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| Thread ID: 75774 | 2007-01-09 23:23:00 | Is reinstalling windows the best option? | Jacquie (9851) | Press F1 |
| Post ID | Timestamp | Content | User | ||
| 514332 | 2007-01-09 23:23:00 | I think I have moved a file on my old laptop, when I try to log on it says the NTLDR is missing. Is my best option to reinstall windows, the whole hard drive is backed up on another laptop. And how much would I expect to pay for this to be done? | Jacquie (9851) | ||
| 514333 | 2007-01-09 23:32:00 | Has your laptop got a floppy drive? Is there a disk in that drive? You get the NTLDR is missing when the boot disk doesn't contain windows. It's possible you have moved or deleted the NTLDR or stuffed up the boot record. If the drive hasn't been formatted, it's quite possible that it can be easily recovered. Should take a decent repair shop 1-2 hours max. A reinstall would take 2-3 hrs if they do all the updates and have to download or find drivers for your laptop, but after that, you have to spend all the time reinstalling your old applications and restoring your data from your backups. |
trig42 (11325) | ||
| 514334 | 2007-01-09 23:36:00 | Hold out for a few replys.. reinstalling takes some time indeed, and thats mostly reinstalling programs. If you do choose to reinstall, make sure you backup all your important documents and files to a different drive or cd/dvd etc. |
jermsie (6820) | ||
| 514335 | 2007-01-09 23:42:00 | If u have access to a floppy or a USB flash drive and another PC with XP on it, try this (support.microsoft.com) or this (support.microsoft.com) Then if u can remember what folder u moved, hopefully u can move it back and it works. |
Speedy Gonzales (78) | ||
| 514336 | 2007-01-10 01:05:00 | Reinstalling is definitely not the best option. If you have the XP CD, you'll want to boot from the CD and get into Recovery Console, You'll need to select your Windows partition, log in as Administrator (usually blank) and then you'll need to find the NTLDR file and NTDETECT.COM file from the XP CD, Usually located in the I386 location of the CD. I'm not sure what the CD ROM drive would be given, but you'll need to do something like COPY R:\I386\NTLDR C:\ and COPY R:\I386\NTDETECT.COM C:\ where R: is the CD ROM drive. This should hopefully get you booting again, you don't need to do FIXBOOT or FIXMBR. Cheers, KK |
Kame (312) | ||
| 514337 | 2007-01-10 02:49:00 | If you have the XP CD, you'll want to boot from the CD and get into Recovery Console, You'll need to select your Windows partition, log in as Administrator (usually blank) I have needed to get into the Recovery Console a couple of times in the past without success due to requiring a password to be entered. Even on machines that have had no Administrator password ever entered it won't accept a blank entry and will go no further without one. I once read a way around this but can't remember how it went - any ideas? |
FoxyMX (5) | ||
| 514338 | 2007-01-10 03:26:00 | . . . do it in Safe Mode and use the default Administrator's account . . . it won't need a password, but has all the rights and privileges you need to make the changes and repair from there . This is an easy way to hack into a password protected system too . |
SurferJoe46 (51) | ||
| 514339 | 2007-01-10 06:05:00 | If NTLDR is missing, you'll never get into Safe Mode, this is the NT Boot Loader, which uses boot.ini configuration to boot the partitions listed inside it, if boot.ini is corrupt or missing it could cause this problem too. Hey FoxyMX, Usually XP Home Ed is setup with the administrator as a blank password, unless someone changed it, which usually requires knowing how to use "control userpasswords2" and resetting the Administrator password with another Administrator account (for XP Pro too) or logging in via Safe Mode and using the Administrator account and changing the password within there. For userpasswords2, you should be on an administrator account, open a Run dialog box (Start | Run) then type "control userpasswords2", this will open a User Account dialog box (not the control panel one), You then select the User from the selection box and then click on the Reset Password button, and you should be able to change it without knowing what the password was. I guess the way around it you heard was the Win2K Recovery Console which never did require Administrator login. This may still work but I have never tried it myself, but if you have a Win2K CD, you could try it. You can always blank an Administrator password using the Offline NT Password & Registry Editor found at home.eunet.no which lets you create a BootCD that allows you to remove the Adminstrator password (and other user passwords). The instructions aren't that clear, but as long as you make sure it writes it to the Hard Drive, and actually says it was written to the drive, then it should be fine. There's other ways that take longer to do, but these ones above usually work. Cheers, KK |
Kame (312) | ||
| 514340 | 2007-01-10 06:54:00 | Just do a Repair install on it. That will replace any dodgy or missing system files without affecting your settings and stuff. Boot off the XP CD, choose Enter ate the first install option screen, then choose R for repair at the second install option screen. It looks like a full install but it isn't. Easiest way..... |
pctek (84) | ||
| 514341 | 2007-01-10 07:16:00 | Just do a Repair install on it. That will replace any dodgy or missing system files without affecting your settings and stuff. Boot off the XP CD, choose Enter ate the first install option screen, then choose R for repair at the second install option screen. It looks like a full install but it isn't. Easiest way..... try to use my guide at FAQF1 (faqf1.net.nz) & tell me if it is easy to follow, or if I've got anything wrong. :thumbs: |
Greven (91) | ||
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