On Sat, 3 Dec 2005 09:02:02 -0800, "Dixonian69"
<Dixonian69@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote:
>Your best bet for help is to only make changes made and reply about add'l
>problems before making those changes!!!
>
>Everyone is trying to help but only do what is suggested. Do not proceed w/o
>psoting new problems and waiting for assisstance before maiking changes!!
>
>Are working with only one computer? OR are yuo putting bad drive in a
>different computer?
>
>The bad "C" drive is primary master with jumper set as master and is Only HD
>in computer?
>
>You had ntldr and ntdetect.com and a boot.ini file with entries that yuo
>provided.
>You booted up. You received an error message. You should have stopped and
>reposted problem!!
>
>You said at one time bad drive would boot normally but not in safe mode?
>Is that still true?
>
>"geezer" wrote:
>
>> On Sat, 3 Dec 2005 14:51:09 -0000, "John Barnett MVP"
>> <freelanceit@mvps.org.NOSPAM> wrote:
>>
>> >Geezer, visit my website http://xphelpandsupport.mvps.org Click the Win XP
>> >Faq button and take a look at question 10 'How do i create an emergency
>> >start up disk for XP' You will need a floppy disk for this. Once you have
>> >created the floppy disk reboot your computer with the floppy in the floppy
>> >drive. If all goes well you should be able to boot to the windows desktop.
>> >If the emergency floppy has booted to the desktop then go to Windows
>> >explorer and click on the floppy drive. The contents of the floppy disk will
>> >become visible (you must have 'show hidden files and folder, etc enabled
>> >otherwise you will not be bale to see the boot.ini file (see question 11 on
>> >my site). Now copy the contents - boot.ini. NTDetect, NTLDR from the floppy
>> >to your C: drive and then reboot again. Hopefully, assuming the floppy
>> >worked, this should repair the problem and you should be able to boot as
>> >normal.
>>
>>
>> Thanks
>> You sound very knowledgable and your site is one to keep accessible on
>> this end.
>>
>> I tried what it says to do, which really is to grab the 'ntldr' and
>> ntdetect.com files from the hard drive - then create a new boot.ini
>> file with content
>> [boot loader]
>> timeout=30
>> Default= multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\windows [operating
>> systems]
>> multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\windows="Windo ws XP"
>>
>> I can find no ntldr or ntdetect file. Remember I have my skeleton
>> drive as c drive and the bad drive as d drive. Both have what look to
>> be valid XP structures. I looked (searched) on both drives. Yes, I
>> have view set to see hidden & system files.
>>
>> However, I did find the 2 files on my XP installation CD. So I used
>> them to make the so-called emergency startup diskette.
>>
>> With the bad drive as c drive, and the only drive, I booted up from
>> the floppy. It told me that a so-called 'hal.dll' file is missing or
>> corrupt. I copied that file from my skeleton XP drive, and placed it
>> on both the floppy and in the bad drive's c:\windows\system32 (which
>> was a 'replace'). I re booted from the floppy again, with only the
>> bad drive in place (as c drive), and I get the same error.
>>
>> What now?
>> Thanks again
>> Geezer
>>
Up thru yesterday the drive booted okay, but different apps were
failing, so I opted to try a XP re-install (not fresh). I did not
want to lose any of my apps or data. I run with this drive as the
only drive (c).
After I did the re-install, the drive would no longer boot.
I made it a second (slave) drive (d), and mounted a spare small drive
(c) I had from the past that had just a copy of XP on it - nothing
else. I just wanted to see if the drive that wouldn't boot still had
my data and apps. It did. It still does in fact. It was in this
mode that I could not find ntldr or ntdetect.com on either drive - so
I copied them from the installation CD.
All of my trials have been with the failing drive as c drive alone.
This post (and the others) are from a different machine entirely.
Sorry for any confusions I may have caused.
Geezer