Computer Ate Over Half My Bookmarks

Hello,
First off, I use Windows XP, my browser is Netscape 7.1 and my computer is a Dell, one year old. This forum was very helpful some months ago when all my email folders disappeared.

I've been having a problem with the driver on my recently installed Epson printer all of a sudden. It causes some system problem and Windows automatically shuts down. Its not a daily problem and I will be uninstalling it and install a new version this weekend when I had some time.

But here's my REAL problem, today around 4:30 EST, Windows shut down while I was moving some bookmarks around. When I got back on, half my bookmarks were missing, they are all kept in category folders from A to whatever. The folders now stop at D. Everything past that is missing. This is a new one on me. I lost hundreds of bookmarks including all my eBay, music, movies and much more. I make what little living I do selling on eBay and I need to get those back as well as all the others.

This has never happened the few other times the system crashed. My browser SEEMS fine otherwise with the missing bookmarks my only problem with it.

Wondering if there is any way to restore those bookmarks without using the System Restore function or is that my only option here? And is there anyway to restore the system to just 1 or 2 hours ago like 3PM on 7/29/04???

I see two options to choose from when I look on System Restore:

Restore My Computer To An Earlier Time which in this case would be July 27 at the latest from what I can tell.

OR

Create A Restore Point which I assume means I could choose exactly when I want the system restored to. Am I correct? It states that I can use System Restore to create my own restore points at times other than those scheduled by my computer. It then gives me a Text Box to type a description for my restore point. It also says to choose a description that is easy to identify in case I need to use it to restore my computer later.

Which one would I use if I wanted to? I don't want to turn everything back a couple days as I would lose a lot of eBay auction material I use to make what little living I am at present. I've put a lot together in the past couple days but nothing after say, 3pm today. I use this to make what little income I do these days.

Any recommendations here what to do? I'd hate to recreate all those bookmarks and we're talking many.

And yes, I will remove the driver and reinstall it this weekend. I'm not going to let anything like this happen again.

Thanks in advance for the sage advice to come!

Larry

 

Hi Larry,

I'm assuming that you've not made a backup of your Bookmarks, or Profile. Whatever changes you were making when your system crashed, are probably lost.

Have you done a search for bookmarks.html? Do that and see what you come up with, other than the bookmarks.html file in the *.slt (salted) folder.

I'm afraid I can't help you with a Windows XP restore. Hoping that an XP user will jump in and help you out with that.

Ramona

 

XP's system restore only restore system files, not data file. I'm afraid it won't help you get your bookmarks back.

 

Thanks Anyway

RAMONA SAID:
Hi Larry, I'm assuming that you've not made a backup of your Bookmarks, or Profile.

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MY REPLY:
No, it appears the bookmarks are lost and its many years worth too. I will just have to recreate as many as I need.

As far as backing up the bookmarks, how do I go about doing that and how often should it be done?

Larry

 

One more thing.............................

Ramona said any changes I was making were lost. The thing is, I was not doing anything major to the bookmarks, just moving 1 or 2 new links into a folder. Somehow when the system crashed, it removed more than half the folders containing hundreds of links, none of which I was touching at the time of the crash.

Perhaps for whatever reason, when it crashed, all the folders from the point of the one I was adding to downward got deleted? That seems to be the case.

But anyway, I do understand I cannot restore the bookmarks but would like to know how to back them up on a regular basis. Thanks!

Larry

 

Hi Larry,

What a bummer that you lost most of your Bookmarks! I always suggest backing up the entire Profiles folder. The critical files are bookmarks.html, abook.mab, prefs.js, others are important too, but these are the ones that make us cry, if no backup is available.

I have a guideline for Preventive Browser Maintenance which I believe you will find useful. It goes into detail on how to backup your Profile.

One other thing you might try is bookmarking the links in the History. Click on:
Go | History or Ctrl+H
Right click the links and select: Bookmark this link
This might save at least a few of your Bookmarks

Ramona