Recovering data from administrator account on Win XP SP3

Does anyone know how to access data in an administrator account on an NTFS harddrive which has been hooked up as a slave drive on a Windows XP SP3 PC.

My PC has had hardware failure and I can't access my data on the harddrive in my %Root Folder%:\Documents and Settings\username. I get an error dialogue box which states the the path above is inaccessible. I have the ASR backup and floppy but unfortunately the hardware to go with it no longer works. Is there something I could do with that? HELP PLEASE!:cry

 

Well I'm not really sure about this as I've never run into this situation myself, but i believe that linux, with the assistance of some software, can read ntfs drives. But i'm not sure if it could read the protected portions of it.... But hey it'd be worth checking out. Sorry I couldn't help much!

 

Thanks..I have Linux Puppy...which software do I need to use with that?

 

Well, if it is accessible, you might be due to permissions. Try, changing the permissions or set the ownership to the account that is trying to access the drive.

I've ran into this situation in the past.

 

I don't know about Linux Puppy but if you can d/load, burn and boot an Ubuntu live CD that should be able to read the drive, no additional software required.

 

I've booted Linux Puppy from a CD and accessed the data I wanted. Out of curiousity how would I have changed the permissions on the slave drive? I tried right clicking on the drive > selecting properties > Sharing & Security. Changed the permissions to share this drive with other users by dragging it to the shared folders. No change to the inaccessible folder.

 

Was this drive in a Vista system before you hooked it up? That might explain XP's inability to access the files, as Vista's privacy and security settings can only be changed by the files' owner while running Vista.

 

Not talking about sharing. Was talking about, right click on folder, properties, security, advanced tab, ownership, set ownership, then change permissions, on the permissions tab.

Also, XP, can access Vista folders. Quite easy thing to accomplish. Similar to having a XP client accessing server 2008 R2 folders.

 

Whether that is possible depends on the version of XP the OP is using, as Home does not have those features.

 

Well, in an earlier post, she was talking about setting permissions.

But, you should know you can set permissions in XP home. Typically you can go into safe mode and apply there. Or run cacls from the command line.

 

When I right click the folder and select Properties, there is no security tab. Just get three tabs General, Sharing and Customize. The drive I am accessing is NTFS with Windows XP Pro installed and I am using a NTFS WinXP Pro to access it. I find it strange that I can't access the folder. There is no encryption or compression on the drive.

 

Have you tried running cacls to set the permissions to that folder?

Something like:

cacls c:\foldername /t /g everyone:F

Would give the group everyone Full access to foldername c:\foldername and all files and folders underneath it.

Also, could you post a screenshot?

 

In Xp Pro go to Tools in any Explorer window then Folder Options and under the View tasb the last one should be Use Simple File Sharing--uncheck that box. That will give you the Security tab. Then under Security add your username and give yourself full control.

Or just follow the taking ownership guide.

 

Huh, I have that checked on my box, and I still have the security tab. Maybe I'm different.

 

I reload my system about every 6 months and I swear I, too, once had the Security tab without disabling Simple File Sharing!
...Or I could just be mistaken because the last 3 times, I have had to disable it.

Not sure if you are just special or if I got in on that deal at least once in the past. Either way, disabling it should give ITgirl the security tab in this case.

 

Yeah, doesn't really matter anyway, as long as she gets what she needs.

I do want to say, I only use XP at work, and it is on a domain. So, perhaps that is why I have the security tab.