[Henry7212]

So, I posted here I think a month or two back about some viruses I had on my computer, I was very happy with the person that helped me and resolved the problem completely. Now, its something a bit more...

The night before this happend, I decicded it was time to defrag. After I had done that I shut down my computer... and for some reason I shut it down the right way this time... I usually just turn the switch on the power strip which I now know is very bad. The next morning I wake up to this message on the screen.

"NTDLDR is missing"

I told my dad about it and he said it had happened to two other computers in our house, and he just said to re install windows... but we no longer have a windows XP cd.

I'd just like to know how this might have been caused and what I need to do to fix it since. I'm not very technical but I would like to learn more.

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Welcome Henry7212 to GTG. Sorry to hear about your issue but hopefully we can get your system back up and running without the loss of any data. Please follow the steps below and since you don't have a XP cd then go to the bottom and follow the directions for downloading the Recovery Console and then running through the steps as instructed. Let me know how it works out for you.



If you have Windows CD...

1. Insert your Windows XP CD into your CD and assure that your CD-ROM drive is capable of booting the CD.
2. Once you have booted from CD, do NOT select the option that states: Press F2 to initiate the Automated System Recovery (ASR) tool.
You’re going to proceed until you see the following screen, at which point you will press the “R” key to enter the recovery console:



3. After you have selected the appropriate option from step two, you will be prompted to select a valid Windows installation (typically number “1″).
Select the installation number, and hit Enter.
If there is an administrator password for the administrator account, enter it and hit Enter (if asked for the password, and you don't know it, you're out of luck).
You will be greeted with this screen, which indicates a recovery console at the ready:



4. There are eight commands you must enter in sequence to repair any of the issues I noted in the opening of this guide.
I will introduce them here, and then show the results graphically in the next six steps.
NOTE. Make sure, you press Enter after each command. Make sure, all commands are exact, including "spaces".
These commands are as follows:

CD..
ATTRIB -H C:\\boot.ini
ATTRIB -S C:\\boot.ini
ATRIB -R C:\\boot.ini
del boot.ini
BOOTCFG /Rebuild

Note about the above command.
BOOTCFG /REBUILD command which searches for pre-existing installations of Windows XP and rebuilds sundry essential components of the Windows operating system, recompiles the BOOT.INI file and corrects a litany of common Windows errors.
It is very important that you do one or both of the following two things:
A.) Every Windows XP owner must use /FASTDETECT as OS Load Option when the rebuild process is finalizing.
B.) If you are the owner of a CPU featuring Intel’s XD or AMD’s NX buffer overflow protection, you must also use /NOEXECUTE=OPTIN as an OS Load Option.
For the Enter Load Identifier portion of this command, you should enter the name of the operating system you have installed.
If, for example, you are using Windows XP Home, you could type Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition for the identifier (it's not crucial, however what the name is, as long, as it's meaningful).
Here is your computer screen:



5. Following command verifies the integrity of the hard drive containing the Windows XP installation. While this step is not an essential function in our process, it’s still good to be sure that the drive is physically capable of running windows, in that it contains no bad sectors or other corruptions that might be the culprit:

CHKDSK /R

6. This last command writes a new boot sector to the hard drive and cleans up all the loose ends we created by rebuilding the BOOT.INI file and the system files. When the Windows Recovery Console asks you if you are Sure you want to write a new bootsector to the partition C: ? just hit “Y”, then Enter to confirm your decision:

FIXBOOT

7. It’s time to reboot your PC by typing
EXIT
and pressing Enter.

With any luck, your PC will boot successfully into Windows XP as if your various DLL, Hive, EXE and NTLDR errors never existed.



2. If you don't have Windows CD...
Download Windows Recovery Console: http://www.thecomput...om/files/rc.iso
Download, and install free Imgburn: http://www.imgburn.c...hp?act=download
Using Imgburn, burn rc.iso to a CD.
Boot to the CD...let it finish loading.
When the "Welcome to Setup" screen appears, press R to start the Recovery Console.
Then, follow instructions from Step #3 above.

Thanks To Broni For The Instructions

[rshaffer61]

Welcome Henry7212 to GTG. Sorry to hear about your issue but hopefully we can get your system back up and running without the loss of any data. Please follow the steps below and since you don't have a XP cd then go to the bottom and follow the directions for downloading the Recovery Console and then running through the steps as instructed. Let me know how it works out for you.



If you have Windows CD...

1. Insert your Windows XP CD into your CD and assure that your CD-ROM drive is capable of booting the CD.
2. Once you have booted from CD, do NOT select the option that states: Press F2 to initiate the Automated System Recovery (ASR) tool.
You’re going to proceed until you see the following screen, at which point you will press the “R” key to enter the recovery console:



3. After you have selected the appropriate option from step two, you will be prompted to select a valid Windows installation (typically number “1″).
Select the installation number, and hit Enter.
If there is an administrator password for the administrator account, enter it and hit Enter (if asked for the password, and you don't know it, you're out of luck).
You will be greeted with this screen, which indicates a recovery console at the ready:



4. There are eight commands you must enter in sequence to repair any of the issues I noted in the opening of this guide.
I will introduce them here, and then show the results graphically in the next six steps.
NOTE. Make sure, you press Enter after each command. Make sure, all commands are exact, including "spaces".
These commands are as follows:

CD..
ATTRIB -H C:\\boot.ini
ATTRIB -S C:\\boot.ini
ATRIB -R C:\\boot.ini
del boot.ini
BOOTCFG /Rebuild

Note about the above command.
BOOTCFG /REBUILD command which searches for pre-existing installations of Windows XP and rebuilds sundry essential components of the Windows operating system, recompiles the BOOT.INI file and corrects a litany of common Windows errors.
It is very important that you do one or both of the following two things:
A.) Every Windows XP owner must use /FASTDETECT as OS Load Option when the rebuild process is finalizing.
B.) If you are the owner of a CPU featuring Intel’s XD or AMD’s NX buffer overflow protection, you must also use /NOEXECUTE=OPTIN as an OS Load Option.
For the Enter Load Identifier portion of this command, you should enter the name of the operating system you have installed.
If, for example, you are using Windows XP Home, you could type Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition for the identifier (it's not crucial, however what the name is, as long, as it's meaningful).
Here is your computer screen:



5. Following command verifies the integrity of the hard drive containing the Windows XP installation. While this step is not an essential function in our process, it’s still good to be sure that the drive is physically capable of running windows, in that it contains no bad sectors or other corruptions that might be the culprit:

CHKDSK /R

6. This last command writes a new boot sector to the hard drive and cleans up all the loose ends we created by rebuilding the BOOT.INI file and the system files. When the Windows Recovery Console asks you if you are Sure you want to write a new bootsector to the partition C: ? just hit “Y”, then Enter to confirm your decision:

FIXBOOT

7. It’s time to reboot your PC by typing
EXIT
and pressing Enter.

With any luck, your PC will boot successfully into Windows XP as if your various DLL, Hive, EXE and NTLDR errors never existed.



2. If you don't have Windows CD...
Download Windows Recovery Console: http://www.thecomput...om/files/rc.iso
Download, and install free Imgburn: http://www.imgburn.c...hp?act=download
Using Imgburn, burn rc.iso to a CD.
Boot to the CD...let it finish loading.
When the "Welcome to Setup" screen appears, press R to start the Recovery Console.
Then, follow instructions from Step #3 above.

Thanks To Broni For The Instructions

[Henry7212]

I have to find a friend with a CD drive so this may take me a bit

[rshaffer61]

No problem just make sure it is the same type as what is installed on your system
Home or Pro

[Henry7212]

My dads beens working on them since I broke my left finger and ankle but heres what he said, he ran the disk and after windows setup ran a PCI error came up and nothing more. He was able to boot it with another drive and thats i'll i've heard so far.

[rshaffer61]

Thanks for the update.
Where is the PCI error showing up at?
During bootup on first post screen?
During XP setup?

[Henry7212]

It was on the first post screen, it loads all the drivers and then a blue screen says theres a PCI error

[rshaffer61]

IS the BSOD saying any other technical information other then PCI?
If you can't see it because it flashes to fast then please do the following.


BSOD outside of Windows

• Start your system and at the Second post screen tap on F8 to get to the Boot Menu
• Use the Arrow Keys to Scroll down to the line that says "Auto Start On Error" and highlight it.
• Click Enter to disable it
• The system should reboot and if not then do so.
• When the BSOD shows it will stop so that you can reply with the STOP ERROR and any parameters.

[Henry7212]

Error says

Stop

pci.sys- Address F748EOBF
nase at F7487000
Date stamp 3b7d855c

my dad is going to copy the operating system off another drive of ours and see if that works, we were able to boot it with another drive and access mine

[rshaffer61]

It may work but it also may be what is causing the issue.
Another system unless it is exactly the same system will have different drivers and loading files.
I would suggest if you can to backup any data on this drive and then with the original recovery disk do a non destructive recovery or if you have a genuine XP installation disk we attempt a repair installation.

[Henry7212]

Well after copying the drives everything seems to be running fine, just a couple of my games needed to reinstall, but I purchased a copy of windows 7 so I'll have an OS if anything like this comes up again, I may be posting again here though I'm looking for advice on buying a new motherboard/processor or new video card to improve things while playing Aion, but I've still got to think about that.

[rshaffer61]

I'm glad to hear everything has worked out. Congratulations. for a successful resolution for your issue.
When you are ready we can assist with the new components if you like.
There is a forum just for system building and you will probably get lots of suggestions there for new parts.
I'm glad we could help and please let us know how everything works out for you.
If there is anything else we can do to help please feel free to ask. I appreciate that you allowed me to assist you with your issue and for your patience. Thank you for choosing GeeksToGo for help.