Where/how does Windows store the data in the event logs?
With Windows 2000/Server2003/Windows XP, the logs are stored in the %SystemRoot%\System32\Config directory, with an .evt extension.
With Server 2008/Vista and up, the log are stored in the %SystemRoot%\system32\winevt\logs directory, and have an .evtx extension. It's possible to convert old .evt files to the newer .evtx format
Within the Computer Manager you can also export them to a .txt or .csv file.