Cannot Reboot after overnight Erase

crowbo1

New Member
Hi All,
After leaving a computer in Erase mode overnight, in the morning I came out to find that my computer was off and it will not reboot. It just shows a cursor flashing on the monitor. The CD/DVD drive will not even recognize a Windows disk. I was erasing the documents and settings folders off of a friend's business computer, which is up for sale. Undoubtedly, it could have been an error on my part, because it was my first use of Eraser.

Does anyone have any experience or insight into how I can get back into the system? BTW, I am using "portable" on my usb drive. It was Windows Professional too.

Thanks in advance
 
Perhaps you set Eraser to erase all files in the C: drive instead of the free space in the C: drive? If that's the case there's nothing that can be done short of a reinstallation of your operating system...

Joel
 
I didn't think I did, as I used the drag and drop method of placement of exactly what I wanted erased. Is there a sure way to tell whether thats the case or not? Do you think if I installed another hard drive with an OS on it, I could see whether there are files still resident on the "erased" drive?
 
You could get a Linux distro with a Live CD (eg Ubuntu) boot it up and mount your hard disk and see if the files are still there.

Joel
 
Thanks for your replies Joel. Could you explain in a little more detail about how to do the Live CD. Do I download it, then burn it to a CD, then boot from that CD on the computer in question? Just want to be clear as I've seemed to done something wrong already.
 
Yep, it should just start Linux when you restart your computer. You should see your hard disk on the Live CD desktop and cantherefore examine its contents.

Joel
 
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