help please

mulldoonuk

sarah-t wrote: »

anyone please ?

Don't worry Sarah...the forum big guns (of which i'am not one ) will be on the case soon

sarah-t_4

hope so

mulldoonuk

sarah-t wrote: »

hope so

There taking their time about it! :cool:

PROLIANT

You can create a bootable pen drive from your XP install CD, http://www.bootdisk.com/pendrive.htm and you will have to use another PC with a CD ROM drive to create the bootable device.
Then during the setup process select repair installation and it will delete all the old system files and replace everything leaving your data intact, you will have to reinstall any service packs after the restore though.

fwor

If you got the laptop drive to desktop PC adaptor then yes, the easiest way is to remove the HDD from the laptop, carefully remove it from its caddy, connect it to the adaptor, remove the side panel from the fat PC, unplug the ribbon cable from the PC's HDD and plug it into the adaptor.

You'll probably find a spare power connector to plug into the adaptor without needing to take it from the PC's HDD (they can sometimes be stubborn to get out, and it doesn't matter if the power connector is left in while the data cable isn't).

Now you can do what sco0ter tried to suggest (but got the wrong command) in an adjacent thread for someone with a very similar problem. Boot from the XP install CD, choose the Recovery Console, and type:

expand d:\i386\driver.cab /F:ntoskrnl.exe c:\windows\system32\

Then put the HDD back in the laptop and see if it boots. If not, you may have to do what PROLIANT suggests and do a "repair install", but hopefully not.

Two other things: disconnect the mains cable on the PC while removing/replacing connectors, and touch the metal chassis of the PC before touching any internal components to avoid static damage.

sarah-t_4

this is the adaptor i bought


http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.d...MEWN:IT&ih=015

sarah-t_4

Ok Finally found the iformation i been loooking for all day

http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/latd400/smen/hdd.htm#1105411

i wasnt taking hd out infact had the whole thing in my hand all day and couldnt work out why the hd was Weird .
at last ! phew
will try repairing tomorrow.

fwor

Ok - so the Dell caddy adapter is called an Interposer - never heard of that before.

Seems you got the USB adapter rather than the one suggested in post #29.

That may make things easier in that you won't need to open up the fat PC, but it may make things harder if just replacing the missing file doesn't work, because only fairly recent PCs will let you install (or repair install) Windows on a USB-connected drive.

Incidentally, if the PC has the same version of XP on it, with the same level of Service Pack and Windows Update, it may be easier just to copy ntoskrnl.exe from the PC's hard disk to the laptop's, rather than trying to do a repair install.

aliEnRIK

sarah-t wrote: »

Ok Finally found the iformation i been loooking for all day

http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/latd400/smen/hdd.htm#1105411

i wasnt taking hd out infact had the whole thing in my hand all day and couldnt work out why the hd was Weird .
at last ! phew
will try repairing tomorrow.

Sorry about that sarah, I was taking it on board that the hard drive was completely stripped ready!

sarah-t_4

aliEnRIK wrote: »

Sorry about that sarah, I was taking it on board that the hard drive was completely stripped ready!

thats ok , i thought it was stripped too
thankyou for all your help today