Windows Profile Fun and Problems
The proper way to recover your profile/data from a messed up computer is probably to use Windows backup and easy transfer to migrate your settings after system restore and other methods fail. Here is an unofficial way to migrate the profile: http://joshmouch.wordpress.com/2007/04/07/change-user-profile-folder-location-in-vista/
If the profile refuses or has trouble loading at startup it could be due to corrupt registry entries: http://forum.oscr.arizona.edu/showthread.php?t=5821
