If my computer problem requires me to either use my "system recovery" disk or buy a new machine, will either 1) my bookmark backup file or 2) your "sync" feature suffice, or is there a 3rd option I'm not aware of that I need to use to restore everything?
What's the best way to restore my bookmarks, if I need to either erase everything on the hard drive, or I buy a new computer? Can I just set up a sync file, or use my backup file of bookmarks to re-install them?
Alla svar (2)
What is broken on your current computer, that you can fix it by wiping your hard drive.
I have lot more than just bookmarks in Firefox, and lot more than Firefox on my machine. Although I have backups, I would not think of backing up everything and wiping my machine. My laptop cost $300 and I can replace it with something a lot better at $389 if I had to. I know from putting everything over on another machine twice. There were a number of files that I missed and retrieved later.
Do you know what is in your Firefox profile(s), or where your data and settings are kept for other software you run.
You are running on Windows XP you can buy a new machine with Windows 7 on it and USB 3 for faster backups.
Since you asked, it keeps restarting on its own. I ran scans with McAfee (I know it's not one of the better ones) and Malwarebytes, found no viruses. It's 6 yrs. old, probably time to get a new one, want to make sure that if I do I will be able to access all that is on the old one. Sometimes it continually restarts until I manually turn it off. Tried in safe mode, no luck. Usually when it starts properly, I get a small window on desktop--"Microsoft Windows", "the system has encountered an error and needs to be shut down" or something similar. Any thoughts?