It is started when my 7+ years Fujitsu E8420P notebook, running Windows Vista Business, crashes frequently. The windows just freezes, inactive mouse, and no apps response. I noticed the culprit is the browser, seems it is Firefox since I used it as default browser. Sometimes Firefox was the only apps running and notebook still crashed. Every time the crash happened, I have to press the notebook power button for couple of secs ( 5 - 7 secs) until it is really powered off. Next time it is rebooted, just hope (or exactly prayed) that it will go back to normal. Sometimes, needs to restart in Safe Mode.
By that time, I already thought to buy external hard disk to back up personal data.
I did partition the hard disk into C and D, where D drive stores data only.
But misfortunes came uninvited ...
Recently it is getting more frequent.
No way to survive with old same method.
It is stalled, frozen, go back and forth Safe mode.
Even it goes to Repair and Diagnostic mode, built-in feature by Fujitsu.
Still no hope, seems boot sector / startup sector in hard disk really damaged, beyond repair.
Procrastinate ... delaying to buy this important device though I was browsing some local / online shops recently to find good bargain.
If anything can go wrong, it will.
At the end 21.07 my system really gave up, refused to start Windows at all.
Yesterday I bought one Toshiba Canvio 1TB External HDD (model: DTP-210) for S$85.
Use it straight away last night.
With the help of Ubuntu 16.04 Desktop Live CD to boot up the notebook, both internal HDD partitions are recognized.
Seamlessly the running Ubuntu system also recognizes the external HDD when Nautilus (file explorer/manager) is opened. I can transfer / backup gigabytes of files from notebook to external HDD smoothly, around 30+ Mbyte/s.
Alhamdulillaah, thanks God.
Though in the product case, it is just printed that this device is backward compatible with USB2.0 but nothing shown that it supports Linux or old Windows OS like Vista.
So I think these three utilities are required to retain your data if system crash happened:
(1) Partition the hard disk into two where you keep important / personal data on second partition.
(2) Ubuntu 16.04 Live CD to boot up
(3) Toshiba Canvio External HDD to transfer data
But the good practice is to backup the data periodically, so no cold sweat looking for Ubuntu Live-CD for help.
Or worst if the notebook does not come with CD drive ... but hey ... notebook can also boot up from USB drive (and again we need Ubuntu Live USB).
Time to think now whether to install Windows again or Linux in my 8 years notebook.
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