Hi,

I have 2 old machines I want to toss. I think one is Win95 and the other Win98. I want to grab certain files from the hard drives before destroying them. The Win98 won't boot and I haven't tried the 95 machine yet.

Is there a relatively simple way of pulling each HD and connecting it to my Win2000 machine to see files and move them to my Win2000 HD?

Thanks.

I like to use usb to IDE connectors to do that myself, those drives are fat16 or could be fat32. XP should pick them up so you can move the data over.

It's not XP it's 2000...

Still, it should work. I would try, but thats just me .

Doesn't matter; both 2000 and XP are fully backward compatible in that regard.

All you should need to do is install each drive as a slave drive in the new system, paying attention to the Master/Slave jumper settings on your IDE devices. The drives should then appear in Windows Explorer; from there you can copy your old data to the new drive. I'd suggest working with the drives one at a time to minimize the chance of confilicts, especially since you indicated that one of hte old drives is unbootlable.

In terms of the unbootable drive, hopefully the damage is minimal enough that the system can at least read the data on the drive and let you copy it off. If the damage is severe enough that you can't even do that, let us know; there are further options you can try.

Thanks guys! I will try this later in the week and let you know how I make out...

OK- let us know if you have any questions or problems.

THANK YOU ALL!!!! Everything worked just as advised. The data was retrieved, the old machines are at the recycler, and the drives are awaiting some fun with a hammer.

You're welcome; glad we could help.
Have fun with that hammer... :mrgreen: