Tools to rescue your PC

My laptop stopped booting up at a conference a month ago and I felt helpless. Now, I know better. I should have brought some emergency software. The Ultimate Boot CD has many diagnostic tools on it, including one which would have proved handy at the conference: MemTest86+ to check the integrity of my RAM. As a last resort, you can also boot using a Knoppix Live CD which allows you to see the files on your hard drive and retrieve them if necessary (e.g. your Powerpoint presentation).