[Sca-cooks] calling all geeks- I'm desperate!

[Phil Troy/ G. Tacitus Adamantius]

Also sprach Laura C. Minnick:
>Ok, I'm working on a book. Have the files saved on a disk. Today it was
>acting strange, so I started moving things off the disk, just to be safe.
>All but one file moved fine. Except one. Naturally the the most imporant
>one. Some 20 thousand words. The othe rfiles I opened and copied. This one
>file it makes clicking noises and then gives me the box with the gray
>'cancel' and 'retry'. It says it cannot read the disk. Well it reads the
>other files on the disk, so? And sometimes it tells me the file is already
>in use or is read-only. It will not open the file. It will not copy the
>file. It will not export the file.
>
>I've combed the hard drive looking for copies, and the last one is several
>drafts old. I looked to see if I could find timed backups- I know they have
>to be there somewhere. Nope.
>
>Can someone tell me how to open the file or something- please? I'm losing
>months of work and I just want to fold up and whimper...

Hmmm. Bearing in mind that I don't use that silly OS of yours...
would it be possible to try to make a disk image (IOW, a file
representing the entire contents of the disk, essentially a perfect
digital copy), then try repairing, defragging, etc., maybe some kind
of registry repair function, on that? It might be possible to bypass
and repair any mechanical issues that way. That is, if those issues
don't prevent the making of such a copy.

Adamantius