those of you who are about to read this won't believe me, but i swear this is a true story....

yesterday my hillbilly neighbor comes by my house, because he "traded his trolling motor for a computer and doesn't know how to use it." so i went over to his house to help him get online, and right away i notice he has his phone cord plugged into a network card. so i tell him he needs to buy a modem.

so today he comes by to tell me he bought a modem, put it in his computer, and when he tried to load the software for it, his computer shut down and wouldn't turn back on. so i go over there, turn it on, and it just comes up with a "Windows Registry not found, abort, retry, fail" message. i guess he somehow managed to wipe out his registry when he installed the modem.

so my question is, short of reloading the operating system, is there any way to recover the registry? or is it a lost cause and should i just reinstall windows all over again? all suggestions are appreciated