Hi, my Gateway laptop all of the sudden started saying that the NTLDR is Compressed...first it says Press F11 to start recovery, and I've tried that and every other time something has gone wrong with my computer THAT always fixes it...but now even when I do the recovery the NTLDR error comes up. I've tried to boot with a CD-Rom/Windows XP disk but apparently the computer isn't recognizing the CD drive either? My ONLY option is to press Ctrl+Alt+Delete to restart, and nothing ever happens. It just keeps telling me to do that. I have no idea what to do and will try ANYTHING to avoid having to erase the whole drive. I can't lose the files on there if at all avoidable! Thank you so much!

Hi Paul. Are you ready? OK Put a blank floppy disk into your floppy drive and boot up. Wne you get to the blinking A: type in format a: When it is done leave it in the drive. OK now go to start/all programs/accessories. Find note pad and open it. Copy and paste this whole thing into the notepad page

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition" /fastdetect

Man I hate these stupid little adds. When I saved this it had a line under XP which was highlighted in red. Get rid of that line or the file will not work. Hit file in the tool bar then save as. At the prompt it will have the name txt. Erase that and type in boot.ini then hit save. Go to where you saved the file and right click on it and send to a: (3 1/2 floppy.).

Put in your XP CD with the Pc already opened to windows. Go to the CDROM in my compuer right click on it and hit open. Not autoplay just open. when the XP disk opens you will see a folder marked I386 Double click to open it. There will be a lot of files. We need 2. Find ntldr and NTDETECT, Copy both of those to the floppy. Now go to my computer and right click on the A drive and open the floppy. There should be just the 3 files in there, nothing else. We cool? OK, restart your computer and go into the BIOS and change the boot order to floppy drive as first boot device. Hit F10 to save changes say Y and hit enter. The computer will now use the ntldr file on the floppy to boot you up to the XP. It will be a smooth boot. You won't have to tell it anything or do anything different. It should just boot right up like normal. When you get to the desktop save all your files. Then you can either do a repair install or clean reinstall, or try to fix the boot sector. Let me know if it works for you?

Thank you SO much for your detailed response... unfortunately I don't have a floppy drive. Is there anything else I can do?

*edit* Well, I've gotten past the NTLDR problem, but now when I restart the computer: Windows seems like it's going to start, then goes into *repair mode* and when I run that after a few minutes of what *looks* like proper repair it says "Fatal Error: Setup Failed to install the product catalogs. This is a fatal error. The setup log files should contain more information." I'm assuming that with this *Fatal Error* I'm going to have to wipe everything clean and do a complete reinstall... is that true?

Use the xp cd and do a repair... fixmbr. works everytime.

I tried to start a repair, but now it won't do ANYTHING except restart XP setup. I can't click cancel or get a command prompt or anything, it automatically restarts setup. And then I get that same "Fatal Error"...

It's a Gateway Jay so the OS is probably a proprietary recovery CD. With one of those included fix everything programs that are great until the fix everything thingy needs fixing. They usually won't let you get into repair mode. Is that the case Paul or do you have full XP CD install? One other thing. Have you tried to boot into safe mode? If you can boot into safe mode with a command prompt, you can access your system restore files and maybe can restore your sys to an earlier date before it broke. If you can get into it with the command prompt then type this

c:\windows\system32\restore\rstrui.exe

then hit enter. Your System restore program will start. That is assuming your operating system is on the C drive. If it on another like D then replace the C with the appropriate letter. Normally to get into safe mode start tappin on F8 when the computer starts booting. Some of the companiy ones like my old eMachine you don't start hitting anything till the eMachine pops up. You would need to check your user guide if F8 doesn't work. It's OK to try it.If it doesn't work no harm done.

Well the CD I have from Gateway just says "OPERATING SYSTEM. To begin reinstallation yadda yadda yadda" on the CD itself. I just to start in Safe Mode but then a bazzillion "multi0disc partition something or other" fly past the screen so fast that I can read them, then says "Windows XP Setup cannot run under Safemode. Setup will restart now." and then I click OK and it starts setup...again. Which is where I have the problem, and that happens when there isn't even a cd in the drive. I really don't want to lose all my stuff, but basically at this point I'll try ANYTHING as long as it involves getting Setup to stop starting itself on it's own. lol Thanks for trying to help me by the way...

OK well I still think the boot floppy will work. So what I did was I used Nero and set it for Boot CD. I sent the three files over there, and let it rip. About 2/3 of the way through I got an error message and told it to continue the burn. When I was done I rebooted my computer and set all my boot optios to CD and it booted right into windows, so I know it works from a CD as well as a floppy. The problem is do you have access to a CD burning program you can make a Boot CD with? If you don't, try downloading this trial version of Nero. I'm not sure if it has the boot CD option but it says it's full featured. The help file has a walk through for burning bootable CDs so you shouldn't have a problem.

http://www.nero.com/en/nero-prog.html

The other thing to remember is that even though the operating system has taken a crap, it's just software not hardware. As long as the hard drive is working, your data is still intact. I'm sure if it comes down to it there must be a way to slave your laptop hard drive to another machine and pull your data.

When you say setup restarts, which setup? Do you mean the setup to reinstall Windows, or something else?

setup meaning to reinstall windows.

I'm going to try the boot disc thing... do you think even with it insisting that I reinstall windows by automatically restarting windows setup that it will get me to a command prompt/etc? I'll cross my fingers!

Before you try the boot thing check this out. you would need to use the win 2000/Nt instructions

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;282296

i'll be away for a bit but let me know whats what.

WELL pressing "up" a billion times finally got me to a place where I can either completely re-install windows from scratch or use the Recovery Console...but the RC didn't work when I just tried it, so if I set up windows from scratch does that mean I lose everything? I'd guess that it does.

OK. WELL, I'm in windows...but none of my stuff is here. I re-installed over the current installation and it gave me the option to leave everything the way it was and so now I'm in Windows, and the hard drive wasn't formatted...it shows the space that I have used (about 50 gigs) and the amount I have free still... obviously my stuff is here, just don't know how to get to it. Or is it actually for real gone, and I should format everything at this point?

Did you actually reinstall the windows? When you go into my computer what do you see? What is it that's telling you about the 50GBs?

When I go into My Computer and click on the CD Drive/Properties it tells me I have 50GB of used space and 10GB of free space...

Oh well. At least we're in windows. LOL Do this. I'm gonna use paul but substitute whatever your user name is. Go to start/run. In the run box type in this

c:\documents and settings\paul\my documents

hit OK. See if it accesses the My Documents folder. If it does grab whatever you can. You can then hit the browse button and navigate around, hopefully. Try it. If you get an error message post the error. Also tell me what you see when you hit the browse button if it doesn't work.

"Windows cannot find 'c:\documents'. Make sure you typed the name correctly, and then try again. To search for a file, click the Start button, and then click Search." If I just click browse w/o typin gthat I get Local Disk (C but I also have a Local Disk (D which I've never seen before... I feel like I should be paying you to help me! I really want you to know I appreciate your time sooo much.

Local disk D. OK somehow you got the new install on a different partition. Try the My Documents entry in run again but substitute the C for D

Well, that opened it. Nothin there. Looked in Program Files and I see all my old folders, but none of the links to the actual programs work, and there aren't any of my video/mp3/work files. How do I format/reinstall/get all my space back to start from scratch? I've come to terms with it and I might as well stop trying to get everything back, tho it's strange that it says that space is used. lol

Paul I'm running out of ideas here. Let's try this. Go to start/search and type in mp3 If any of the mp3 files come up right click on it and hit open containing folder. See if that will get you to music files. Other than that, here is a free data recovery program. Try it and see if you can get into them.

http://www.pcinspector.de/file_recovery/UK/welcome.htm

Payton

I just wanted to say that your message and instructions saved my data for me. Thank you so much!

I had a S.M.A.R.T. warning that my hard drive was about to fail, so I switched off S.M.A.R.T. in BIOS, did a (non formatting)system restore and couldn't get past the "NTLDR is Compressed - Press Ctrl Alt_Del to restart" message.

Followed your instructions below and was able to get in, grab my files and now I have to replace my HDD and battery and hope for the best. Can't really afford a new PC at the mo!

Thank you so much for your instructions - you're the best!!

x

Payton said: