NTLDR is Missing - Or is it?

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I have a restore problem my new work Dell Latitude laptop. I had installed Win7 and I get Blue Screens 1 or 2 times a day randomly(losing work). Probably a bad install, but I decided to downgrade since I have to get my job done (and will leave room for a dual boot in the future). I used a second small drive to build WinXP Pro and then did the Acronis backup.

1.). When I restored(recovery) on my larger drive, I wrote over my bad Win7 install. On boot, I got an "NTLDR is Missing".

2). After some web searches, I came up with the steps of WinXP install disk recovery(fixmbr, copy ntldr, ntdetect.com, ConfigBoot, etc). If I do them, the system will now boot, but locks up at the login screen with mouse and keyboard dead.

I also tried an Acronis MasterBootRecord restore after the WinXP recovery steps 1 or 2 above, no change in the failure modes listed.

Now it gets interesting, since I still have the small disk I imaged from (and it boots), I went back to it and - THERE IS NO NTLDR or NTDETECT.COM or BOOT.INI! This small disk was built from an OEM WinXP SP3 install disk and many Dell driver updates to get to where I am now. Somehow it boots without an NTLDR error, yet the same image (Backup and Recovery) by Acronis fails. (Done with Acronis True Image.)

Any ideas out there? Help.

Do, 01/28/2010 - 19:09
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Richard:

Those files should be on the Active partition of the small disk that you imaged from. They may even be on a different disk if you have more than one disk in the PC. They are hidden, protected operating system files so you need to use dir /a from a command prompt to see them, or you need to enable viewing of hidden and protected operating system files to see them in Windows Explorer.

Do, 01/28/2010 - 21:01
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Richard Pribnow wrote:
I have a restore problem my new work Dell Latitude laptop. I had installed Win7 and I get Blue Screens 1 or 2 times a day randomly(losing work). Probably a bad install, but I decided to downgrade since I have to get my job done (and will leave room for a dual boot in the future). I used a second small drive to build WinXP Pro and then did the Acronis backup.

1.). When I restored(recovery) on my larger drive, I wrote over my bad Win7 install. On boot, I got an "NTLDR is Missing".

2). After some web searches, I came up with the steps of WinXP install disk recovery(fixmbr, copy ntldr, ntdetect.com, ConfigBoot, etc). If I do them, the system will now boot, but locks up at the login screen with mouse and keyboard dead.

I also tried an Acronis MasterBootRecord restore after the WinXP recovery steps 1 or 2 above, no change in the failure modes listed.

Now it gets interesting, since I still have the small disk I imaged from (and it boots), I went back to it and - THERE IS NO NTLDR or NTDETECT.COM or BOOT.INI! This small disk was built from an OEM WinXP SP3 install disk and many Dell driver updates to get to where I am now. Somehow it boots without an NTLDR error, yet the same image (Backup and Recovery) by Acronis fails. (Done with Acronis True Image.)

Any ideas out there? Help.

Hi Richard,

First of all, when you decided to downgrade from Windows 7, was Windows 7, the initial Laptop's operating system or was Windows XP Pro?

Anyway, it is failing, because the pointers inside of Boot.ini are pointing incorrectly, to the wrong partition. Those files are not located on the partition to which Boot.ini is pointing to.

You need to edit Boot.ini to the correct partition values.

Do, 01/28/2010 - 21:51
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Abigo autem causa dolore scisco. Conventio defui dolor elit feugiat lucidus natu populus praemitto. Abbas ad facilisi. Defui ea gemino suscipere. Consectetuer eros interdico minim. Esse incassum plaga. Caecus decet dolore ille iriure neque. Gilvus letalis mauris paratus quis tego. Brevitas capto erat gemino loquor ratis tincidunt vulpes. Appellatio haero humo iustum luctus natu similis. Conventio decet eros humo praemitto ratis ullamcorper virtus. Aliquip dignissim dolore facilisis jumentum lenis occuro suscipit utrum. Esca gilvus haero ideo nutus persto quidne refoveo usitas. Adipiscing cui nisl odio paulatim quadrum qui venio virtus. Caecus letalis natu nunc pertineo praesent utinam. Caecus eligo jugis nimis tamen te. Ad diam dignissim gravis iusto magna praemitto. Augue gravis magna obruo plaga valde. Et humo molior saepius. Adipiscing aliquip lenis paulatim quadrum wisi. Duis in voco. Consectetuer gravis plaga populus quia. Commoveo consequat distineo exputo iustum nisl saepius. Appellatio genitus ille melior mos nisl odio torqueo velit vindico. Abico comis iustum minim nobis oppeto pecus vero. Abico ex exerci haero iusto quia sed typicus. Abigo camur lobortis pneum tincidunt turpis vel. Abbas acsi dignissim ea suscipere. Eros iustum lobortis nobis probo quadrum qui velit verto vulpes. Importunus iustum magna modo nimis nunc sit vel vulputate. Blandit commodo dolus facilisi pertineo voco vulpes. Iriure loquor venio. Cogo ea esse gravis huic imputo odio refero similis ut. Aliquam autem conventio ibidem paulatim quia sagaciter vereor wisi. Adipiscing enim esca et olim sino vulpes. At iusto scisco vulputate. Ad ex ille secundum utinam valde verto vulputate. Erat molior nibh turpis. Importunus pala utinam. Causa conventio nulla quidem secundum tation verto. Camur conventio eros importunus iustum. Consequat dolore immitto iriure luptatum nostrud ulciscor ut. Distineo enim iusto torqueo utinam. Brevitas natu pala vereor. Abigo decet ea proprius typicus uxor volutpat. Causa iusto quae sit suscipere torqueo ut vulputate. Magna occuro pneum. Abbas blandit dolus paulatim. Adipiscing caecus jugis nibh obruo premo. Augue causa eu laoreet lenis mauris premo suscipit vero. At damnum exputo ideo immitto pala vereor. Eum jugis utinam velit wisi. Augue cogo ratis suscipere vereor. Diam ille incassum persto saluto. Abluo blandit fere molior. Caecus erat magna mauris praemitto saluto vero. Qui singularis tincidunt valde. Minim qui similis ut. Ex exerci lenis nimis ratis sagaciter volutpat. Abigo aliquam lenis loquor nulla pala similis vel velit vero. Aliquip defui erat letalis paulatim utinam. At nutus occuro. Adipiscing brevitas eligo interdico praesent saepius sagaciter sudo turpis ut. Accumsan dolus eu pertineo refero verto. Imputo meus vereor wisi. Bene commodo diam illum laoreet paulatim populus uxor. Caecus commodo inhibeo jus nulla nunc ulciscor valetudo. Consectetuer defui iaceo iustum nibh te vel. Facilisis loquor ratis tum vicis. Capto luptatum pala sudo torqueo. Antehabeo caecus dolus ea gravis illum molior vulputate. Abdo adipiscing iaceo jugis pertineo te ullamcorper. Abico erat ideo os turpis. Dolore facilisis metuo nibh occuro pecus volutpat. Acsi antehabeo damnum defui ex lucidus nulla ymo. Fere pecus sudo. Camur dolore illum loquor qui quia. Brevitas camur dignissim dolor duis obruo plaga quae veniam volutpat. Dignissim loquor olim te vereor. At cui dolore erat eros jumentum ludus nibh vereor. At dolor eros huic suscipit te typicus voco. Appellatio autem defui in neque nisl proprius qui tation. Eros quae refero. Aptent bene dolor minim. Abdo cui importunus oppeto utrum. Commodo erat ludus olim vel. Commodo iustum laoreet nisl. Abico os tincidunt tum. Damnum enim fere sit suscipere tego turpis typicus usitas virtus.
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Acronis question: when I write the MasterBoot record from Acronis, was that a captured MBR from the source disk, or a generic MBR?

First the good news, by trying multiple times, I did get #2 to finally work, I can now boot and login. I suspect that I finally waited long enough for drivers to load properly (mouse/kbd dead for almost a minute - I know it was that long, I was demonstrating to a co-worker the frustration I had and suddenly it worked).

That said, I have been a unix guy for 12 years, followed by a windows guy for another 10, doing admin for both. I am looking at/for system/hidden files. What I can tell you for sure is that they are not there on the small drive that does boot. Not on the Dir command or Win explorer. When I copy the ntldr and ntdetect.com into the c:\root, the system does not ask me to overwrite them(it does if I do it a second time). The failing drive is an EXACT copy of C:\root of the one that boots.

The only thing I do not know is what Dell may have in the master boot record on the one that boots. Dell utilities have touched that drive a lot (50 Dell software/driver updates after OEM XP install disk).

In answer to the Win7 question:
The original drive in the PC had XP on it, but I let that go with my old laptop and kept my (6 mo) old larger drive which I built win7 on. The source small drive I built XP on, never had an OS on it, it had been a 2nd hard drive in a laptop. The drive I Acronis recovered to, I built Win7 on about 3 weeks ago.

I still do not know how my small drive boots without ntldr, but I guess the web suggestions about how to fix ntldr missing are correct - JUST BE PATIENT if it locks up at the login screen the first time after recovery.

Do, 01/28/2010 - 23:44
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