crashed computer...

[Rhino]

The usb adapter makes a lot of sense if you have access to a second machine. If you don't, I would suggest simply adding a second hard drive to your computer and doing a fresh windows install onto it, prior to migrating all your data.



Easiest (but most risky) thing to do would be to reinstall windows over the top of the current install. Most of the time it's simply software problems rather than hardware. I've been seeing this exact same behavior lately. In the past 2 weeks I've gotten 4 calls about it. My current thought is a nasty virus gone haywire.
As long as you select to keep the file system intact you will not lose any files. You will, however, need to perform a significant amount of cleanup and reinstall your applications.