[scott1358]

Hi All,

I've committed a bit of a booboo when trying to resintall Windows on my laptop, and I've never had this problem before so don't know what to do.

I've reinstalled Windows XP Pro and Home before on various desktop and laptops and it has always been successful, it's been a while since I last did it so I may have done something different this time which has caused the problem.

Anyway... I inserted the Windows XP Pro disc into the laptop and it said the version on the laptop was newer than the disc I had, but I rebooted anyway and booted from the disc. When it asked about the partion, I deleted the partition which windows was on (I can't remember if did this before or whether I just always selected the same partition without deleting it). Once deleted it asked me to select the new clean partition and it started installing. At about 36% it stopped and said it could not write a file to the system folder, I kept trying to get this to write and in the end selected 'skip' but the same happened with the next few files, so I decided to cancel the installation and tried again.

This time, when I switched the laptop on I forgot to press f12 and select to boot from the cd, and an error came up saying "NTLDR missing" - this is what happens by default when I switch the laptop on now. When I booted from the Widnows cd, after the initial stages where it is a black blue screen whilst setting up files, when it starts to say "Windows is now installing" it just stops, with another blue screen with STOP and an error code (I'm not at home so I cannot remember what it was). This happens time and again when I try to install it. I tried to use a Windows XP Home disc to install it and the same thing happened except it was a different error code following the "STOP A MAJOR ERROR HAS OCCURRED".

I don't know what to do now. I can't even get an MS DOS screen because of this 'ntldr missing' screen.

Can anyone offer any help?

[Hybr!d]

Well basically Windows didn't install fully so that is why the laptop won't boot off the hard drive.

You will need to try the install again, this time do a full format on the hard drive.

All the data will be permanently erased but it should fix the 36% stop error you are getting.

If it stops again chances are the hard drive is shot.

Why were you doing a reinstall in the first place?

[scott1358]

The laptop started to work very slowly and took forever in running most programs. I've had it almost two years and it had just become cluttered with a lot of junk so just wanted to refresh it.

I have tried to install from both Pro and Home discs but I can't get that far to try to install again or to format the hard drive, as these STOP errors keep appearing. I only managed to get as far as the 36% on the first attempt, every subsequent attempt just STOPped.

I just can't seem to get past these screens, and when switching the laptop on without booting from the discs, just get the hdtrl message, so am unable to do anything else.

[Hybr!d]

So what happens exacly when you boot from the XP CD?

[scott1358]

After asking me to press any key etc... following a black screen for about 10 seconds, a blue screen appears with 'Windows XP' in the to pleft hand corner, and at the bottom it says it is installing different files, after a few minutes the bottom message changes to 'installing windows', and after about a minute, will go to a screen (which is a slightly different blue and a sharper font) which says 'STOP' and an error code. I'm sorry that I don't have the exact code - I'm at work at the moment, but will be able to get it when I get home l later. The same happens with a Pro disc but there is a slightly different error code, which talks about drivers.

[Hybr!d]

At some point you have to choose where to install, setup partitions and you can do a format.

It's sounds like you are getting beyond this point, so go back, watch the options on screen and go down the full format route.

[scott1358]

I'll do this again later when I'm at home and update on what I actually see on the screen, including the error codes. Thanks

[Hybr!d]

Ok mate. let us know.

[scott1358]

Okay... back at home. Here are the steps:

(It's a Dell Latitude laptop by the way)

Switch laptop on, press f12 to choose to boot from cd. After pressing any key, screen goes blank and says 'Setup is inspecting your computer's hardware configuration...'

Screen goes blank again and then to blue screen saying 'Windows setup' and at the bottom it says 'Setup is loading files' - different names of the files appear - most seem to be drivers. This happens for a few minutes. .

The message at the bottom then says 'Setup is starting Windows'... stays on this screen for approximately 2 minutes.

A blue screen appears which says:

"STOP: c0000221 unknown Hard Error
\systemroot\system32\ntdll.dll"

And that's it... it goes no further.

A different error appears with a Windows XP Pro disc which I'll put here if you need me to.

[Hybr!d]

Can you add the second error please.