Hi all. My brother's computer is having issues. It won't load up windows (windows XP), but rather keeps showing the dreaded "NTLDR missing" caption. Any help you guys can give would be great.

We've already tried using the XP disk to repair the system: that failed.

We tried the XP disk again to run Scandisk: and found no errors.

NB: We don't want to format the harddrive and reinstall Windows. We want the info from the harddrive in tact (if at all possible).

All the best guys,

Did you use the recovery console to repair?

http://www.bestpricecomputers.ltd.uk/freeh...ldr_missing.htm

That was the first thing we tried

Edit - Oh, we already tried that download you provided too. It didn't work

Download?

If that isnt working try

http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/XPrepairinstall.htm.

Hey, didn't want to do the repair install because I've used up all the activations of windows, so, thought I'd try the rebuild bootcfg... but I couldn't figure out the options - it asks for "load identifier" and "os load options"... argh.

Umm re-activate it via telephone? You don't have a limited number of activiations you know...

Also, learning to use Google can be a big help! http://www.google.co.uk/search?sourceid=na...q=ntldr+missing

Seriously we've googled the crap out of it dude. According to all the info we've collected, all the patches we've installed, all the downloads we've installed, it should now be working.

My friend is a computer programmer/hardware whizz, and he says it should be working too and can't see why it isn't. I was hoping you guys here might have had more info.

Edit - I forgot to mention, but we don't really want to have to reactivate our windows disk either. It is currently installed on the PC and laptop. The laptop however had issues with the hard drive, and had to be re-installed approximately 14 times (I know, that's a lot)

Anyway, if we ring up to reactivate the CD, they might check the records and.... well, there goes our windows experience