retrieve photos from hard drive

Hello Group.......

I just re-installed xp from the back-up disc..........i did an advance install because I wanted to remove some nasty things going on

Fortunately when I reinstalled media player and real player, I was able to scan disc for music and retrieve all my music

I know  the photos are still on my hard drive because of how much free space is left on the hard drive.......

It's about the amount left over after my music.........

Is there a way I can scan my disc for photos and get them back like I did my music.......

Also there  are all the folders with my different programs on my hard drive... they may be empty... how can I find out????? I can't open them.............

Belarc shows that I lost almost all my stuff, but i still see the program files and something is using about 3 gigs of space........2 gigs has to be the photos................

I did back-up a lot of things to cd, always do music... exe's....so I can always reinstall programs.....

but I system restored ....1day  previous to service pack 2 because my xp reinstall disc was older than sp2 and then reinstalled xp, then reinstalled sp2.....my system is not the same but close..............I just need to know how to scan for my photos so i can put them on a cd data

Thank You

George South