I've had a problem with my computer for the past year or so, and after extensive attempts to fix it as it was, the whole thing basically crashed and couldn't get back up. Using my father, who is the resident computer guru, we decided the best thing to do was reformat the hard drive and start from scratch. We had some problems at first, as it was discovered that the problem was about 6 or 7 corrupted files (possibly from a power outage a while ago) and they absolutely refused to leave that hard drive. He hooked it up to his computer and finally managed to format it and wipe it clean. I took it back to my computer, hooked it up, and we went to work...
When we went to reinstall Windows XP, we did as follows:
- Insert the Windows XP disk.
- Booted up computer and received error saying "NTLDR is missing. Press ctrl+alt+del to restart." Okay... Well, understandable. There's no CD drive driver on the hard drive now, so that might be the issue.
- Restarted a couple times but error still occurs. We decided to insert the 1st of the 6 Windows boot disks and attempt to use those.
- Insert boot disk #1 and start computer. Computer chugs along until it hits the error message "file \biosinfo.inf could not be loaded.
The error code is 4096. Setup cannot continue. Press any key to exit." - Frustrated. Took frustration out on PB&J sammich.
I've browsed google and one answer I've found is that the hard drive is essentially busted and I'll need a new one. I'm heading out later today and figure I can get one, but I'd rather see if I can use my old one still first. Any ideas?