Windows 2000 My Documents Contents Disappeared

[det07]

On our computer one of the profiles password changed login failed. So I went in under ADMIN and changed the password. When we login to the proflie everything that was in My Documents is gone. Is there any way to recover the lost files.

In a related question I was told a while back that all the files in My Documents and on a desktop are kept in a compressed file. If that file gets corrupted then all is lost. Had a supervisor at work lose Megs of data that way. Is there a way to change a setting someplace so that My Documents are not compresssed and therefore much less vulnerable to an individual file corruption causing such massive loss of data.

Thanks in advance for any help. DT.

 

[shmoes]

By any chance did you change the profile name along with the password? or was the store folder for mydoc changed?
Changing a password should not have any affect on what you described.


browse to c:\documents and settings\profile name\my documents.

The smartest way not to lose data in the workplace, is to have a backup.


~Shmoes

I lay claim to nothing and everything. My words may be wisdom or disaster. In the end you make a choice. Noone is perfect.

 

[wolluf]

My documents are not normally compressed.

As Shmoes says - changing password should not affect contents of my documents - have you left any detail out? eg, sometimes a profile becomes corrupted, so Windows creates a new one when you log on. The old one should still be there - with my documents etc, but when you log on (with new one) you won't see any of old stuff. Check the \documents and settings folder - there may be 2 or more folders with profile name concerned (second an subsequent with .xxx extension - xxx may be numbers or a name - you also haven't said if this is workgroup or domain. If domain, could be local/domain logon issue).

 

[det07]

This is a workgroup.

The password was not changed it just stopped working.
I then changed the password so that login was possible using ADMIN.

Yes of course backing up files whether at work or at home is the safest thing to do.

However the windows profiles seem to be prone to corruption. If it is possible to remove all compression that may improve. Also I do not save anything of value inside my profile I always browse and save in normal directories - I have not had to resort to backup files since I moved past Windows 95.
If you know how to turn compression off for profiles please let me know.

I found the profile:
profilename.bak.

Apparrently the data was just renamed .bak when the password corruption occurred.

How can I get this back into operation?


Thanks again for any help. DT

 

[Wirdo]

just copy everthing in that folder (hidden files as well) into the new profile or the one you changed the password for that became empty.

 

[ricpinto]

Suggestion:
Go to win explorer, tools, folder option, view and tick "show hidden files and folders" also untick "hide protected operating system files". Now search for a particular file that is inside your missing "My Documents". If you can find it then that's the location and if not then I'm affraid something really bad happens.

 

[wolluf]

det07 - I say again, profile folders are NOT normally compressed - so unless you are compressing them yourself....

'Also I do not save anything of value inside my profile ' - what does this mean - I thought you'd lost a 'My Documents' folder - which nornally lives under the profile.

Have you described your setup fully?

You should be able to copy any files/folders from the .bak version into the current one (eg, My Dcouments, emails, start menu items) - but if you say you are getting profile corruptions commonly, it would be an idea to find out what's causing them.