I have a notebook with 3 partitions: 1 XP (NTFS) and 3 EXT3. I tried to do a re-install from my USD HDD, where I keep my back-up data, and for whatever thge reasons, the Linux OS installed itself on both my notebook and the USB HDD. Don't know why, except I may have erase my backup data. I re-install XP on my notebook, thinking I would see my USB HDD; but, to no avail.

I then used my lunux CDLIve suse 10.1 to see what would happen and, yes, my my HDD mounts and I can only see a fresh linux install... no windows data.

Is my data lost?

Thanks

It looks like you may have lost your data. There are ways to recover it, but Im not sure if it is possible since you will have overwritten it.

You must have pressed the wrong button during the SuSe install to make it install to both the HDD and the USB HDD

--Ian

Hmmm--I have never seen an installer that would simultaneously install to two different disks...

What is on the main disk now?

If there is valuable data on the USB drive--don't write to it. There is alwasy a chance that **some** can be recovered.

Thanks for your help. I haven't written anything to the USB since I didn't want to mess up any possible data recovery. I'm experimenting with a couple of recovery data util to see if this works; otherwise, I'll ask a local tech firm to help.

Thanks