Category: PC Crash

Repair Windows XP without formatting »

Sometimes you have to repair the Windows XP installation because system files required to run the operating system have been either deleted or corrupted, or a virus has contaminated your hard drive. Another reason why you might have to do this is when you replace a component in your PC, such as the motherboard. When you install […]

Windows won’t load – ntldr is missing »

After the POST (power on self test) screen, Windows does not load and the following message is displayed: “ntldr is missing”. This means that one or two essential system files are either corrupt or have been deleted: ntldr and/or ntdetect.com. Without these files, Windows cannot operate. This message is usually associated with Windows XP. To […]

Copy files in Command Prompt or Recovery Console »

If you are unable to load Windows, it is useful to know how you can still access your files and copy them to a safe location. For the purposes of this exercise, we’ll assume that Safe Mode does not work and the only way to access your documents is through the Recovery Console. You can […]

How to use the Windows XP Recovery Console »

First of all, you’ll need the Windows XP CD. Next, you need to make sure that CD/DVD is the first boot device in BIOS. To load BIOS, press DEL at the startup screen (in some PCs a different button is used, for example one of the Function keys) and look for the boot device priority. If […]

Blue Screen of Death, Endless Rebooting and d346.sys »

Recently I had a serious problem with my laptop. When I turned it on and Windows XP started to load, it suddenly displayed the Blue Screen of Death (BSD) and restarted itself. I tried to boot into Safe Mode (press and hold F8 until you see the menu)  but it stopped with a message: ‘press Escape to stop loading […]