Recommended Posts

I had two partitions on my hard drive, one with what was left of a Windows XP Pro installation that I wasn't using, and one with a Windows XP Home partition that I used primarily. The Windows XP Pro partition was set as active, and there was a boot.ini file on that partition that pointed to the XP Home partition, and it would always boot fine.

So, today, I wanted to install Fedora, so I deleted the Windows XP Pro partition, expecting that the Fedora boot loader would point to the XP Home partition and I'll be able to boot both Operating Systems... but alas, it doesn't work that way.

I got the following message upon boot:

NTLDR is missing
Press CTRL+ALT+DEL to restart.

So, I went to the MS support site and went through all their hoops (copied NTLDR and ntdetect.com from my Windows XP home cd to c:\ (XP Home partition).

Now, when I try to boot, it just reboots the whole machine right after the PC loads (after BIOS info etc.)

I tried making a boot floppy using this guide.

When I use the boot disk, it gives me this:

Windows NT could not start because of a computer disk hardware configuration problem. Could not read from selected boot disk. Check boot path and disk hardware. Please check the Windows NT (TM) documentation about hardware disk configuration and your hardware disk configuration and your hardware reference manuals for additional information. Boot Failed.

I also tried the thing through the recovery console thing, to no avail.

Help! I just want to be back in my XP Home installation again!!

Link to comment
https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/162975-ntldr-is-missing/
Share on other sites

i've gone through this problem a dozen times, so i think i can help.

NTLDR isn't the only thing that's missing. Everything is missing. NTLDR just happens to be the first thing the windows boot loader tries to load off the partition. Your boot loader is still trying to boot off the old partition. You need to set the new partition to 'active' using a bootdisk partition editor that supports NTFS partitions (unless you were using FAT32).

I used to have a cd with hundreds of these little programs when i was trying to fix this problem myself, but alas i don't anymore. You shouldn't have too much trouble finding a dos partition editor and a dos bootdisk. If you need a certain 'magic' partition editor, PM me.

Link to comment
https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/162975-ntldr-is-missing/#findComment-2047034
Share on other sites

ugh, i hate problems like yours

I had a job once with someone with what your problem sounds like, my suggestion is use an xp install disk, to reinstall windows or wutever they call it without erasing data on the drive

this won't get fedora to work, but you can be back on windows, but of course you have to reinstall everything

personnaly I would rebuild just to access the drive (unless you have another computer to do that from) then take all needed files and settings off of it and format, then reinstall windows then fedora

hope you fix it

Link to comment
https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/162975-ntldr-is-missing/#findComment-2047092
Share on other sites

okay... i tried that boot disk and i got the following message:

Windows could not start because the following file is missing or corrupt:
<Windows root>\system32\hal.dll
Please reinstall a copy of the above file.

I looked in the i386 folder on the XP Home install CD, and all it has is hal

There's no .dll extension on it...

What do you folks reccommend?

Link to comment
https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/162975-ntldr-is-missing/#findComment-2047130
Share on other sites

  HPMCommander said:
Well, here I am in a clean install of XP... and so I've got no personal settings, nothing... just a default user. What'd be an easy way to transfer my files and settings from my old partition to the new one?

theres no easy way to do anything in recovering XP. If you never disabled systemrestore, your old registry files (hives) are in c:\System Volume Restore. Your current registry hives are located in c:\windows\system32\config. To restore the old ones, boot to the recovery console with your XP Pro cd and copy over to the new ones. That might work, but it doesn't always. If it doesn't, you'll have to make another clean install.

Link to comment
https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/162975-ntldr-is-missing/#findComment-2050709
Share on other sites

If you saved all your files locally (desktop, My Documents) then everything is in your profile located here C:\Documents and Settings\*Loginname*. Simply open that folder select all and copy it's contents. Go to your primary XP partition and copy those files to your new profile located in C:\Documents and Settings\*Loginname*

That will restore your desktop, my documents, favorite places, etc. If you saved your work outside your profile and on your defunked partition you can kiss those files bubye

Link to comment
https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/162975-ntldr-is-missing/#findComment-2050790
Share on other sites

This topic is now closed to further replies.
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
  • Posts

    • It is good that it can be removed. Those users who want it can use it, and those users who do not want it can remove it.
    • Yeah, but I can't blame people given the way things are nowadays with inflated prices that used to be reasonable not all that long ago. but I would not even attempt to offer someone $30 for a 8TB SSD (I know that was just a example of people trying to really low-ball someone though) as trying to undercut the normal-ish price a decent amount is one thing but that much I would not even attempt to offer someone on Ebay etc. but on the flip side... I think some people want more than stuff is worth at times and even when you offer them something reasonable they might take it as a insult etc. but usually these types tend to be a bit more unreasonable/unrealistic with their pricing. I get people don't want to give their stuff away, but at the same time some try to squeeze every last penny out of stuff to. there needs to be some sort of balance there as a guideline. but even when it comes to prices on random stuff... it can be difficult to determine what's roughly fair/reasonable as a happy medium where both sides feel like they did at least okay on the deal. but just off the top of my head buying expensive used stuff, especially stuff that might be more prone to failure (instead of being quite unlikely to fail), I might try to dodge or want a cheaper than usual price to even risk it etc. but I guess I could probably speak for many when it comes to a gaming PC in that a person wants the cheapest possible price for something that's good enough as this tends to be roughly the sweet-spot of $ spent vs real world performance where it really matters. because it's generally not worth paying hundreds extra or more for something that's not significantly better than a more reasonably priced gaming PC that tends to be good enough as I figure once you get a setup that can do roughly 1080p @ 60fps with high enough graphics (or in this ball park either way), the gains past that tend not to be worth spending hundreds of dollars more when that money could be saved and ones current computer (the one that does 1080p @ 60fps with high enough graphics etc) will easily last years (probably 3-5 years for a conservative figure) before they genuinely need a upgrade and the saved hundreds of dollars could be put towards another build at some point in the future. I never understood people who want to build a "better PC" when their current one is still clearly on the faster side of things and still runs pretty much everything more than well enough as you are pretty much just wasting money for something that's not that much better for the vast majority of tasks. like as a ball park when it comes to GPU's, to use NVIDIA as a example... right now I suspect a solid Geforce 20 series GPU is no where near needing a true upgrade as I would say more worthwhile upgrades are more seriously worth considering for people on the Geforce 10 series or older GPU's at the moment as I would probably use that as where the line is roughly drawn if you have to split stuff up into 'current enough' vs 'older' standards (even though I realize say a strong Geforce 10 GPU is still more than solid enough for many). basically, short of a few specialized use situations etc, most people don't need anywhere near high end PC's, even from a gaming perspective since 30fps being playable and 60fps is pretty much perfect have been standards around for decades now as these are the ones that truly matter the most from a general real world gaming perspective. the 120fps+, while might help a bit, is still largely excess luxury in that it's just not worth the extra money unless prices are fairly close as if you got to pay hundreds of dollars more for it, overall most people are better off with the 'slower' setup. p.s. hell, I am still on a i5-3550 CPU (which is 2012 CPU tech) with a NVIDIA 1050 Ti 4GB (which is 2016 GPU tech) and while if I upgraded today I would get a worthwhile difference, but in all honesty the main reason I hold off, besides prices nowadays being a bit inflated, is what games I do play tend to work anywhere from playable (30fps) to perfect-ish (60fps) and I am of the mindset I have a feeling my current GPU etc is more reliable than modern GPU's etc which is another reason I am in no rush to upgrade. I suspect ill eventually be forced into upgrading, but baring major hardware failure out of no where, ill likely be on my current setup for years to come at a minimum. say the rest of this decade, possibly further, especially given while I might play a semi-recent game here and there I am usually replaying games that stand the test of time from the past etc.
    • I have only two Play Anywhere titles from all games I own, and Game Pass doesn't include DLCs. I know it's shocking, but I like to buy premium editions of games I've really liked on Game Pass. I have Ultimate and I've already checked what I can play on PC when I upgraded my laptop to a new one with Nvidia 4070 half a year ago - not much so I haven't even bothered.
    • I hate to break it to you, but if you have the Copilot app installed and up-to-date, you have this. Your computer doesn't need to be a Copilot+ PC to use this, any x86-64 CPU without NPU will do. Also, you don't have to use it, it's not enabled the whole time. Even if you open the Copilot app, you must manually enable Vision on the desired opened windows, it doesn't work by itself. But if you're worried, just remove the Copilot app. Problem solved.
    • no octopus needs seven equal noses. Simply, it can act limpy. Don't worry, Aclarke, it happens
  • Recent Achievements

    • One Month Later
      POR2GAL4EVER earned a badge
      One Month Later
    • One Year In
      Orpheus13 earned a badge
      One Year In
    • One Month Later
      Orpheus13 earned a badge
      One Month Later
    • Week One Done
      Orpheus13 earned a badge
      Week One Done
    • Week One Done
      serfegyed earned a badge
      Week One Done
  • Popular Contributors

    1. 1
      +primortal
      534
    2. 2
      ATLien_0
      254
    3. 3
      +FloatingFatMan
      183
    4. 4
      +Edouard
      166
    5. 5
      Xenon
      122
  • Tell a friend

    Love Neowin? Tell a friend!