My home computer crashed (apparent virus), and it contained my iTunes collection. Is my collection lost?

Question

My iPod is on the blink right now too, so I have to send it off to be repaired, but my home computer just flashes a blue screen when I boot it up. So, I have no access to my iTunes right now. Is it true that unless I can get my iPod back on track and/or get my home computer repaired, I've lost my iTunes collection forever? This is what I'm hearing from my friends! If this is true, it's very disappointing, since I've paid good money to pay for my music downloads the legal way! Please help!

Answer 1

not neccesarily true. you can take your hard drive to a computer shop and have them go thru it and see what is still on it. i did it myself and retrieved everything that i thought i lost even my whole photo album. word of advice put everything on backup like a disk or something!!!!!!!

Answer 2

Hopefully you created a startup floppy disk for your computer. Put the floppy disk in the drive and turn on your PC. This will load all necessary files to start your computer. You will not (at this time) have anything other than a DOS screen. Depending on the OS you use, you may have the option to restore your computer to a previous 'good' state using System Restore selecting a SysChk point date.
>>If you have a 'bootable' CD for your antivirus software, put the CD in the drive, turn on computer, let it boot up using the CD which will download the virus signatures, scan your computer and provide a log of what it finds and provide the option to delete the virus or archive. If you do not have a CD, suggest you purchase one. Although expensive, Norton System Works Professional is a Very Good and user friendly program.
Good Luck.

Answer 3

if the virus has deleted your hard drive then you have lost everything. but that is VERY rare. do NOT format ANYTHING!! if you do you WILL lose your songs. instead try the following: open the side of your computer, remove your hard drive, bring to friends house, open his computer, plug in to his computer. here are some links i found for you to look at: how to remove hard drive http://www.fonerbooks.com/r_hard.htm How to install into your friends computer: By now you should have the hard drive sitting in your hands. look at the back where the IDE cable (thin gray cable) and molex (power Connector) plug in http://www.chinook-computers.com/computer_build/images/Pb060067.jpg the spot the screwdriver is pointing is where the master/slave/cable select (cl,csl,etc) and note the position (the hard drive should have this written on it. It will probably be on the top label or under the area where the jumpers are set. if on cable select check the drive in your friends computer. If your friends computer is also set to cable select you can just plug it in to the second spot on the SAME cable as your friends hard drive. boot (turn on) your friends computer and let it start up. to avoid headaches make sure your friend is running xp (98 won't work if your computer is less then 6 years old) computer will boot, install drivers (if your drive is working) if a bubble dosent pop up in the bottom right hand of your screen then your drive is probably dead. if it does follow instuctions (if any) restart computer, go to My Computer there should be a list of a drives in there your disk is a hard drive so that narrows it to two or three choices (try drive D first open your my documents folder, and copy your 'My Music' folder to your friends drive. i have to go but I wil add another post.

all right i'm back.
Here is a picture of an IDE cable and the proper way to install it http://www.kids-online.net/learn/click/details/idecab.gif I forgot to mention to use an 80 conductor IDE cable (shoud be the one attached to your hard drive) and not a 40 conductor (attached to CD-ROM drive. The difference is the 80 conductor cable will look like it has more wires but will still have 40 pins on the connector (wires will be smaller and closer together). A 40 conductor cable will have bigger, thicker wires. If you have any questions email [e-mail].

Answer 4

well, not necessarily. Usually when you get blue-screen-of-death while it boots, it means that the Operating System is corrupted. If you have an emergency recovery disk, that has a backup of the OS registry you can try to fix it. Otherwise the easier option would be to install your harddisk on another computer as a "slave" drive. If it's only the Operating System that is corrupted; you should be able to access all your data on it this way. I've done many times with successful results.

Answer 5

Hmm, that happened to me once. I don't think it was a virus, something booted up wrong and my itunes was completly gone. My husband messed around with it and had to re-install some stuff, but all my music was still there. I'm sorry I can't tell you what to do to fix your problem, but maybe all hope isn't lost. In the future, I would advise you to get an external hard drive so you can save all important stuff on it and then put it in the closet. Mine was $80. Totally worth it for when problems arise. Good luck!

Answer 6

For about $50 you can take your hard drive into a computer store and they will take what ever information off of it that you want. Now, I'm not positive if this will work in the case of a virus. But if your computer failed because of a technical malfunction there is a good chance that everything can be saved.

Answer 7

There is no good answer for you. Try taking the pc to be repaired - even if they can't fix it they may be able to recover some data (songs) for you.

You might try booting your PC while holding down the F8 key and when the menu comes up boot in "safe mode". Then as soon as it is up, copy your files to another hard-drive, CD, DVD, iPod, or whatever.

Answer 8

you have to reformat the harddrive and re-install your operating system. However you can bring it to me so that i can recover your files. if your computer has not been working for at least 5 days, then nothing can be done and all is lost, and you have to do what i said at first. the virus keeps working even if your computer is turned off. if it was a strong virus then your harddrive might already be corrupted and you are going to have to buy a new one.

Answer 9

Assuming the computer can be fixed - and it could be any of a number of things - without having to format the hard drive, then your tunes will be saved. If the hard drive has to be formatted, or the tunes files are corrupt, you probably lost them.

Answer 10

If worst comes to worst, take your PC to the Geek Squad at Best Buy, and they can recover files form your hard drive. They should be unaffected unless the virus erased your files too.

Answer 11

Yes, if you cannot get your Ipod or PC back into working form, your music is gone. This why whenever you buy music from iTunes a little box pops up that says "Back up your music!"