NTLDR is missing

[bootproblem]

Hello,
1) I bought a new hard drive, formatted it using external device and another computer. Installed it and try to boot. It doesn't boot from any drive even from CD-drive to install my fresh OS.
2) Error message "NTLDR is missing. Press Crtl+Alt+Del to restart.
Very worried, please help.

 

[rolli59]

http://www.computerhope.com/issues/ch000465.htm

 

[photonboy]

Hey.
1) Make sure the CD drive is set BEFORE hard drives in your BIOS for boot order., and
2) unhook any other hard drives while installing Windows

It sounds to me like your boot order is set with the hard drive first so it's looking at that hard drive which is blank (or a different drive) and not booting the Windows install disc.

*If only the CD drive is hooked up the boot order in the BIOS won't matter. A quick thing to try is to boot to the Windows install disc, or other boot disc (i.e. MEMTEST) with no hard drives hooked up, just the CD/DVD drive.

Other:
I've seen weird glitches that required a hard drive to have a low level format (i.e. write zeros). That's the last thing I'd try though.

 

[egilbe]

The drive you formatted wasn't set as the boot drive when it was formatted. Do what photonboy said. Check boot order in BIOS. Make sure CD-Rom is first. install windows on the drive again. It should format the drive as the boot drive, this time.

 

[photonboy]

I'm actually a little confused why he says "it wouldn't boot from any drive..". Boot what? I didn't think he had an OS installed yet.

To be clear, you can ONLY boot CD's and hard drives that have been made bootable. Examples are:
- Operating systems on hard drives (Windows, Linux)
- CD/DVD (Windows install disc, MEMTEST, Linux Live disc, Acronis restore disc etc.)
- USB (same as CD/DVD)

Boot Order:
The BIOS has a Boot Order which can be changed. So if you had the order as: 1. USB, 2. CD/DVD, 3. Hard drive then it would check them in ORDER to see if they had anything bootable.

The mistake many people make is having the hard drive BEFORE the CD/DVD and try to boot something like MEMTEST but it can't because it finds Windows first on the hard drive.

*I just realized that his computer really should have ignored the hard drive and booted the DISC since the hard drive should not have been bootable. I'm not sure what's going on there.

 

[mortino]

get yourself to a cmd promt (windows recovery works off the cd) and type in bootsect.exe /nt52 c:. this will write in the windows xp bootloader (NT Loader aka NTLDR) to the master boot record and alow you to boot. (for other ppl who might view this thread looking for same answer for vista or 7 and presumably this will work for 8 switch out nt52 with nt60)