I copied the ISO to a CD+R (I don't know why I thought that would work) and rebooted. Halfway through I pulled the disc out and Windows would not finish booting up. I restarted but same thing. I took the HD out and put it in another computer. In Windows Computer Management, the disk shows "(G 931.51 GB RAW"

Did I just lose everything that disk? There wasn't anything very important and nearly everything was backed-up, but I would really like to have that disk back.

And what happened here?

Did you actually begin the install of LinuxMint? What happened when you attempted to boot off the CD?

You may just have a bad MBR and can rebuild it with the Windows recovery tools.

No clue. In general, it's not good to "pull a disk out" when the computer is running, booting, etc. In this case, you say it was booting Windows (ignoring the CD, as expected)---I can't see how ejecting a CD could cause a problem.

You can probably recover some data, but only if you are very careful to do nothing that would cause a write to the disk. The standard tools are "testdisk" and "photorec"--both available here:

http://www.cgsecurity.org/

I'm not sure if it was installing. I remember recovery tools showing up, but that was after like forty minutes. And even then all I had was a background image and a pointer.

Thank you for the tool links. I'll see what I can get.

I want to get into programming and decided to start with a Linux system, what with all the compilers available. This is a 'fun' start.

Your original post isn't really clear. You need to burn the ISO file as an image. How were you doing this copying? Were you doing it from a windows operating system. You indicate you "copied" the ISO then rebooted and "pulled the disk out". Does this mean you pulled the disk (CD) out while you were trying to reboot windows? I also can't see how removing this CD with copied data during a boot would cause this problem. From what you have posted I don't see how you could have started an installation. More specifics on exactly what happened might help.

I had a similar problem. I tried to do a dual boot with Windows XP and openSUSE. I had done such a thing before back in the day when I was running Win 98SE and I dual booted with Red Hat, but I was on dialup then.
This time I tried to dual boot openSUSE with Win XP, but I was connected with a wireless dongle. When I went to run the ISO disk that I got, since I couldn't connect to the net through the dongle, I couldn't access the repos I needed to install SUSE. When the installation program ran from the ISO disk, I think it overwrote my MBR for Windows, since every time I tried to reboot I got the black screen with "error loading operating system".
The only way I managed to get to where I am now running Linux was to physically connect my PC to the router with a cat5 cable.
Maybe the starter of this thread is on a wireless.
You here at LQ should start a pinned thread: Do Not Try To Install Linux Unless You Have A Physical Connection!
I have tried (with much expert advice) to get my wireless dongle to work, and it has always failed.
Please tell people this before they fry their Windows trying to dual boot.

Removing a CD while the computer is booting would have zero effect on the hard drive. I think the failure is just a coincidence.

I dragged and dropped the ISO to the CD. I do know better than that, I don't know why I tried to install it that way. One of those moments, you know? After I copied it, I restarted and once the BIOS or Windows logo appeared (I don't remember when exactly) I pulled out the disc. Then Windows logo stayed glowing for about ten minutes before I held down the power button.

Anyway, I have since installed LinuxMint on a USB and used that to install on a fresh hard drive. Everything there is working fine.

Yeah, I didn't expect that to cause a problem, but the drive is only a few months old and it feels like I did something to cause the failure. I might have pushed the reset button, too, I don't remember.