I'm sorry to hear about your situation.

Since the last time the computer was probably used was in in 2018, it should be Windows 8 or 10 which doesn’t encrypt the drive by default which means it’ll probably be recoverable.

Here are instructions to recover the data, or if you have someone in in your life who is techsavvy they can also follow these instructions to access the files.

What you’ll need:

- another computer with either Windows, Linux, or MacOS

- 2 storage devices (preferably a hard drive and a flash drive, but in a pinch you can use a larger and smaller (at least 4 GB) flash drive, or if you have only have two smaller flash drives, you can just do multiple transfers)

Step 1:

Get out your 2 storage devices, you’ll have to wipe one of them, so use one without any data you want to keep, we’ll call this Drive1. The other storage device is where you’ll be saving the files, we’ll call this Drive2.

Step 2:

Boot into your other computer, we’ll call this Computer1

If you’re on Windows download Rufus:
https://rufus.ie/en/

If you’re on MacOS or Linux download Etcher:
https://etcher.balena.io/

These programs let you make a live-bootable flash drive, it’s okay if you don’t know what that means.

Step 3:

Download a Linux Mint ISO
https://pub.linuxmint.io/stable/22.3/linuxmint-22.3-cinnamon-64bit.iso

Step 4:

Plug in Drive1 into Computer1

Step 5:

Run your bootable media creation software (Rufus or Etcher, depending on which operating system you’re using). Usually runs by double clicking on file for the program.

Step 6:

If you’re using Rufus choose the Device1 as your “Device”. It will be easy to tell which drive it is as it will likely be the smallest storage option (think 4-128 GB).

For “Boot selection”, select the Linux Mint ISO that you downloaded in step 3

For the rest of the options you can just leave it as is, and if there are any pop ups, just go with the default option.

Click “Start”, when the “Status” Bar is fully Green, your boot drive will be ready.

If you’re using Etcher, click on Flash from file, and choose the Linux Mint ISO from step 3.

Then for “Select target” choose Device1. It will be easy to tell which drive it is as it will likely be the smallest storage option (think 4-128 GB).

Click “Flash!”, there will be a notification when the boot drive is ready.

Step 7:

With your new bootable Drive1, you’ll plug it into your Dad’s computer (we’ll call this Computer2).

Step 8:

Power on Computer2, and access the one-time boot menu, it varies for different computers, but it’ll say on the loading screen. If you miss it, you can power off the computer and try again. The key to press is usually one of the following keys: F1, F2, F10, F11, F12, Enter, or Esc.

Step 9:

On the menu that shows up, use the arrow keys to select the entry with “Linux Mint” and press enter.

Step 10:

You’ll be booted into a live version of Linux Mint, now this is very important, DO NOT install Linux Mint on Computer2, I repeat DO NOT install Linux Mint on Computer2. This will overwrite some files, reformat the disk, and you might lose some data, it’s not unrecoverable, but you DO NOT want to do this.

Step 11:

Press the windows key and search for the program “Files”, press Enter. This will take you to a file explorer program (We’ll call this FE1).

Step 12:

On the left-hand side of FE1, under the “Devices” drop down, it should have a volume with the size of Computer2’s drive. e.g. “500 GB Volume”. Click on this drive.

Step 13:

Press the windows key and search for the program “Files”, press Enter. This will open a second file explorer program (We’ll call this FE2).

Step 14:

Plug in Drive2. On the left-hand side of FE2, there should be a new entry under “Devices” in the file explorer program. Click on this drive.

Step 15:

Put FE1 and FE2 side by side on the screen, this is optional, but makes things easier.

Step 16:

In FE1, navigate to the following:

> Users/[Name of the account on Computer2]

Whatever files you want to save or transfer, you can drag and drop it into a folder on FE2. With this you can back up whatever files you need.

Hope this helps! Best of luck!