Replace your computer's hard disk, fix all problems and reverse the process to copy the data back to your computer, or take CD backups on the other PC.

You all downloaded some game or app once that was 50 parts big, and you had to rename them all from .bmp to .rar to extract them.

You can easily create a batch file that does that for you.

Open Notepad

fill in the notepad:

CODE

ren *.bmp *.rar

Ofcourse, you have to edit these two extensions to fit the files you want to convert. Save this file as renamer.bat and run it in the directory where you want to rename your downloads.

How to Rename File Extensions  

A lot of people here may ask how to rename a file extension in windows; well it’s very simple and takes little of your time. There are two ways to rename a file extension ‘without’ a stupid program.

Number 1, Folder Options:

Go into your Control Panel, in my case I use Windows XP so I would press [Start then Control Panel]. Now that you figured out how to get in Control Panel open “Folder Options” and click the view tab and make sure ‘Hide file extensions for know files’ is not selected, then press Ok.

Now go into a folder and notice you can see your files extensions, rename them to whatever you'd like, for instance:

Code:

Dildos.exe to Dildos.Anonymous / Etc,Etc,Etc

Number 2, MS-DOS:

The difference between renaming files in DOS is that you can rename multiple files rather then one at a time, therefore making time gracious. Here I’ll provide you a few examples.

Go to your start menu and open run, then type “cmd” without parenthesis. Ok you’re in MS-DOS right? Geesh common man I know a 5 year old that can do it. Ok good your in? Excellent… Ok now find out which directory has your files and type:

Example

cd C:\Files\

In your case “C:\Files\” may not exist, so type in the directory that your have you files in. If everything goes will dos will look kinda like this:

Code:

Microsoft Windows XP [Version 5.1.2600]

(C) Copyright 1985-2001 Microsoft Corp.

C:\Documents and Settings\User>cd C:\Files\

If all fails, you perhaps didn’t type in the correct folder/name and it will look like this:

Code:

C:\Documents and Settings\User> >cd C:\Filse\

The system cannot find the path specified.

Did you get in the directory yet????? If not I recommend you stick with the first step and hang yourself. Oh your in? OK COOL, type: dir and you will be provided with what files are in your folder, including their extensions. In my case:

Code:

C:\Files>dir

 Volume in drive C has no dildo.

 Volume Serial Number is CXXX-XXXX

 Directory of C:\Files

02/01/2005  07:22 PM              .

02/01/2005  07:22 PM              ..

01/31/2005  06:40 PM            14,336 stf.bmp

01/31/2005  06:40 PM            14,336 stf02.bmp

               2 File(s)         28,672 bytes

               2 Dir(s)  39,024,766,976 bytes free

C:\Files>

Did you notice how I had two files named stf. Since both of these files have the same extension, *.bmp they can be renamed all together. If there are other files in there witht he same extension and you don't want to rename them, move them to another folder and / or directory.

Last but not least, after listening to my horrific grammar type:

Code:

C:\Files>ren *.bmp *.rar

And your results are:

Code:

C:\Files>dir

 Volume in drive C has no penis.

 Volume Serial Number is CXXX-XXXX

 Directory of C:\Files

02/01/2005  07:37 PM              .

02/01/2005  07:37 PM              ..

01/31/2005  06:40 PM            14,336 stf.rar

01/31/2005  06:40 PM            14,336 stf02.rar

               2 File(s)         28,672 bytes

               2 Dir(s)  39,024,676,864 bytes free

C:\Files>]