NTLDR Missing on existing Windows XP

[kimco52]

I have a computer running Windows XP Pro with all the latest updates for some time. Other than a problem with numbers of drives with combination of SATA and PATA, it has been working fine.

I did a normal shutdown the other night. Everything shut down normal. When I went to turn it on yesterday, it got through POST and came up with the message "NTLDR is Missing.. Press CTL-Alt-Del to restart". And of course, doing that puts you in an endless loop process.

I did a search for NTLDR and found the same references which I noticed in another thread about this with a new Win2K installation. I read through all those and mine is a little different. Mine is an existing "functioning" system. I downloaded the fixing software and put it on a floppy and ran that it the first try it came up with was a message "Missing HAL.dll.... Reinstall it".

Not knowing what was going on, I decided to investigate a little. Fortunately, my C-drive is on a docking module so I unplugged it and took it over to a second computer with the same docking tray as an additional drive (E). I started that computer and it recognized the disk. Looking in my computer, I explored "E" and it looked like everything is there correctly. I went to the Windows/System32 folder and found that both Hal.dll and ntldr were indeed there. At this time, I copied all the folders from that drive to a new folder on that computers D-drive as a backup to get my data files off of it as best I could.

I then moved that drive back to the main computer. I then unplugged my promiseATA and SCSI cards from the computer and disconnected all drives except that C-drive and the DVD/CD ROM drives that are on the motherboard PATA connectors. Changed my boot order in BIOS to boot to CD before HD.

I turned the computer on without a CD loaded. It went through the normal boot procedure, and came up with the message "Disk Boot Failure, insert system disk and press Enter".
I am thinking that is the "real" error message, and not the NTLDR message. I think the reason I got the NTLDR message earlier is because it could not boot to the C-drive and went to the next disk drive it saw in the system and could not find NTLDR on it, which is true.... it is only on the Windows folder of the C-drive, not any other drive.

So, I put in my WinXP CD and booted from it and it said it could install Windows to that drive and it knew the drive was there, that it had one partition and that there was 32GB left on it. So it detects it correctly and knows what is on there. But it no longer sees it as a boot device. The drive appears to be OK, other than that. Windows gave me an option to install to that partition, delete that partition, or to repartition the whole drive and format. I obviously do not want the last two if I can avoid it.

What I really want to do is "Repair" it. I think it somehow got corrupted somewhere and if I can repair it I would. But I don't see where I do that. I have done one before but don't remember how I got there. There is an option to repair using system recovery console but when I get there, I am sitting in dos not knowing what to do. So I exit it....that isn't what I did before. I also don't have a system recovery floppy that it presented as another option in the beginning.

Does this make sense and where do I go from here? Am I missing something?

[buttzilla]

I know NTLDR stands for NT loader this is the boot loader. If you have a xp install cd you can run recovery console. You can look up Recovery console on microsofts web site. In recovery console at the comand promp you would type FIXMBR then hit enter it will ask if your sure just hit yes or enter. Then Type FIXBOOT then enter again this should repair the boot record. I know that only retail version seem to have this option of using recovery console on the disk. I have oem version that don't have it but you can use a retail version that does on the oem to recover it. This works most of the time. But I have seen it not work a few times because the boot was badly damaged. Below are links on recovery console.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314058
http://www.microsoft.com/resources/documentation/windows/xp/all/proddocs/en-us/bootcon....mspx?mfr=true
http://www.microsoft.com/resources/documentation/windows/xp/all/proddocs/en-us/bootcon....mspx?mfr=true

[supertech365]

go back to recovery console and enter chkdsk /r

[SLK001]

I did a normal shutdown the other night. Everything shut down normal. When I went to turn it on yesterday, it got through POST and came up with the message "NTLDR is Missing.. Press CTL-Alt-Del to restart". And of course, doing that puts you in an endless loop process.

Not necessarily. Sometimes there is a problem accessing your NTLDR file with strange drive configurations. I had a system that I installed a bad drive (trying to recover data for a friend) as a slave drive. Try as it might, the system could NOT access any data on the drive, so I powered down and removed it. On power up, I received the dreaded "NTLDR is Missing.. Press CTL-Alt-Del to restart". After a 5 minute rant about my friend's ancestral lineage (that my neighbors heard), I calmly loaded my BartPE CD and booted from that. I then checked for my NTLDR, and to my surprise, it was where it belonged on the C: drive. I ran a file check comparing it with the copy that I keep on my BartPE CD and they were identical.

I then reset the machine and everything powered up normally. I don't know what Windoze did, but it eventually corrected itself. With you running the combo of PATA and SATA drives, the OS may be getting "confused".

[kimco52]

I will check out those links. My XP is an OEM version, also. I don't have a regular one.
I have not added or removed anything on this computer for over a month and it has been working flawlessly through that time. This just happened out of the blue.

[buttzilla]

Here is a link to a 7mb iso version of Microsoft recovery console. Unzip and use imgburn or nero to burn the iso then put the cd in and make sure you have your bios set to boot the cd drive first. After the cd boot it will look like a regular install and at the prompts hit r to run the console. I tried this download out and burned it. It works fine.
http://www.webtree.ca/windowsxp/Tools/bootdiscs/xp_rec_con.zip

[kimco52]

For some reason, I cannot unzip this file. In fact, I try to open it and the computer churns for a couple seconds and then nothing.

I try to open the file with Winzip and nothing happens.

I must be missing something there. All other zip files work correctly.

[buttzilla]

It is a zip file but i use winrar, but it should open with winzip no problem. Are you actually using winzip and not microsofts built in zip? Have you tried downloading a second time. maybe the first got corrupted.

[buttzilla]

It is a zip file but i use winrar, but it should open with winzip no problem. Are you actually using winzip and not microsofts built in zip? Have you tried downloading a second time. maybe the first got corrupted.

[buttzilla]

kimco52 if you private message me i'll email you the iso file when i get home from work about 2 hours from now. I can't do it here at work. My email will be similar to my screenname here.

[kimco52]

buttzilla,
I was using, I believe, the Microsoft built in zip because it goes through the prompting thing, winzip does not.
However, as it turns out, my XP Pro Installation CD had the Recovery Console on it. I booted up on it and followed the directions and got into it. I followed your instructions to do the FixMBR.. it said that it was a bad or improper MBR and fixing it might make it worse. It asked if I wanted to continue and I said yes, as you said, and it said it Fixed it.

Then I did the fix boot, answered yes, and it said it fixed it. Then I did what supertech365 suggested and started chkdsk /r.

It is currently in that mode about 60% done. AT this speed, it may be 30-40 minutes before it is done.

I will let you know what the results are.

[mn072065]

Thanks buttzilla, i will try your method, I too need it since I'm trying to repair a friends PC, Thanks

[kimco52]

Well, it finished and said that it found one or more errors and corrected them.
I exited, removed the Windows CD and it still came up with:
"Disk Boot Failure, Please Insert System Disk and Press Enter"

So, FixMBR and FixBoot apparently haven't fixed it.

Any other suggestions? Short of deleting partition and starting over or losing data and programs?

Starting over might have me calling Microsoft and talking to someone in India asking me why I am installing it again (on the same computer).

[TBoneit]

If chkdsk doesn't fix it the when you get to the part where you hit "R" to go to the recovery console go beyond that and choose the second repair option. The Recovery console being the first. That will more or less erase your windows directory contents and then reload them from the CD without actually wiping out you Windows installation. This will replace any corrupt file with fresh copies. You will need the product key and have to reactivate if you go this route.

Be very careful to choose to repair not a fresh install instead. If it shows you the drives to choose a partition, Hit F3 to exit and try again.

Many time chkdsk will fix it, sometime not. If chkdsk fixes it then open a command prompt and type at the C: prompt
sfc /scannow
this will check for any corrupt or changed or deleted files and as for your windows Cd to restore them.

Good Luck

Edit: BTW the chkdsk /r switch is taking so lobg as it checks the disks structure and then surface tests it.

[buttzilla]

Is there a chance the docking module on your first computer is going bad? Can you swap the module from the second computer and put it on the first to test and see if its not a hardware issue. By docking module do you mean hot swap drive bay? And by the way windows zip can not handle newer winzip files.

[kimco52]

Buttzilla,
I am using the Sanmax PMD-96I Mobile Docks. I do not hot swap them. Always shutdown and restart. Not much to go wrong there. Just cables, connectors, and pins. I use a few of them... two in the problem computer, one in the one I am now using. I also use a similar one in this computer and a different one so I can move drives around. The second type has an Amphenol connector on the removable tray. These are reliable connectors.

That may be my problem with newer zip files. I do not have Winzip on this computer. I might have ultimate zip around somewhere.

Tboneit,
I am not sure I know what you mean by the second repair option. The first one is just as the CD is booting and it says you can press F10 to do automatic system recovery. If you do nothing, it continues booting. Then it starts Windows and gives you 3 options: Install Windows, Repair using recovery Console by pressing R, or Cancel/Quit. If I choose Install, there may be something further on. That is where it asks about formatting or deleting partitions, etc.

While in Recovery console, I can see files on the C-drive and do a type of text files and it appears complete and correct. I would presume that the docking module and tray are working correctly from that.

[kimco52]

Further info,
While in Recovery console, I ran bootcfg. I first did a /List. It said there were no entries or anything to list. I then did a /scan. It said there was an error and that it must be corrected before anything can be added and to run CHKDSK.
I started chkdsk /p to do a thorough check of the disk. It is in that process.

[kimco52]

UPdate,
Well, Chkdsk said it fixed problems. I ran bootcfg /scan and it found the system so I added it. Now it sees the thing and I redid FixMBR and FixBoot.

That still did not fix the problem. It still does not boot. I had created a copy of that disk about 3 months ago onto a SATA drive. I unplugged the C:drive and plugged the SATA drive in (It is on a SATA type Mobile Dock and Tray) and started the computer. It booted up sorta fine. I say sorta because it had a message that stated that the configuration has changed significantly since it was built so it needs a Windows Activation. It said I had 3 days left to Activate. Then it wanted to start looking for hardware drivers for stuff that it should already have. Anyway, I know the computer will boot up to something so I shut that down.

So, what else can I do? Can I reinstall XP without losing my data if I don't reformat or partition and could that fix the boot problem?

Or do I need to buy another disk and start all over again fresh? Unfortunately, my install disk is only SP1-A so it will have to go through all the updates to catch up.

[classfour]

It looks like the drive caddy interface is bad. Instead of taking the tray to the other machine, remove the tray from the other machine and install it in this one (with the offending hard drive). I've got several of those, and they're not typically built to be as reliable as a simple IDE interface. I only use them for non-OS drives, period. The same goes for the external enclosures - and I've lost a couple of those.

If you don't want to do that: Pull the HDD from the caddy, and install it into a bay inside the computer case with a direct PRIMARY IDE connection (or SATA, if that's what it is).

No Boot = BAD HARD DRIVE

[glyn1972]

Hello there!

My suggestion here, would be to now to compare the boot.ini files from your working copy drive and the one that isn't working to see if there's any differences.....

Could be that XP is looking in the wrong place for NTLDR!

Cheers,

Glyn

[bevills1]

I suggest booting the drive on the system where it will boot and backup data before reformatting. The problem will likely recur if the cause is 1 of 2 possibilities I suspect. First possibility I suspect is it may be similar issues I saw in another forum where poster had corruption with pata and sata system. Second possibility I suspect is instability due to bios issues which I experienced myself. You probably need to try some of the things the other forum poster did if issues are similar to his or do bios update if it's a bios issue like mine was. Measures other forum poster took are in post #37 at http://club.cdfreaks.com/showthread.php?t=217235, and more details about both his and my issues are in several posts in the thread there.

[kimco52]

Thanks for the suggestions, guys.
Well, as we said in Science class, you have to do the experiments. I went one even better. Rather than swapping out drive trays, I removed the suspect HD from the tray and unplugged the cable from the motherboard and used a new cable to plug into the motherboard and with that drive on the Primary IDE port as a Master and the CD on the Secondary as a Master and nothing else and I got the same message and results. I believe that eliminates the tray and associated wiring from the equation.

Also, after my last posting, I booted to the XP CD and evidently I had fixed some problems by using chkdsk the last time as I mentioned because now when I get to the final part of the "installation" It presented me the option to install new or Repair an existing installation. I chose repair and it did it's thing and when it got to the remove disks and we'll reboot to the disk part, it got to the same point and had the same Disk Boot Failure message.

I notice in the documentation for Recovery console that it says fixmbr and fixboot are only supported on X86 based systems. I don't have that on this computer. It is an AMD Athlon. Could that also be a problem in that it says it fixes and repairs but really may not have done it?

My BIOS is at the current level.
Where is the boot.ini file? I have my settings as show all files including system and hidden but I don't see it.

[folkboat]

Had this same problem on XP system - drove me nuts!!

Finally repaced the C: drive cable - problem disappeared.

[redwudz]

Most all 32bit computers are X86, including AMD.

The boot.ini is at the root of your C drive, C:boot.ini. To see it you have to go to folder options and check 'Show hidden files and folders' and uncheck 'hide protected operating system files (Recommended)'. NTLDR is there also. You can edit boot.ini with notepad,. But there's not much to it:

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOW S
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Micro soft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect

One repair option I keep handy is a Bart PE disc. It will run a computer even without a hard drive present. It also contains all sorts of recovery tools. You boot from the CD and have full access to the computer.

EDIT: BTW, If this hasn't already been mentioned, I suspect NTLDR isn't actually missing, just the pointers to it.

[Bjs]

NTLDR is Missing : http://www.computerhope.com/issues/ch000465.htm

How to rebuild the Windows boot.ini : http://www.computerhope.com/issues/ch000648.htm

Boot.ini resides on c: (normal setup) , if after the repair it still keeps disappearing , its caused by the current format used by the drive .

After talking with an ms tech , and the system repeatedly failed using their instructions to correct the same issues as described , the drive was reformatted to fat32 , reactivated the os , and has not missed a beat since .

Basically , its time to replace the drive .

You could use the hard drive tools from the manufacturer to mirror the data from the old to the new drive , normally without loss .

The quick and dirty approach is to boot the pc up with a bootable linux , and copy the valid boot.ini file from a usb flash drive to c , exit , and reboot the system .

[kimco52]

The boot.ini on the bad disk is:
[boot loader]
timeout=1
default=signature(770076)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition( 1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
signature(770076)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDO WS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Micro soft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect /NoExecute=OptIn

The boot.ini on my working XP system (this computer) is the same as the one listed by Redwudz. I copied it over to the non operating one (renamed the old boot.ini) and it made no difference..... same bad system disk.

NTLDR is not missing. It is really there.
I did follow the same instructions that Bjs linked to on rebuilding the boot.ini file. That is the resultant boot.ini I listed with the 770076 notation. That notation was the result of following those instructions. The generic line at the end was there originally.


This is an Hitachi drive. It had been used originally as a Win98SE OS and changed to Win2K for a short time and then it has been an XP disk for about 1.5 years. Maybe it is time to replace the drive.

Normally, when I upgrade disks (increase size), I mirror the previous drive and it works fine. Unless I want to start with a fresh OS install, then I start from scratch. IF this drive is bad, wouldn't making a mirror of it make the new one also appear to be bad? Whatever is causing the problem...wouldn't that appear on the new one?

Am I limited to 120GB on the boot drive without using funny software?

[classfour]

120GB or more not a problem with XP SP2

[kimco52]

Update on all this.

Thanks to all for your help and guidance.
I/we were on the right track but not enough. I finally decided to do a reinstall on the disk. It and a CDROM were the only devices. It went through the installation process and when it tried to boot to the disk it still came up with the error.
I decided to start with a fresh unpartitioned drive. I put it in a tray and proceeded with the installation. When it got to the reboot on the new disk drive, it came up with the error "Disk Drive Data Error" and would not continue. I said, Oh *****. I then unplugged the cable from IDE0 and moved it to IDE1. Then started all over again. It got up to the same point and had the same error.

So, I wondered what is wrong but decided to go to bed, take a nap, then go to work. When I got home from work, I looked at it again. I took the drive over to my working computer and could see the data on the disk. I went back to the non working computer, and connected it up with the new cable straight to the IDE0 port and turned it on. Same problem.

Hmmmm. The new cable was a correct ATA100 cable.. you know, the kind that comes with a new drive. I got lots of them still in packages. Well, I disconnected that cable and opened another package and put that cable on the drive and voila, it started working and wanted to continue with the new install. I let it finish.

I then took the old drive, put it on the cable and the same thing... it wanted to continue with the install but it couldn't find the original CDROM it was installing from. So, I turned it off and put that cable on the docking station and CDROM and put the original drive back in a tray and put it in the system and it booted up, wanted to continue with reinstallation, asked for the CD and it is finishing as we speak.

Ooops, I need to enter my product key now. So, Sometimes, replacing a cable may not work. Try another one. If I had tried a second one at the time, I would not have had to reinstall all this stuff.

Looks like I'll be back up and running now. Thanks for the help.

[bevills1]

Once had same faulty ide cable problems with 2 bad cables, and a third cable was needed before a good cable was found to get everything working again. In my instance I found problem quickly because drives weren't even seen in bios. Did you check to see if drives appeared in bios with bad ide cable?

[kimco52]

Yes, I did check and the drives were always recognized in BIOS. That was the wierd part. It would see them and the XP CD would see them and write to them but they would not boot.