NTLDR is missing - SOLVED

Tack

There are a couple of other threads describing this situation, but I'm completely at a loss.

Here's the situation.

I just put a brand new hard drive in and tried to load XP on it. I restarted the computer hoping to get the option to boot from the CD, but that never happens. Every time the only things I see are:

Press < Tab > Key into User Window!
Serial_Ch0 Master: No Device
Serial_Ch Master: No Device

Blah-d blah boot agent
Press Shift-F10 to configure.

I figured it's a problem with the BIOS, so I Shift-F10'd it and changed the Boot Order to every option and restarted it (ROM Disable, Int 18h, Int 19h, PnP/BEV(BBS)). None of them produced any changes. I simply can't boot from the CD.

I checked the connections and they seem to be fine. After all, I was able to load the new hard drive with its "utility disc."

What can I do?

Ruckus

What kind of motherboard, what kind of harddrive, does your motherboard have more than one SATA controller, perhaps a secondary that is SATA RAID?

Tack

The motherboard is an MSI K8T Neo-FSR with as far as I know (I'm not that computer literate) one SATA controller.

The hard drive is a Seagate with an Ultra ATA/100 interface.

Ruckus

Is the harddrive connected to one of the onboard IDE ports or is it on a SATA converter?

If it is on the onboard IDE, what channel and what master/slave assignment, and does it share a channel with an Optical drive or any other drive.

Tack

It's connected to the first IDE slot and it's assigned to master. It doesn't share a channel with any other drives--the other IDE slot goes to the CD drive.

Ruckus

Then you should be able to go into the BIOS, set the CD-ROM as the primary boot device, and the seagate as the secondary boot device, boot from the CD, Bob's your uncle*.

And while you're in the bios, there should be an Autodetect function somewhere that scans the IDE ports and lists attached devices.

*Bob's not your uncle, he's just some guy your mom picked up in a bar, but to make you feel better about the whole situation they call him Uncle Bob.

Tack

This is the BIOS screen you're talking about, right?

saint2e

I've seen this a couple of times. Usually it's a virus that's affected/wiped out the MBR (Master Boot Record). That's what the computer reads to boot up the OS on the hard drive.

There are a couple tools online that will rebuild that for you. Just do a search for the thread name in google, and you'll see a bunch of little tools that you can use via a boot disk to reset it.

Ruckus

Tack wrote: »

This is the BIOS screen you're talking about, right?

No thats an realtek network card boot menu, for network booting using PXE.

I'm talking about the first one, usually "Press Del to enter setup" or "Press F8 to Enter Setup"

Tack

So then I'm assuming this is the BIOS screen. Problem is, the only key on my keyboard that does anything in this screen is escape.

Ruckus

No, that's a SATA RAID controller BIOS. There should be one earlier than that, like the first or second thing the computer displays during POST.

Tack

Alright I got it to boot from CD... Now do I want to put the OS CD in or the harddrive setup CD?

Tack

Scratch that, I think I got it. Thanks for your help!