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My hard drive crashed, I installed a new one, and I lost all of my bookmarks--how do I retrieve them?

  • 4 replies
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  • 3 views
  • Last reply by cor-el

slaf15
slaf15
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I have a Toshiba laptop and my hard drive crashed. I had to install a new hard drive and restore the Windows 8 OS--basically started from scratch as NONE of my data was recoverable. Wondering if I can retrieve all of my old bookmarks. Im a graduate student and had a ton of important things bookmarked. I dont remember creating any sort of profile when I originally downloaded Firefox. Please help!

I have a Toshiba laptop and my hard drive crashed. I had to install a new hard drive and restore the Windows 8 OS--basically started from scratch as NONE of my data was recoverable. Wondering if I can retrieve all of my old bookmarks. Im a graduate student and had a ton of important things bookmarked. I dont remember creating any sort of profile when I originally downloaded Firefox. Please help!

All Replies (4)

Diego Victor
Diego Victor
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You need to find your old profile in your old hard drive. Maybe you will need unhide the hidden files and folders:

Go to your hold profile. Probably the path is:

  • <old drive>:\Users\<user name>\AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\<profile folder>

Read more:

So inside of your old profile folder there is a folder called Bookmarksbackups enter in it, the get the most recent .json file copy to your new hard drive then open Firefox go to Bookmarks >> Show all bookmarks >> Import and backup >> Restore then chose the option to select a file then select that file that you copy to your new hard drive

Modified by Diego Victor

slaf15
slaf15 Question owner
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The problem is that I cannot access any info on my old hard drive...and Im not sure that I even created a profile.  ??

the-edmeister
the-edmeister
  • Moderator
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Firefox automatically creates a Profile the first time it is used; so you do have a "Profile".

How are you trying to access the data on your old hard drive?
Do you have a USB to IDE or SATA adapter cable to allow you to connect the old hard drive to a USB port on the new PC?

cor-el
cor-el
  • Moderator
  • Top 10 Contributor
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You always have a Firefox profile folder. Firefox creates one automatically for you the first time you start Firefox.

You can use this button to go to the currently used Firefox profile folder:

  • Help > Troubleshooting Information > Profile Director: Show Folder (Linux: Open Director; Mac: Show in Finder)

The "AppData" folder in Windows Vista and later Window 7+ versions and the "Application Data" folder in XP/Win2K are hidden folders.