Disk Boot Failure

thomas01155

every time i start my computer i have formated it recently i get DISK BOOT FAILURE, INSERT SYSTEM DISK AND PRESS ENTER i have checked that my harddruve is in probly connected and it is and all the connections. i put in the system disk but it still cant see the hard drive.

startrekker

Are the settings in the bios set up ok. Try setting them that the boot proroty is hard disk first to see if this solves the problem

thomas01155

already tried

albertross_2

Is this the laptop?

Have you installed the o/s yet, or are you saying you have booted from a windows CD, and it can't see the HD?

Seagull

I agree with startrekker's comments, this error sometimes shows when a floppy disk or cd has been left in place and the systems attempts to bopot from them before the hard drive.

thomas01155

I changed the bois so that it boots from harddrive and when i put in the windows xp disc to try and get to the recovry consel it says cannot find harddrive please make sure its connected. I have tryed active kill but that cannot see the harddrive ether. Its not a laptop it has 350 mb ram 10gb hardrive quantum fireball.

startrekker

mmmm, if you are feeling adventurous i have just found this thread on a forum


Troubleshoooting Disk Boot Failure
This error means your FAT boot sector is corrupt. Indications can include messages such as;

"Invalid system disk."; "Disk I/O error."; "Replace the disk, and then press any key"; "Non-System disk or disk error"; "Replace and press any key when ready."; and "Disk Boot failure "BOOT: Couldn't find NTLDR."; "I/O error reading disk.";

Or you may seem something like this, "disk boot failure insert system disk"; "boot disk failure insert system disk and press enter"; "windows xp disk boot failure"


How to Repair the Boot Sector:
If XP won't start it may be due to a damaged boot sector or a missing or corrupt ntldr or ntdetect.com files.

To replace damaged ntldr and ntdetect.com you can copy fresh files from the XP CD using the COPY command. Boot with the XP CD and enter the Recovery Console (as above). At the Command Prompt type the following (where "X" is your CD-Rom drive letter) allowing the files to overwrite the old files
COPY X:\i386\NTLDR C:
COPY X:\i386\NTDETECT.COM C:

To repair a damaged Boot Sector at the command prompt type FIXBOOT and press Enter. Then answer "Y"

A link to this information, along with excellent win xp info can be found at
http://www.webtree.ca/windowsxp/repair_xp.htm#How to Repair the Boot Sector:

I would try the fixboot option first. Also try F8 at startup for xp boot options. If you need to boot XP disk, you might have to change BIOS boot options to cd-rom as 1st option if disk won't boot up.

startrekker

before you start you need to set the boot priority to your cd rom as first boot

thomas01155

the f8 thing doesent work it doesent get that far

startrekker

you need to put the xp disk in after you change the boot sequence in your bios and then go into recovery console, once at the command prompt

To repair a damaged Boot Sector at the command prompt type FIXBOOT and press Enter. Then answer "Y"

startrekker

the instructions i posted are if you are at the command promt if you use the recovery console