Help my friend of 14 yrs passed away 3 weeks ago and his widow asked me if I could help her get data from his machine
He had a heart attack after his computer crashed ... We think there is something very important on it... Can anyone help me get past the OS and get it to boot up so that I can just pull the data from it ? Please hurry -

First off, I just want to say that I am sorry for you (and your friend's) loss.

That said, you have to realize how fishy your post seems. Even apart from the story given, this is just flat out fishy sounding: "Can anyone help me get past the OS and get it to boot up so that I can just pull the data from it ? Please hurry -".

I assume you are requesting to bypass a Windows log in password, however, personal security is an issue that is taken very seriously, especially today. Do not be surprised if this thread is locked or, at the very least, neglected.

Do yourself a favor and either make use of a search engine or bring the PC to a certified technician with documentation to prove that your friend is indeed the owner of the PC.

If the system is indeed locked, you will need professional help. TS does not endorse piracy or illegal activity and since no one here can prove this is legit, you will have a difficult time here.

Thanks guys. I didn't put too much thought into the original post... and it does sound fishy. Sorry. I told Donna to take the CPU over to BestBuy to thier repair guys. I confirmed with them that they can try to recover the data. Thanks for the help.

All I'll say is that MOST information, including stuff like this that people ask is available if you just google it. It's amazing how people never bother and just insist on asking questions that could be answered in an instant by google's archive of links from all over the net (that said some things have gotto be answered as without content google is nothing).