I was having issues with not having enough hard drive space for my home folder. I also realized that I was using 32 bit Ubuntu but needed to use 64 bit for my laptop. I backed up all my data and I installed Ubuntu 9.04 64 bit. I was able to get everything back right with Thunderbird, Sunbird, and Firebox. When I copied my home folder back, everthing seemed fine. All the files and the file structure are in tact...but there is no data. Every file has 0 bytes. All of my stuff that I have backed up for the past 5 or 6 years is not there. The sad part is all my kids pictures are not there.

This would not be a problem but I think I just wiped out my external hard drive. I was installing Xubuntu on an old desktop and I had my external hard drive plugged into it because I thought I might have to back up some data but already backed it up. When I started installing Xubuntu, it threw my external into the partitioning and I didn't realize it. When I saw what it was doing, I tried to stop it but couldn't. So I unplugged it. Now my laptop and my wife's laptop will not read the external hard drive. It doesn't even show that it is there.

If anyone can help, it would be much appreciated.